15 Facts About Janet Beaton

Janet Beaton, Lady of Branxholme and Buccleugh was an aristocratic Scottish woman and a mistress of James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell.

Janet Beaton was immortalised as Sir Walter Scott's Wizard Lady of Branxholm in his celebrated narrative poem "Lay of the Last Minstrel".

Janet Beaton's father was the hereditary keeper of Falkland Palace.

Janet Beaton's brother was Robert Beaton, 4th Laird of Creich, and her sister, Elizabeth Beaton was a mistress of King James V of Scotland, by whom she had an illegitimate daughter, Jean Stewart.

Janet Beaton's niece was Mary Beaton, one of the celebrated ladies-in-waiting of Mary, Queen of Scots, known as "the four Marys".

Janet Beaton married her first husband, Sir James Crichton of Cranston Riddell in 1538 when she was nineteen years of age.

Janet Beaton had rights over the mills in Musselburgh inherited from her first husband.

Janet Beaton was awarded compensation for her losses in 1554 and Durie was executed.

Janet Beaton was brought before the Justice; however a warrant issued by the regent Marie of Guise brought the proceedings against her to a halt.

Janet Beaton had many love affairs throughout her life, the most significant of these began sometime around the year 1558 with James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell.

Janet Beaton was twenty-four at the time and she was almost forty.

Janet Beaton was immortalised by Sir Walter Scott in his narrative poem "Lay of the Last Minstrel" as Wizard Lady of Branxholm, who could '"bond to her bidding the viewless forms of air".

In 1567, following the murder of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, Janet Beaton's name was written on a placard in Edinburgh accusing her of having used witchcraft to influence the queen in consenting to her second husband's murder by Bothwell and the other conspirators.

At Dunbar Castle, Janet Beaton was one of the three attendants of Queen Mary following the latter's abduction by Bothwell.

Janet Beaton was one of the ladies of Mary, Queen of Scots.