Shakespeare's famous play Macbeth didn't come out of thin air. He based it on a known historical figure from Scotland. But where did he get his material?
Shakespeare's main source for Macbeth (written c.1603-1610) was Raphael Holinshed's "Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland" (1587). Holinshed got his history from Hector Boece's Scotorum Historiae (1527). Shakespeare probably also used other sources to fill out his portrayals of Holinshed's "weird sisters" into a full-blown contemporary portrait of fictional witches, most notably King James VI/I's book Daemonologie.
There is little doubt that Shakespeare was catering to the new monarch's obsession with witchcraft; Shakespeare knew how to play an audience. The 16th and 17th century witchcrazes, already ugly and widespread in Scotland due partly to the enormous religious conflict going on between Catholic and Protestant, hit a new fever pitch under James. Towns like St. Andrews, previously the ecclesiastical center of Scotland, still show the scars from all sides of this conflict. James' vicious obsession with witches cast them as omniscient, omnipotent and omnimalevolent beings who disrupted human society and destroyed human lives just for fun. Shakespeare's cackling showstoppers are a far cry from the reality of the pathetic outcasts who were actually targeted.
Strangely, Shakespeare appears to have had little or no knowledge of medieval sources for Macbeth's life. The two earliest biographies come from John Fordun (d. c.1385), a priest in Aberdeen, and Andrew of Wyntoun, a Prior of St. Serf's in Lochleven (1350-1427). Fordun's Latin work "Chronica Gentis Scotorum" is a typical history-from-the-beginning-of-time (i.e. Adam and Eve). As usual with these works, he becomes useful once he gets out of legend and into known history. Fordun gives us the basics of what we know about the real Macbeth, but he has more interest in Malcolm and Macduff. Andrew shows more interest in Macbeth in his own chronicle "Oryginall Cronykil of Scotland". He introduces the element of destiny and magic to the story by having Macbeth receive a prophecy from the Fates in a dream. There is also the Chronicle of Huntingdon (1291), a review of international relations between Scotland and England compiled for Edward I of England. This latter source asserts that Macbeth had a claim to the throne due to being the nephew or grandson of King Malcolm II.
These histories were all compiled from earlier sources, such as The Chronicle of Melrose (731-1270), the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (in 1054) and The Prophecy of St. Bercan (mid-11th century), that recount different events in Macbeth's life in fragmentary fashion. An interesting thing about the medieval sources is that they are all much more positive than the 16th century sources that Shakespeare eventually used. They portrayed a doughty king typical of his age, and not a tyrant at all.
