Andrew Forman - See of St Andrews

See of St Andrews

Both King Henry VIII and Pope Leo X tried to take advantage of the vacuum created by the loss of so many of the Scottish ruling class. Henry, on 12 October 1513, asked the pope to repudiate the privilege held by the Scottish kings to nominate the successor to vacant ecclesiastical positions; he also asked that the see of St. Andrews should have its metropolitan honours removed and that the unoccupied Scottish bishoprics caused by the battle of Flodden should remain unfilled until he was consulted. Pope Leo also moved quickly to take advantage and appointed his nephew Cardinal Innocenzo Cibo to St Andrews on 13 October. He instructed his ambassador John Battista to take control of the see of St Andrews on Cibos behalf but the governing council of Scotland prevented his entry to the country. The papal datary claimed the priory of Whithorn while Cardinal St Eusebius tried to appropriate Arbroath Abbey prompting the infant King James V via his council to write to Cardinal St Mark stating that he "will not submit to a violation of his privileges." Pope Leo replied in November confirming the right of the Scottish king to make recommendations for religious appointments. Even so, Forman was still influential in Paris and Rome and with the help of the French king and Albany, he obtained provision to the see of St Andrews on 13 November—Leo and Albany agreed that Forman would resign Bourges in Cibo's favour. However, this didn't automatically guarantee his succession to the cathedra. On the death of Alexander, archbishop of St Andrews, John Hepburn, Prior of St Andrews and dean of St Andrews immediately assumed the vicar-generalship collecting the revenues of the cathedral and then had the chapter elect him to the archbishopric.

Despite this, King James via his general council, nominated Aberdeen's aged Bishop Elphinstone to the position. Gavin Douglas, provost of the collegiate church of St Giles in Edinburgh was recommended to the pope by both Margaret, the queen-mother and the English King Henry, and took possession of the archbishop's palace which was also St Andrews castle. John Hepburn, who still regarded himself as a contender for the vacancy, dislodged Douglas by force from the castle. The council met in St Andrews on 2 March 1514 at which Hepburn also attended and argued for the council to appeal to the pope to disregard all letters of support for Forman. Hepburn had successfully engineered the council's support as a letter dated 4 March from the king to the pope accused Forman of having a lot of blame for his father's death at Flodden—the letter also stated that Forman was now an exile and a rebel and intimated that his positions and benefices had been taken from him and called for Forman to be disregarded for the vacancy. Forman was not to be deprived as was confirmed in a letter that Leo wrote to Albany on 11 April and named the bishop of Moray for St Andrews. On 13 November, Leo formally provided Forman to St Andrews and followed up by making him legatus a latere on 11 December—the bulls were published in January 1515. In time, both Douglas and Hepburn, unable to secure the backing of Albany and the pope gave up the contest.

Albany left Paris for Scotland in May 1515 without Forman but then in June, Forman did travel to Scotland where he was placed under virtual house arrest in his own priory of Pittenweem and would remain there until the end of the year. Albany eventually managed to persuade the council to reluctantly accept Forman as archbishop and provided the temporalities of the see in February 1516.

He died in Dunfermline on 11 March 1521 and was buried in St Andrews Cathedral.