Clan Wallace: William wasn't the only famous Wallace!

William Wallace is undoubtedly the most famous Wallace, a Scottish Knight who became one of the key influences during the Wars of Scottish Independence leading the way for the whole clan. Having defeated the English army at the Battle of Stirling Bridge, Wallace was appointed as the Guardian of Scotland until his defeat at the Battle of Falkirk, after which he was captured just outside Glasgow. King Edward I of England ordered that Wallace be hanged, drawn and quartered for high treason. Now one of Scotland's biggest icons worldwide, Wallace has a National Monument as well as many smaller statues in his honour. He has also appeared numerous times in recent pop culture. In the mid 90's Wallace was most famously the subject of the film Braveheart starring Mel Gibson, and more recently featured in games such as Age of Empires.

Of course William wasn't the only famous Wallace so we've taken a look at a selection of other notable Wallace's below:

Gregg Alan Wallace is most famous for starring on MasterChef. He is also a writer and was previously a greengrocer. Born in Peckham on the 17th October 1964, Gregg is an avid Millwall supporter. His career started in Covent Garden where he started a company called George Allan’s Greengrocers that built up a turnover of over £7.5 million. Not just your average greengrocer, although his restaurant and grill didn't go quite so well and both folded in 2014. Gregg was invited to co-present Veg talk on BBC radio 4 and has also presented Saturday kitchen, The Money Programme and Eat Well for Less, and regularly writes for Good Food and Olive magazine. Gregg has been married four times and divorced three, has two teenage children from his second marriage and is now married to Anne-Marie Sterpini who is 21 years his junior. His MasterChef co-host John Torode served as best man at the wedding.

Going back a little further into history Alfred Russel Wallace was born in Wales in 1823 and moved to England shortly after he was born. He was an explorer, naturalist, geographer, collector and social critic, known for his courageous views on scientific, social and spiritualist subjects. His most outstanding legacy is the theory of natural selection that predated Charles Darwin's theory, Wallace sent his theory to Darwin who presented his paper along with extracts of his own due to the similarities they shared. It was this research that led him to devise and draw Wallace’s line (the line that separates the ecozones of Asia and Wallacea). Before he married and settled down he travelled South America and the East Indies where he collected over 125,000 species, thousands of which were new discoveries to science. Throughout his life he published 21 books and more than 700 articles, essays and letters.

Christopher George Latore Wallace, better known as Biggie Smalls or The Notorious B.I.G., was born in Brooklyn in 1972, described as the saviour of East Coast hip hop and ranked by Billboard in the top ten greatest rappers of all time. When he released a demo tape under the name of Biggie Smalls he had no serious intention of getting a record deal. The name Biggie Smalls was a reference to a character in the film ‘Let’s Do It Again’, as well as to his 6ft3, 300lb frame. He was signed by Sean Combs (also known as P. Diddy) to Bad Boy Records and his first studio album went quadruple platinum. He was murdered in a drive by shooting in 1997 two weeks before his second album was set to release. He had four albums released after his death, all of which went double platinum, including collaborations with Eminem, Snoop Dogg, Jay-Z and Lil Wayne to name a few.

Wallace & Gromit is a British clay animation series created by Aardman Animations. Across four short films and one feature length film the series focuses on Wallace, an eccentric cheese-loving inventor (whose last name is never revealed), and his dog Gromit. Wallace has been voiced by Peter Sallis (until 2010), and Ben Whitehead (in 2009 and since 2011). The pair have taken on many adventures; Travelling to the moon to steal cheese, taking on a penguin plotting to steal a diamond and most recently in "A Matter of Leaf and Death" solving a murder mystery. Now an international icon for Britain BBC News have called them "some of the best-known and best-loved stars to come out of the UK".

Darrell "Bubba" Wallace JR is an American stock car racing driver. He currently competes full time in the monster energy NASCARcup series driving the no.43 Chevrolet ZL1 for Richard Petty sports. NASCAR is the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing it is an American Auto racing company that is best known for stock car racing. NASCAR sanctions over 1,500 races at over 100 tracks in 39 US states as well as in Canada. They have also presented races in Japan, Mexico and Australia. Bubba was born on the 8^th of October 1993 to Desiree and Darrell SR and has one sister Brittany, it was his sister who called him Bubba when she was younger and the name has stuck. He has a girlfriend Amanda Carter who likes to support him fully at the track as does his family. Bubba is making history as the 1^st African-American NASCAR driver to have a full time ride since 1971 and is noted for being one of the most successful African-American drivers in the history of NASCAR.

Dan Wallace is a Scottish Swimmer who has previously represented Great Britain in the Olympic Games and is currently out in the Gold Coast representing Scotland for the 2nd time at the Commonwealth Games. Dan is very proud of his Scottish heritage, famously wearing his Team Scotland Kilt when walking poolside to the last of his races at the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games. To celebrate heading off to the Gold Coast Dan has had a tailor made MacLachlan Modern tartan suit, designed, made to measure and delivered by ScotlandShop. You may ask "Why isn't Dan wearing Wallace tartan?" Well already the proud owner of a Wallace Modern kilt, Dan wanted to choose his favourite tartan this time round opposed to his family tartan. You can read more about Dan's story here.