William II de Soules
Scottish noble
William II de Soules (d. 1320/1321), Lord of Liddesdale and Butler of Scotland, was a Scottish Border noble during the Wars of Scottish Independence. William was the elder son of Nicholas II de Soules, Lord of Liddesdale and Butler of Scotland, and a cousin of Alexander Comyn, Earl of Buchan. He was the nephew of John de Soules, Guardian of Scotland.
While still a young man, he was received into the peace of King Edward I of England in 1304. He remained in English service in the following decade, and received reward in 1312 with a knighthood and the lands of Sir Robert Keith although by that time those were in the hands of the Scots. After the victory of the Bruce cause at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314, he switched to the Scottish side. By 1318 he was Butler of Scotland, and in 1320 he appeared as a signatory to the Declaration of Arbroath with this designation.
Later in 1320 he was involved in a conspiracy against King Robert along with Sir David, Lord of Brechin. Some say that he wanted the Scottish throne for himself, others, that the probable aim was to place Edward Balliol on the Scottish throne.
The public source identifies “William II de Soules” as scottish noble. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around William, Soules and Scottish.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q16205255. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1320, 1321, 1304 and 1312.
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This entry incorporates text from “William II de Soules” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.