In 1542, on this day Princess Mary Stuart becomes Mary, Queen of Scots.
This post was written by Dirk Puehl the highly recommended author of #onthisday #history Google+ posts.

Princess Mary Stuart becomes Mary, Queen of ScotsWhen Mary, the ex-queen of France returned to her native Scotland in August 1561 and was met with stubborn resistance of her future Protestant subjects, it needed several attempts of her half-brother James Stewart, 1st Earl of Moray to finally renounce her Catholic faith. After a reconciliation with John Knox, the leader of the local Protestant reformation and signing the Treaty of Edinburgh, Mary Stuart became Mary Queen of the Scots today, 470 years ago.

The royal widow was finally persuaded to marry the Englishman Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester - who himself was talked into going to Scotland and leaving the side of Elizabeth I and finally agreed to marry Mary after she accepted Protestantism. The couple had issue in 1562.

Leicester's and Mary's son Robert was acknowledged as heir to the Scottish and later the English throne by Elizabeth.

With her marriage to Robert Dudley, Queen Mary obviously got far more than she had bargained for - as she was still speculating for the English throne and continuously trying to bully her husband into taking steps against Elizabeth, he, as a convinced Puritan had not only massively strengthened the rights of Sottish Parliament but reacted decisively against his wife's ambitions. In 1571, a discovered plot of English Catholic noblemen against Elizabeth's life with obvious involvement of Mary led to her banishment at Findlater Castle on the Moray Firth.

Robert ruled Scotland until his death in 1588, succeeded by his son Robert IV. Raised in the Puritan spirit of his father, his reforms after ascending the throne of England in 1603 were the main reasons of the Cavalier's revolt and the Civil War a generation later.