The Banquo reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Banquo

Banquo is a character in the play Macbeth, by William Shakespeare.

Banquo is a noble general who is respected highly for his courage and bravery in Scotland. Banquo is with Macbeth during the encounter with the witches near the beginning of the play. After predicting that Macbeth would be king, they predict that Banquo would never himself be king, but would beget a line of kings (the Stuart line of Scottish and English kings). Macbeth, after being crowned king, sees Banquo as a potential threat to his crown and sends murderers to kill him and his son Fleance. Fleance escapes, and the ghost of Banquo returns to haunt Macbeth. Banquo and Macbeth can be seen as two contrasting characters who took different paths after the witches prediction and landed in different places. Banquo had integrity and a clean conscience whereas Macbeth took to betrayal and murder which ultimately led to his downfall.

Although Macbeth was certainly a historical figure (a very different one from the character in the play), Banquo's actual historical existence is more questionable. He is mentioned by Holinshed, and other chroniclers, as an accomplice of Macbeth in his usurpation, and as being the ancestor of the Fitzalan High Stewards of Scotland, from whom the new King, James I, descended, but this descent was disproven in the 19th century, when it was discovered that the Fitzalans actually descended from a Breton family. Whether or not Banquo, Thane of Lochaber, actually existed remains in doubt.

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