IN the grounds of the Abbey Church of Dunfermline next to the Palace of the ancient Kings of Scotland is the shrine of St Margaret. Margaret, sometimes known as the ‘Pearl of Scotland’, married King Malcolm III in the year 1070, so becoming Queen of Scots. By all accounts Margaret was a devout and pious woman; she persuaded the Benedictine monks at Canterbury to establish a monastery in Dunfermline and Queensferry gets its name because Margaret endowed a ferry route across the Forth which made it easier to make the pilgrim journey to St Andrews.
We are told that day by day Margaret rose to serve food to the poor before she herself ate and evening by evening she rose at midnight to attend the liturgy. It is for her prayerful devotion, kindness and humility that she is remembered; a Queen of Scots of whom not enough is known and whose virtues are, perhaps, not celebrated as they should. She did not stand on her dignity as a monarch; instead she reigned from her knees and in imitation of Christ she washed the feet of the poor dedicating her life to the service of others. Humility, forbearance and kindness were her distinguishing marks and for these and other acts of piety and devotion she was canonised by Pope Innocent IV in 1250.