The Scotsman

Exam body rapped over Mary, Queen of Scots gaffe

● SQA promises no students will be penalised over erroneous date

- By MARTYN MCLAUGHLIN

It is an embarrassi­ng gaffe about one of the most famous Scots in history that might ordinarily be explained as a schoolboy error.

But the body responsibl­e for accreditin­g exams across Scotland’s schools has been forced to reassure students after it gave an incorrect date for the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, in a crucial history test.

The National 5 history paper stated Mary Stuart had died in 1567, some 20 years before she was executed on the orders of Elizabeth I of England.

The Scottish Qualificat­ions Authority (SQA) attributed the mistake to a “typographi­cal error” and said no students would be penalised for incorporat­ing the date in their answer.

The error was printed in an introducti­on to the source material for the question, described as being “from the diary of a lady in waiting who accompanie­d Mary during her imprisonme­nt in England ... written in 1567.”

Students were asked to “evaluate the usefulness of source B as evidence of the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots in 1567. (You may want to comment on what type of source it is, who wrote it, when they wrote it.)”.

Sir Tom Devine, emeritus professor of history at the University of Edinburgh, said the mistake was “unacceptab­le”. He added: “It is slightly cheering to know that the examinatio­n board don’t know everything about Mary, because I thought that everyone knew the whole lot, right down to the undergarme­nts she wore at her execution.

“MQS and BPC [Bonnie Prince Charlie] are what we might call pop-up figures in Scottish history. They may be impossibly romantic to some, but they are totally boring to me.”

One history teacher, who did not want to be named, said the error had confused and upset many of his students.

“It is shambolic that a mistake like this managed to get through SQA’S quality assurance and into the exam,” the teacher said.

“It will have wrong-footed pupils sitting an intense twoand-a-half hour exam and has led to some of mine secondgues­sing their knowledge, which really upset them. It’s not good enough.”

In a statement, the SQA said: “We are aware of a typographi­cal error in the National 5 History question paper, concerning the date of Mary, Queen of Scots’ execution.

“We will take it into considerat­ion when the paper is being marked to ensure no candidate is disadvanta­ged.”

The SQA added that while around 14,000 students sat the National paper, only around 4 per cent of them – an estimated 540 – would have chosen that particular question.

In 1568, Mary, a Catholic, fled Scotland in hope that her protestant cousin would help her in her fight against Scot-

0 The National 5 history paper claimed Mary was executed in 1567 tish nobility. But she ended up imprisoned by Elizabeth after being deemed a threat to the throne.

After the discovery of correspond­ence between Anthony Babbington and Mary, which revealed a plot to depose Elizabeth, she ended up being tried and convicted for treason.

The diary the question quoted described how at Mary’s execution, she quickly kneeled before the block with “great courage” and showed no signs of “faltering”.

Mary’s lady-in-waiting wrote: “The executione­r, or rather minister of Satan, strove to kill not only her body but soul, because he kept interrupti­ng her prayers.”

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