Margaret Drummond

Margaret Drummond (c. 1475 – 1501) was a daughter of John Drummond, 1st Lord Drummond, and a mistress of King James IV of Scotland. She had a daughter, Lady Margaret Stewart. The death of Margaret Drummond has been the subject of a very persistent romantic legend. Relationship with the king The duration of her relationship with the king has much discussed. She was definitely the mistress of James IV during 1496–97, and possibly as early as 1495. Records show her living at Stirling Castle from 3 June 1496, and from 30 October to March 1497 at Linlithgow Palace. Her presence, and perhaps a previous similar arrangement for another mistress in the royal houses, was noted by the Spanish ambassador Pedro de Ayala. Ayala later wrote of James IV:"When I arrived, he was keeping a lady with great state in a castle. He visited her from time to time. Afterwards he sent her to the house of her father, who is a knight, and married her [to a third party]. He did the same with another lady, by whom he had had a son." The king had a number of mistresses in his time, and this relationship seems to have been shorter than those he had with either Marion Boyd or Janet Kennedy.