David Beaton

David Beaton (c. 1494–1546) was the last Scottish cardinal before the Reformation and, from 1539, Archbishop of St Andrews. A trusted diplomat of James V, he led negotiations for the king's French marriages and championed the Auld Alliance against Henry VIII's pressure to break with Rome.

After James V's death in 1542 he claimed the regency for the infant Mary, Queen of Scots, on the basis of a will widely regarded as forged, but was imprisoned. In 1544 he became papal legate in Scotland, and in March 1546 he had the Protestant preacher George Wishart burned for heresy and was himself murdered in St Andrews Castle two months later.