 Writer Randall Wallace (qv) initially planned to start the story  with William Wallace as an adult and added the prologue of his  childhood only as an afterthought. As the sequence was first  written, Murran gave William a rose (rather than a thistle) at his  fathers burial; however, someone who read the script helpfully  pointed out that the rose, being a traditional symbol of England,  would be (to say the least) somewhat inappropriate as a prominent  feature in the story.