Our Patriot monarch, King Robert the Bruce, belonged to the Norman family De Bruis, which, in the person of Robert De Bruis, came to England with the Conqueror in 1066. This knight received the lands of Skelton in Yorkshire, and his son, Robert, who was an associate of the prince who afterwards became David I. of Scotland, obtained the Lordship of Annandale.

At the Battle of the Standard (1138) Robert Bruce fought on the English side; while his son, Robert, 2nd of Annandale, fought under David and was taken prisoner, it is said, by his own father. He had two sons, Robert and William. Robert, the elder, died before 1191. William, his brother and heir, died in 1215, and was succeeded by his son, Robert, 5^th Lord, who died in 1245, having married Isabella of Huntingdon, great-granddaughter of King David I. Their son, Robert de Bruce, was in 1255 nominated one of the Regents of the Kingdom of Scotland, and guardian of Alexander III. In 1290 he claimed the Crown of Scotland, as nearest heir of King Alexander III. King Edward I. overruled all the pleas of Bruce, and adjudged the Kingdom of Scotland to Baliol, whose claim was strictly the preferable under the law of succession attributed to King Malcolm Mackenneth. Bruce died in 1295, aged eighty-five. His eldest son, Robert de Bruce, was born in 1245 and died in 1304.

By Margaret, Countess of Carrick, his wife, he left a large family – His eldest son, ’Robert the Bruce, born 11^th July 1274, asserted his claim to the Scottish Crown (which had fallen vacant by reason of Baliol’s disgraceful renunciation of his throne). He ascended the throne of his ancestors, and was crowned at Scone, 27^th March, 1306. After many vicissitudes, the power of King Robert I. was finally cemented by his splendid and decisive victory at Bannockburn, 1314. He died at Cardross, in Dumbartonshire, 7^th June, 1329, aged fifty-five; he was interred in the Abbey Church of Dunfermline.

The Earl of Elgin, descended from Bruce of Clackmannan, who sprang from a cousin of King Robert’s, is now acknowledged chief of the family. His seat is at Broomhall, in Fife, and the old fortalice of his house, Clackmannan Castle, is a picturesque tower whose battlements still overlook the valley of the Forth. The Earldom was conferred in 1633 on Thomas, 3^rd Lord Bruce of Kinloss, who descended from Sir David Bruce, 7^th Baron of Clackmannan.

(T. INNES 1938)

(This has not been edited from its original print, including spelling and format).

Up to the middle of the fourteenth century, Scotland, owing, it may be assumed, to the temperate habits of the people as well as to the salubrity of its climate, was free from the plague, that awful scourge which, in other countries, had long been dreaded as one of the chief causes of the misery of the people. It is especially noted by the biographer of St. Columba, and repeated by Buchanan, that, in the seventh century, when terrible pestilence, “ such as was never recorded by any writer before”, afflicted all Europe and spread even through South Britain, the Scots and Picts, who inhabited the northern part of the island, were alone spared the direful visitation. Its first appearance is chronicled by Wyntoun, under date of 1349:

In Scotland the first Pestilence
Began, of so great violence
That it was said, of living men
The third part it destroyed then;
After that within Scotland

A year or more it was wedand (raging),
Before that time was never seen
pestilence in our land so keen;
Both men, and bairnies, and women,
It spared not for to kill them.

Some additional details are supplied by Fordun, who states that, “by God’s will this evil led to a strange and unwonted kind of death, insomuch that the flesh of the sick was somehow puffed out and swollen, and they dragged out their earthly life for barely two days. Now this everywhere attacked especially the meaner sort and common people; seldom the magnates. Men shrank from it so much that, through fear of contagion, sons, fleeing as from the face of leprosy, or from an adder, durst not go and see their parents in the throes of death.”

There can be no doubt that this terrible epidemic disease was the black death. It came from the East, whence its devastating progress can be traced until its appearance in Dorsetshire, in August, 1348. It soon spread through the whole kingdom. For a time its progress was arrested by the Scottish Border; and “the foul death of the English’’ is said to have been at the time a favourite oath with the Scots, who felt a malicious pleasure in the calamity that had overtaken their old enemies. It was they themselves who, by making a reckless raid into England, brought the black death into their own country, where the mortality which it spread is probably not over-estimated by Wyntoun. In 1362 there was a new outbreak of the “death sickness”. Fordun states that it raged exceedingty throughout the whole kingdom of Scotland, and that it was in all respects like the earlier visitation, both in the nature of the disease and in the number of those who died. Wyntoun contributes the further information that it began at Candlemas, and continued to the Yule or after; and that King David and the Bishop of St. Andrews, with their respective suites, retired, the one to Kinloss, in Moray, the other to Elgin, and remained in the purer air of the north land all the time that the “ Dede” was desolating the south.

Of the third visitation of the pestilence, that of 1380, Wyntoun gives no details in the two lines which he devotes to the mere mention of it; but its origin and duration are indicated by Buchanan. He states that William, the first Earl of Douglas, having raised an army of twenty thousand men, invaded England, and came suddenly on a fair days to a town called Penrith, which he entered, plundered, and burnt; that he then, without molestation, marched his army back again, laden with much spoil; but that he brought the pestilence home with him, “ which was greater than any that had ever been known before, for it raged all over Scotland for the space of two years”. Wyntoun, that sinister pre-eminence is claimed for the plague of 1401, of which he says that it was

“more fearful than memore
wass had of the three before.”

And the reason which he gives in justification is that, whereas the spread of the disease had hitherto been gradual, on this occasion “it would overtake all lands” at the same time. Thus, as he grimly expresses it,

“That pestilence gart many banes
In kirk-yardis be laid at ance”

When the pestilence next appeared it had assumed so wholly different a character that Bower calls it “ pestilentia volatilis”. The name seems to be fully justified by the few details that are to be gathered as to its progress. Having first broken out in Edinburgh in 1430, it continued its deadly work till, at least, the year 1432, when there is record of its having raged in Haddington. Its erratic nature may further be inferred from the fact that the Parliament, which was held in Perth in 1431, enacted that the collectors of the land-tax should present their accounts in that city on the second of February next to come, provided the pestilence were not there; but if it were there, at St. Andrews.

The early years of the sixteenth century were marked by an outbreak of the pestilence in Edinburgh and its neighbourhood. As evidence of that there is a quaint entry in the Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer, who, in 1503, disbursed ten shillings for “ translating” the lining of some of the King’s gowns, “for caus William Ferry, furrour, was suspect with pestilence”. In July of the following Year, when King James IV was on his way from Stirling to the capital, he gave three shillings “to the pur folkis of Linlithqw that wer put furth of the toun”; and ieght pence “to the seik folkis at Edinburgh”, Three months later, when the Queen was at Dunfermline, a plague-scare was the cause of her sending for eleven carts to transport her “gear”, and that of the Englishmen who were with her, to Lindores. But it appears to have been discovered that there was no real cause for alarm, and that the four pounds, eight shillings of expenses had been wasted, for “syne scho departit nocht”. In the same year, from the twentythird of August to St. Luke’s Day, that is, to the 18^th of October, Curry, the King’s Jester, being “suspect of pestilence”, was, together with his man, kept “furth beside Stirling”. And that in his case, the suspicion was only too well founded, may be inferred not only from his long isolation of fifty-five days, but also from the fact that, on his discharge, both he and his man were provided with coats, shoes, and blankets, presumably to replace others that had been burnt, with a view to preventing infection.

That this visitation of the plague, though apparently not general, was exceedingly severe locally, is made apparent by a letter which Alexander Craufurd, the preceptor of St. Anthony’s, in Leith, wrote to the General of the Order. The plague, he says, has carried off all the brethren except himself and another; their lands in town are untenanted, their fields untilled, and they themselves deprived of the alms of the faithful; they are unable through poverty to attend the general chapter of the Order. Not only does the writer beg to be absolved by his superior for having, from necessity, failed in the performance of that duty, he also craves to be dispensed from attendance for the next three years. And, in order to save his house from total extinction, he requests permission to initiate novices in place of the brethren deceased.

In 1545, Hertford’s invasion of Scotland aggravated by the introduction of the plague which, as is known from a letter of his to Henry VIII, had broken out in his army and spread through the Borderland. That it reached Edinburgh appears from an ordinance of the Privy Council, which directed that the Court of Session should remove to Linlithgow. The precautions adopted by the Magistrates of Glasgow in 1574 indicate the presence, in that year, of the dread disease along the east coast of Scotland. By an order issued in October, they forbade all intercourse with Leith, Kirkcaldy, Dysart, and Burnt island. As Edinburgh was not yet suspect, except as to Bell’s Wynd, it was thought sufficient to require testimonials from persons coming thence. Infringement of the latter regulation was to be punished by a fine of ten pounds, of the former by death. A month later, the pestilence had made such further progress in the capital that the meeting of the Court of Session and of Parliament was postponed for several months. But the century was to be marked by a visitation far more serious than these local outbreaks. It continued for nearly four years. As was frequently the case, it came from over the sea; and a “creare “, or cutter, that arrived at Easter Wemyss in 1584 was believed to have been the first cause of it. In 1585 it was at its worst in Edinburgh. It was reported as raging at Niddrie in 1586; and in the following autumn Leith, which had been amongst the first of the Firth ports to suffer from its ravages, was, after a short respite, again devastated by it, owing to the ‘opening of some old kists”. Not till the month of December of that year was the Privy Council able to announce that the country was at length free from the fearful scourge, and that the College of Justice, which had again been transferred to Linlithgow, was to resume its sittings in the capital.

Calderwood states that in 1585 some twenty thousand persons died of the plague in Edinburgh alone. That is obviously an exaggeration. Robert Birrel’s estimate is far more moderate. He reports that of those who were unable to flee when first it was known that Simeon Mercerbank’s house was infected, there succumbed one thousand four hundred and odd, a number more in proportion to the mortality of Perth, which the chronicle of that city sets down at one thousand four hundred and twenty-seven, and of St. Andrews, where Moysie records that “upwards of four hundred people died”. As to the desolate appearance of the capital whilst the plague was raging in it there is the testimony of James Melville, who passed through it in November, on his way from Berwick, where he had been living in banishment for a time, to a General Assembly that was to be held in Linlithgow. “We came riding in at the Watergate”, he says, “up through the Canongate, and rade in at the Netherbow, through the great street of Edinburgh to the West Port, in all whilk way we saw not three persons, sae that I miskenned Edinburgh, and almost forgot that I had ever seen sic a town.”

Maister Gilbert Skeyne, Doctour in Medicine, who wrote Ane Breve Description of the pest of 1586, and who had been induced to do so by “seeand the puir in Christ inlaik (succumb) without assistance of support in body, all men detestand aspection, speech, or communication with them”, has given a sad picture of the inhuman selfishness which such a visitation engendered. “Every ane he says, “ is become sae detestable to other (whilk is to be lamentit), and specially the puir in the sight of the rich, as gif they were not equal with them touching their creation, but rather without saul or spirit, as beasts degenerate from mankind. “ In his enumeration of “the causis of pest”, Dr. Skeyne supplies details from which some notion may be formed of the unsanitary conditions that prevailed in Scottish towns at the time. “The cause of pest in ane privat Citie “, he writes, “is stink and corruptioun and filth, quhilkis occupeis the commune streittis and gaittis, greit reik of colis without vinde to dispache the sam, corruptioun of Herbis, sic as Caill and grow and Treis, Moist heuie sauer of Lynt, Hemp, and Ledder steipit in Vater. Ane privat house infectis ather of stinknd closettis, or corrupte Carioun thairin, or neir by.’

If the most effective of preventives, sanitation, was practically ignored by municipalities no less than by individuals, the Government displayed considerable zeal and vigour in its efforts to prevent the introduction of the plague when it became known that it was prevalent in any country with which Scotland held intercourse. If the northern counties of England were affected, instructions were sent to the Wardens of the Marches to prevent Englishmen from crossing the Border, and to charge Scotsmen “that none make market with Englishmen in those parts, nor have intercourse, nor intermingle with them because of the pestilence”. Disobedience of the orders issued for the purpose of stopping all traffic and communication between the two countries was to be punished with death. The fairs held periodically in such towns as Duns and Kelso, to which people of both nationalities were wont to resort, were also prohibited.

With respect to merchants coming from infected or even suspected ports, it was ordained that they should contain themselves and their goods within shipboard, or at least proceed to some quiet place where the lieges could have no “company or melling with them ” For members of the crew to come within any “burghs, towns, or common passages ”, until they had been declared free from infection, was made a capital offence. A ship hailing from the Baltic would probably have a cargo consisting wholly or in part of flax, pitch, tar, iron, and ash-barrels. In that case, “ because the most danger appeared to be amongst the flax ”, it was to be unloaded and housed on St. Colm’s Inch, opened, handled, and cast forth to the wind every other fair day, for from six to eight weeks. The other goods were to be cleansed by “overflowing of the sea, at one or two tides The ash-barrels were to be singed with heather set on fire; whilst the ship itself was to be bored so as to let the seawater into it. And all that was to be done at the expense of the owners. The sailors and others who handled the goods were to be cleansed and set apart by themselves for a time on one of the islands in the Forth, at the discretion of the official inspectors. There is evidence that Inchkeith, Inchgarvie, and May Island were used in this way, as quarantine stations. Even after all those preventive precautions had been taken, they had to obtain a special licence from the magistrate before attempting to hold intercourse with the lieges.

If it happened that a “foul” ship entered a Scottish port, the local authorities were required to “search, seek, and apprehend the masters, skippers, and inbringers of it, and put them in sure firmance and captivity “and hold and detain them therein until order were taken and commandment given to execute justice upon them In all adjoining burghs proclamation was to be made that “none suffer or permit any of the aforesaid persons or their goods to come on land, or otherwise to reset or grant unto them meat, drink, house, or harbrie, or have any manner of communication with them, under whatever colour or pretence”, under pain of death. Should any have got away and found refuge already, they and their resetters were to be apprehended, the houses to be closed up, and “themselves to be execute jncontinent to the death ” .

When, in spite of all preventive measures, the plague broke out in a seaport, the first care was to cut off all communication. If there were a ferry service, as, for instance, between the north and south shores of the Forth, the boats were forbidden to ply, and, if necessary, actually dismantled to enforce the prohibition. In respect of inland intercourse, the panic ordinances passed by local authorities were often contradictory to each other and inconsistent with the enactments of the Government. Whilst the Privy Council endeavoured to restrict travelling by wholly isolating certain localities, or by requiring passes in the case of others, individual municipalities would not allow pipers, fiddlers, minstrels, or any other vagrants, to remain within their boundaries without the special leave of the Provost, under pain of a scourging, and would drive all ‘”poor common beggars ” forth to their own parishes, by threatening to burn them on the cheek if they were found within the burgh twenty-four hours had been made.

Notwithstanding all orders to the contrary, when the pestilence was known to have penetrated into one of the larger towns, the chief concern of the “ substantious gentlemen, burgesses, and other inhabitants ” who could command the means, was to remove themselves as far as possible from the centre of infection. In consequence of this, the poor were left “ destitute of all comfort and provision for their maintenance ”, so that many of those that died perished “rather through lack of sustentation than of the said plague”* At the great outbreak of 1585, James the Sixth, with characteristic pusillanimity, headed the exodus of the panic-stricken. He first retired to St. Andrews, but remained there only a short time, “understanding that the pestilence had reached the place of his present residence”. Before leaving the town, however, he issued one reasonable order, to the effect that “all filth and filthie beasts or carrion be removed furth of the highways, and the same cleansed and holden clean ”- Having then gone for safety to Falkland, he commanded that, within six hours, and under pain of death, all that were not properly dependent on some particular person requisite to attend on the King’s service, or that were not otherwise entitled to be in the town by special leave or occupation, should depart to their own dwelling-places. Within a month, “the suspicion of the pestilence lately entered at Falkland” caused the royal poltroon to remove to Stirling. The manner of his ignominious flight is recorded by Moysie. The King, he says, was hunting at Ruthven when “word came that there were five or six houses in Perth affected with the plague, where His Majesty’s servants were for the time. Whereupon His Majesty departed the same night, with a very small train, to Tullibardine, and next day to Stirling, leaving his whole household servants enclosed in the place pf Ruthven, with express command to them not to follow, nor remove forth of the same until they saw what became of them upon the suspicion.” In such wise did King James show the sincerity of his belief in his own philosophical remark, that“the pest always smites the sickarest, such as flies it farthest and apprehends deepliest the peril thereof”.

Such measures as were adopted by the local authorities were intended to prevent the spread of the disease rather than to relieve those already stricken by it. Under pain of death, the master of a house in which any person fell sick was to report the case immediately to the visitors or searchers. And there are numerous instances to prove that the authorities were in grim earnest in decreeing the extreme penalty. From amongst them the case of David Duly, an Edinburgh tailor, may be cited by reason of its remarkable sequel. In the official report of his offence, it is charged against him that he kept his wife sick of the contagious sickness of pestilence for two days in his house, and would not reveal the same to the officers of the town until she had died of the disease; and that, in aggravation of his transgression, at the very time that his wife was lying in extremis, he had gone to St. Giles’s Church on the Sunday, and there heard mass amongst the clean people, thus “doing what was in him to have infected all the town ”. For the flagrant contravention of the statute, “he was adjuged to be hanged on a gibbet before his own door”. In the afternoon of the day on which he was sentenced, Duty was brought out to execution; but, as the official record words it, “at the will of God, he eschapit”, the rope having broken and fallen from the gibbet. The Provost, Bailies, and Council were struck at this interposition of providence. It made them remember that the culprit was “a poor man with small bairns”; and they took pity on him to the extent of commuting his sentence to one of perpetual banishment from the city.

When the offenders were women they seem to have been dealt with in the same way as were witches, That may be inferred from a number of cases, of which that of Marion Clark is typical. For going about, “ the pestylens and seiknes beand apone her ”, she was condemned “to be drounitt in the Quarrell hollis”.

When it became known that the plague had broken out in a family, all the members of it whom it had not yet stricken were compelled to remove to a plague camp, situated in some outlying part of the burgh, where they were housed in wretched “ludges”, or huts which had been hastily run up for their accommodation, and where they might be, but seldom were, visited by their friends, accompanied by an official, after a certain hour in the morning. In some cases the landlord of the house lately inhabited by them was required to burn it, as well as their goods, without delay, and with “ absolute exoneration ” to himself for so doing. In others they were allowed to take their furniture belongings with them; and it was deemed sufficient to get the “land and rooms” from which they had been taken, cleansed “ by water and fire”. This was to be done between the hours of nine o’clock in the evening and five in the morning. The charge for it was fixed at ten shillings, which “ substantious ” citizens were expected to pay themselves. In the plague camp the clothes of stricken or suspected persons were disinfected by being boiled in a large cauldron in the open air. The due carrying out of these plague regulations was under the supervision of two bailies specially appointed for the purpose. Like the cleansers and the bearers of the dead they wore distinctive uniform, consisting of a gown of grey stuff, with a St. Andrew’s Cross both before and behind. For the removal and burial of corpses, a grim and ghastly ceremony that was performed under cover of night, there were to be provided “ twa close biers, with four feet, covered over with black and ane white cross, with ane bell to be hung upon the side of the said bier, which sal make warning to the people”.

Within a burgh where the plague had broken out a belated attempt at sanitation was made to the extent of forbidding the owners of dogs and swine to allow the animals to wander at , and of empowering anyone who encountered these “ in high streets or vennels ” to kill them. Meetings of all kinds were prohibited. Thus, in Edinburgh, Parliament was prorogued if sitting, diets of the Court of Justiciary were suspended, and the administration of the public business generally transferred to some town that had remained clean. No one might hold school under pain of banishment; and children of less than fifteen years of age were liable to be put into the stocks, and to be scourged with rods, if they made use of their enforced leisure to play “ on the gaitt or in the streets or in the kirk”.

It being made a capital offence for the destitute of any plague-stricken locality to wander about begging their living as usual, the “magistrates, barons, gentlemen, and other honest men” were called upon “of their charity” to make provision for their maintenance; and, if voluntary contributions were insufficient, recourse might be had to special taxation.

There is no reason to believe that Scotland was more grievously stricken during the second half of the sixteenth century than it had been in earlier times; but the information to be gathered from Acts of Parliament and of the Privy Council, from burgh records, private diaries, and contemporary memoirs becomes fuller and more detailed. It supplies data from which the calculation may be made that the plague years, in the aggregate, covered at least a third of the whole period. It shows that what is but a remote contingency at the present day was a constant terror then; and it brings home the fact that pestilence, with its usual sequel, dearth, must be taken into account as one of the causes to which the poverty of the country and the lamentable condition of the lower classes are to be attributed.

(LA Barbe 1919)

BELOW: Some artwork from the Dance of Death, the most celebrated series of woodcuts designed by Hans Holbein (Germany). The forty-one blocks were cut by Hans Lützelburger in the years immediately before his death in 1526, though the set was not published until 1538. Dance of Death originated as a drama in the middle of the 14th century. Following widespread epidemics such as the black plague, these plays took place in a cemetery or churchyard. Actors, dressed in pale costumes painted to resemble skeletons, personified Death and summoned a group of people from all social classes in a dancelike procession. In a period when the life span was short, the purpose of the Dance of Death was to remind the populace to prepare for the Last Judgement.

This has not been edited from its original print.

In such documents as we have concerning the mediaeval trade of Scotland, wine figures at an early date and appears to have constituted one of the principal articles of importation. In the Acts of the Scots Parliament there is an “Assize of Wine according to the Constitution of King David”; and from the prices indicated by it there is reason to believe that the consumption was not inconsiderable as far back as the twelfth century. In accordance with the scale fixed by this enactment, the proportionate rates between the “lagena”, which was presumably the gallon, and the “dolium ”, were to be as one penny to ten shillings, so that when the latter cost twenty shillings the former was to be sold at twopence. That wine was not a scarce commodity may be inferred from the fact that a puncheon was to be paid to the Guild of Berwick as a fine for the violation of certain rules laid down by it. And further, testimony as to the existence of a retail trade is borne by the quaint law which provided that if the wine imported into the country were to be sold in taverns, the cask was to be the King’s. And, in the instructions drawn up for the holding of the “Chalmerlan’s Ayr ”, we find evidence that the necessity for something in the nature of a licensing court had been felt and provided for. That official was to “challenge” wine taverners as to four distinct points – selling wine without its having been tasted; selling it in measures of their own that had not been duly tested; selling it without having had the price fixed by the tasters; and mixing “corrupt wine’’with wholesome wine.

In the reign of James I, the demand for wine had reached such proportions that, in order to secure an adequate supply, an Act was passed, in 1431, by which it was required that half the price of the salmon exported should be paid in Gascon wine. That there was at this time a trade in Rhine wine also, is implied in the enactment of 1436, that “na man of Scotlande by at Flemyngs of the Dam, in Scotlande, any kynde of wyne under the payne of eschet thereof”. The reason for this prohibition was that shipment at any port but Campvere was an infringement of the privilege which it enjoyed as the Staple, but which was not always respected by Sluys and “the Dam”, from which German wines could be conveniently smuggled out and shipped to Scotland.

The special legislation called for by the wines of Bordeaux and the Charente district indicates both the wider popularity which they enjoyed and the greater importance which they consequently acquired as an article of commerce. But, if they were more within the reach of the general public, there were other growths that found favour with those whose means allowed them to indulge in choicer brands. Evidence of this is to be found, not in the Acts of Parliament or of the Privy Council, but in the Exchequer Rolls and Household Books that have come down to us. From these we learn that after Mary of Gueldres had become Queen of Scotland she continued to favour the Burgundian wines to which she had been accustomed; and that Beaune was her favourite vintage. There are also entries referring to the purchase of Malmsey, which the traders of Genoa, Venice, and Pisa brought from Candia and Cyprus, and with which they supplied the chief ports of Western Europe; of Muscadel, the name given to several kinds of sweet and strong Italian wines; of Bastard, a Corsican wine that was taken with honey; and of Spanish wines, especially those of Alicant.

In 1482, the Legislature turned its attention to the fraudulent methods by which unscrupulous merchants sought to increase their gains. It was ordained that none of the lieges should bring “corrupt or mixed wine into the realm”. If such should happen to be sent, no man was either to sell it or tap it after it had been condemned by the bailies and tasters. It was to be returned to the shipper. No less a penalty than that of death was attached to the infringement of this early law against adulteration. And the same punishment was to be inflicted on anyone who should be discovered mixing wine after importation.

That the retail trade continued to increase during the next quarter of a century seems to be indicated by the Act of 1503, by which persons not dwelling in burghs were forbidden to sell wines. Thirty two years later, under JamesV, a special measure was adopted, from which it is to be gathered that the importation of wine into Scotland did not yet meet the requirements of the population and still needed encouragement. Prior to that it had been forbidden to send staple goods out of the country between St. Simon and Jude’s Day and Candlemas, that is, between the 28th of October and the 2nd of February. This restriction, a kind of close time which the scant resources of the country had made necessary, was removed to the extent that authorization was given “ to send any kind of merchandise forth of the realm in the time foresaid in any ships that brought in salt or wine”.

In 1540, under the same King, a noteworthy Act was passed by Parliament. In terms of one of its clauses, provosts and bailies, besides being appointed to fix the retail prices of wine, were constituted official merchants of it in wholesale quantities, and no one, whether freeman or unfreeman, was to buy from any but them unless it were directly from the importer. By another clause it was further ordained that no man was to buy wine until the King, through his officers, had bought up as much of it as it pleased him to take. And this privilege of pre-emption was to be shared by “ all noblemen of the realm, such as prelates, barons, and other gentlemen ”. During the next sixty years this pre-emptive provision called forth numerous enactments on the part of the Privy Council. Some of them, such as those of 1564 and 1565, were merely a repetition of it, but were couched in terms that implied considerable dissatisfaction on the part of the lesser people, as well as general laxity on the part of the municipal authorities in the enforcement of an unpopular law. But, in spite of all enactments, the royal household was so “empty and desolate of wines”, in 1566, that the Lords singled out two Edinburgh merchants, Richard Anderson and Robert Johnstone, and commanded them to deliver respectively, four tuns and seven and a half tuns to the Queen’s butler. For these they were to receive “good and thankful payment”, at the rate of “ fiftie pundis, money of this realm ”, for each tun.

In 1569, there occurred an incident which showed how jealously the burghs guarded the monopoly conferred upon them by the Act of 1503. As a free burgh of Regality, the Abbey of Holyroodhouse claimed and exercised the privilege of “ selling of wine for serving of the lieges of the realm ”. The right of the Abbey to put itself on a footing of equality with Edinburgh does not appear to have been admitted by the latter, for there was at the time, “process depending before the Lords of our Sovereign’s Session thereanent ”. But the law’s delay did not suit the magistrates of the city; and three of the bailies resolved to take the matter into their own hands. Accompanied by a number of the community of their burgh, they proceeded to the Canongate, which, together with Leith and the Barony of Broughton, constituted the Regality of Holyrood, and there, in spite of remonstrances and protests, broke and cast down the “ senyeis ” of wine. This unjustifiable aggression on the overbearing neighbours, was brought under the notice of the Regent and the Privy Council by Adam, Bishoo of Orkney, who was then Commendator of the Abbey. The course adopted by the Council suggests a desire on its part to placate the masterful municipality of the capital rather than to do justice to the lesser Regality and to its claim to be independent of “any jurisdiction inferior under the Prince”. It is recorded that my Lord Regent’s Grace and Lords of Secret Council ordained and commanded both the said parties “to desist and cease from all attempting of anything against others by violence or way of deed (assault) in time coming ”, and “ to pursue all their actions, causes, and controversies by order of law and justice”.

In 1576, the privilege of pre-emption was restricted to the King and the Regent; and, in the following year, even their right was limited to the purchase of one tun out of every ten imported. But even this concession did not bring about satisfactory results, for, though the importers might be willing to supply their royal customer, they objected to his dilatoriness in settling their accounts. Some of them went so far as to refuse to replenish his cellars, even though that was declared to be “ane matter sa necessar as that it could not be differrit or myslippinit ”, unless it were for ready money, or, if credit were to be given, at a higher rate, and “ with assurance for payment thereof”. This led to the passing of a new law which authorized the royal “simleir”, or butler, not only to visit, taste, and uptake wines to the furnishing of His Majesty’s house, upon reasonable prices, but also to break open “doors of lockfast houses and ‘lumes’ in whatsomever burghs and to search all ships in whatsomever havens and harbours, and use our Sovereign Lord’s keys to that effect”. Besides being resented by the importers and wine dealers, this arbitrary and oppressive ordinance gave offence to the town councils of the chief seaport towns, and the Privy Council had to threaten pains and penalties before they yielded an unwilling compliance. In 1586, another equally high-handed measure was passed. It was ordered that a macer or other officer of arms should arrest all wines imported, belonging to whatsoever person, the same to remain unsold in whole or in part till so much thereof was “waillit, taistit, tnarkeit, and intromettit with ” by the King’s “simleir”, as should be thought necessary for the use of the royal household, “ upoun ressonabell pryceis to be payit thairfore” As to the manner in which James fulfilled his promises of settlement, the Acts of the Privy Council also supply information. Under date of 1592, they contain an entry to the effect that Adam Anderson, burgess of Perth, should stand caution for the Provost and Bailies of the city, that they should pay to the Provost and Bailies of Edinburgh, the sum of three hundred and forty pounds, as their part of the contrlbution imposed upon the Burghs collectively for the thirty tuns of wine advanced by the said Magistrates of Edinburgh for furnishing the King’s house in January, 1589.

If it was found difficult to supply the wants of the Sovereign, the lieges themselves were naturally even worse off than he. From the middle of the sixteenth century onwards, there were published at comparatively frequent intervals a number of enactments which all had for their main object the “suppressing of dearth of wines”. With this in view, on February 1, 1551, Parliament fixed the prices of Bordeaux and Rochelle wines, They were not to exceed fifteen pounds to twenty pounds per tun, or eightpence to tenpence per pint, for the former; and twelve to sixteen pounds per tun, or sixpence to eightpence per pint, for the latter. The Act likewise forbade the mixing of old and new wine, as well as the addition of water. Nor might the newly-imported wine he hoarded or concealed. The law required it to be put up in taverns and vaults and sold at the prices fixed by the authorities. Perth was permitted to raise these by twopence per quart.

In spite of all this legislation, and in spite, too, of the “ daily ” importation at both the east and the west seas, it was found that, owing to the action of forestalled, prices continued to increase and that the dearth remained. To remedy this abuse the Privy Council, in 1552, caused proclamation to be made in all burghs that no wines arriving in the havens or ports of the east and northland seas should be bought at any dearer price than seventeen pounds the tun of Bordeaux wine and thirteen pounds the tun of Rochelle wine; or should be sold at any higher rate than eightpence the pint of Bordeaux and sixpence the pint of Rochelle wine. In the west sea ports the highest price at which Bordeaux wine might be bought was two pounds less per tun, but no reduction was made in respect of Rochelle wine. Confiscation not only of all the wine which had been the subject of an illegal bargain, but of all their movable goods also, was the penalty to be inflicted on both buyers and sellers who disregarded the Act.

An explanation of the differential tariff, by which most of the enactments give the west country consumers so marked an advantage over those on the east coast, is suggested by the editor of the eleventh volume of the Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer. “Perhaps”, he says, “one reason why the price of wine was thus regulated, was that English pirates were in the habit of frequenting the West Coast and selling wine there at an absurdly small figure. Randolph, the English Ambassador, writes to Cecil in October, 1564, that an English pirate called White was selling wine ‘ better cheape ’ than his correspondent could drink London beer in his own house. was probably with the view of preventing such practices that the proclamation was now made, so as to give the public no inducement to buy from the pirate rather than from the ordinary trader.” But, apart from any such cause, the shorter voyage from either the Gironde or the Charente ports to the west coast of Scotland, as compared with that to the harbours on the Forth, seems sufficient to account for the difference in prices and to justify it.

An ordinance published by the Privy Council in 1562 indicates an important modification in the Lords’ views concerning the wine trade. The first cause of it was their “understanding” that the fine coined money of the realm in both gold and silver was being carried out of the country by traders generally, but more especially by those who brought home wine from Bordeaux, the Charente district, and other parts beyond the seas; and that in consequence of this exportation good money was growing scant, and the price of all kinds of victuals daily increasing by reason of this scarcity; They argued that, if the trade were restricted wines would fall in price, and the money obtained for them be bestowed upon wares within the realm, with the desirable result that the good money would remain amongst the lieges, and the cost of all kinds of commodities decrease daily. To further these objects they again fixed a tariff of charges. The fact of their bringing them down to very nearly what they had been in 1552 shows that there must have been a very considerable rise during the decade to justify complaints and to call for official interference. A drastic remedy for the dearth of money was provided by a further clause of the same Act. It obliged foreign importers of wine to spend what they had obtained for it on other merchandise within the realm, and it forbade their carrying away “any kind of money, gold or silver, coined or uncoined ”, under pain of confiscation. In order to secure the obviously difficult execution of this new law, searchers were appointed and instructed to “search diligently at every port and haven within the kingdom.

By1566 there had been an advance to thirty-six and thirty-two pounds per tun, and to sixteenpence and fourteenpence per pint, of Bordeaux and Charente wines respectively. In subsequent years, however, the rise was far more considerable as well as less gradual. Thus, in 1578 Bordeaux wine cost fifty pounds per tun and two shillings per pint;but the retail price had leapt to three shillings and fourpence in 1585, to double that amount ten years later, and to eight shillings per pint in 1598. In the last year of the century, however, there was a slight diminution, for at that date Sir John Carmichael obtained a commission from His Majesty against such inhabitants of the Burgh of Dumfries as sold wine at higher prices than five shillings a pint. But when almost immediately after this a tax of twenty-one pounds per tun was imposed “ for the help and supply of His Highness’s honourable necessities”, an increase of twelve pence per pint was sanctioned. In consequence of this the price of wine at the beginning of the seventeenth century was almost exactly twelve times as much as it had been fifty years earlier.

(LA Barbe 1919)

This has not been edited from its original print.

The writers to whom we owe the earliest descriptions of Scotland, are all in agreement as to the abundance of fish to be found both in the inland waters and in those by which the coasts were washed. “This region”, wrote John of Fordun, in the second half of the 14th century, “is manifold in its wealth of fish in sea, river, and lake.” And fifty years later, the statement was briefly, but emphatically confirmed by Andrew Wyntoun: “Off fysche there is habowndance”. From John Major s History of Greater Britain, published in 1521, we get both further corroboration and fuller details, together with an explanation of the phenomenon. It is based on the crude scientific theories of the day concerning the greater depth of the northern seas, as proved by the ocean’s flowing “from the north south-wards ”, and as accounted for by “ the air that has been turned into water”.

After enumerating the chief rivers of Scotland the Forth, the Tay, the Spey, the Don, and the Dee – Major adds that they all abound in salmon, trout, and pike. He also supplies some interesting information as to the price of salmon and herring: “In most parts of Scotland ”, he says, “ you may buy a large fresh salmon for two duodenae, in other parts, however, for a sou; and for a laird you may carry away a hundred fresh herring.” Major also states that “near the sea is great plenty of oysters, as well as crabs and lobsters”. And he describes the shell-fish as being “of marvellous size”.

Hector Boece fully bears out all that his contemporary has written as to the great abundance of fish in Scottish waters. According to him, the harvest of the sea was so great that it would have sufficed to sustain the whole population, if the land had refused them its fruits. And as evidence that his statement is not exaggerated, he adduces the fact that fishing fleets from France, Flanders, Zeeland, Holland, and many parts of Germany annually visited the Northern Seas, about the time of Lent, that is, in the spring, and returned with such quantities of fish as not only sustained themselves, but also enabled them to provide for the wants of “all other countries ”, even as far as the Mediterranean.

To mention the many localities especially referred to bv Boece as being “ richt plentuus and full of fische ”, practically amounts to an enumeration of the chief salt and freshwater lochs, and of the more important rivers in Scotland. In Galloway, Loch Ryan and Loch Luce are “both full of oysters, herring, conger eels, mussels, and cockles, with many other fish In Lochtyne there is a “greater plenty of herring than in any seas of Albion”. In Lochaber there are lochs and rivers “ full of salmon and other fish, swimming; so plenteously that the same are taken without any skill ” whilst in the Don and the Dee there is “ mair fouth of salmond ” than in any of the other rivers of Britain. Cockles, oysters, mussels, seals and porpoises, dolphins and whales, with great plenty of whitefish, entitle the Forth to a foremost place amongst the most productive of Scottish waters.

Two circumstances in particular impress the old chronicler as no less providential than they are marvellous. One of them is, that of all kind of fish there is “sa gret plente throw all partis of our seis, that, howbeit infinit noumer of thaim were tane away on the ta day, na thing thairof sal be mist on the morow”.

The other is, that “ay the mair derth and penurie of vittallis is in Scotland, the fische swoumis with the mair abundance and plente”. Though lack of details can hardly be laid to his charge, Boece wishes it to be understood that his account of the country’s wealth is not exhaustive, and he is ready with a good reason for not attempting to make it so. “To schaw every kind of fische ”, he says, “ it wer bot ane faschious and vane lauboure; for the samin ar knawin to al cuntreis.” And that this is no mere boast may be gathered from Pedro de Ayala, the ambassador of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain at the Court of James IV. In the account which he gives of Scotland, he states that it was commonly known as “piscinata Scotia”.

Scattered through the old writers’ notices of the Scottish fisheries, there are a number of marvellous stories which would do credit to Mandeville himself, and which are not without interest, as samples of some of the popular delusions of the day. To account for the disappearance from the mouth of the Tay of the herring that had formerly abounded there, Boece records the generally accepted “ truth”, that when any avaricious and unhappy men fight for the fish that God sends, of His infinite goodness for the sustentatioun of the people, and pollute the sea with their blood, for many years after, no fish swim in that place. Nor is this the only instance of credulity with regard to a phenomenon that hardly ranks as a prodigy with the more sceptical generation of the present day. Bishop Leslie accounts in the same manner for the disappearance of herring from Lochbroom.

Far more wonderful than what may be looked upon as the superstitious explanation of an actual fact, is the account that Boece gives of a “ great fish” to be found about the Orkneys. It is described as larger than any house. The “marvellous and incredible ” thing about it, however, was not so much its size as its power of sleep. “ This fish ”, records the chronicler, “ when she begins to sleep, fastens her teeth fast on a crag above the water. As soon as the mariners find her asleep they come with a strong cable in a boat; and after they have bored a great hole through her tail, they fasten her by the same. As soon as this fish is awakened she tries to leap with great force into the sea, and when she finds herself fast, she writhes herself out of her own skin and dies. Of the fat that she has, oil is in great quantity; and of her skin, because it endures long, strong cables are made.” Any prototype that this marvellous monster may be said to have had, was probably the whale. It is less easy to identify the “uncouth and wonderful fish ” that were said to haunt the Forth. They are described as having cowls hanging over their heads like monks; and it is added that their appearance always betokened mortality of men and beasts.

In his account of the horse-mussel, with which the Dee and the Don abounded, Boece embodies the popular belief as to the origin of the pearl. Early in the morning, he says, when the air is clear and temperate, these mussels open their mouths a little above the water, and most greedily swallow the dew of heaven. In proportion to the measure and quantity of the dew that they swallow, they conceive and breed the pearl. These mussels are so “ doyn gleg ”, that is, so excessively quick, of touch and hearing that, though the sound be never so slight that is made on the bank beside them, or the stone never so small that is cast into the water, they “douk haistelie ”, and at once go to the bottom, knowing well in what estimation and price the fruit of their womb is held by all people.

Though considerable allowance must be made for Boece’s credulity when he thus ventures into the realm of natural history, his accuracy is less questionable when, with the actual experience that his residence in Aberdeen may be assumed to have given him, he describes the way in which these precious horse – mussels were gathered. “ First, four or five persons pass into the river together and stand in manner of a round circle in the water, to their shoulders. Each one of them has a staff in his hand that he may not slide; and then they look and search through the clear and mpid water until they see the mussels; and because they may not take them up with their hands, they ‘cleek ’ them up with their toes, and sling them to the nearest bank”.

In the earliest ages, the inhabitants of Scotland do not appear to have availed themselves of the abundance of fish that both sea and river offered them. During the Celtic period, when adoration was paid to the waters, fish was considered a forbidden food. Even after the introduction of Christianity, there were, for a time, ascetics who practised and enjoined abstinence from fish, which they considered dangerous to purity of soul. Before long, however, this prejudice ceased to be entertained, and fish became the chief article of diet on the many fast-days imposed by the Church on the faithful. But, apart from the demand created by the ecclesiastical ordinances, there was the necessity that resulted from the scantiness of fodder during the winter months, when it was found practically impossible to keep cattle in condition that suited them to be slaughtered for food.

The household book of James V supplies interesting information as to the extent to which fish was used in the early decades of the 16^th century- In the list of the sea-fish, the herring- fresh, salt, and red—figures conspicuously. As white fish there are both fresh and dried “ mulones ”, a term that has been translated as “cod”, though it is impossible to overlook its suggestive resemblance to “ mullet In addition to these, there are codlings, pollacks, whiting, ling, and “speldings”, which last may possibly be sprats. Frequent mention is also made of sand eels, blennies or “greenbanes,” gurnards, lump fish or “cock-paddles”, anglers or “sea-devils”, sea-cat, smelt, conger-eels, and lampreys. There appears to have been a liberal supply of flatfish, including turbot, halibut, and flounders. The sole is only occasionally referred to, as is also the “rigadia”, which may possibly be the skate or ray-fish.

Numerous entries indicate the extensive use of salmon—salted and kippered as well as fresh and also of trout, eels, perch, and pike. The occurrence of the last of these amongst the fresh water fish purchased for the royal household, in 1525, is noteworthy ’as disposing of ‘ the generally received opinion that this fish was introduced in the reign of Henry VI11, in 1537 ”, and as supporting its claim to be considered a native fish.

If the term “ polupi ” has been correctly interpreted as meaning “cuttle-fish ”, its repeated appearance would indicate a partiality for what must now seem a strange, if not repulsive article of food. It seems to us, however, far more probable that the name is but another form of Boece’s polypod ”, and, like it, is applied to the lobster. To judge from the frequency of the entries recording the purchase of oysters, these appear to have been considered as great a delicacy four hundred years ago as they are at the present day. According to the same evidence, there must have been a considerable consumption of mussels, cockles, whelks, razor-fish, scallops, periwinkles, and limpets,and also of crabs and shrimps. And, finally, that dishes wholly unknown, at the present-day, on the tables of either rich or poor, frequently figured on that of royalty itself, may be inferred from the purchase of porpoises and seals for the larder.

Various authorities, from treatises on the art of war to returns of commissariat expenses, testify to the extraordinary quantity of fish that was used for victualling troops and provisioning castles. We know that amongst the supplies delivered to the garrisons that Edward I quartered in the south of Scotland during the years 1299 and 1300, there were large stores of herring, which were bought by the last of 10,000 of stockfish, and of ling. In order to meet his own requirements, during this expedition, the same monarch was accompanied by some of the fishers attached to his household; and in his “Wardrobe Account” there is an entry for “four nets which were purchased for fishing- in the rivers and lakes of Scotland for the King’s use ”.

The amount of fish required in the large establishments of the nobility may be estimated from the fact that, in one year, the Breadalbane family laid in 420 salmon, 15,000 herring, and 30 dozen of “hard fish”. In addition to this the numerous religious houses created a constant demand for the same commodity; and their chartuaries abound in records of the provision that was made to meet it. We learn from them that David I gave the monks of the Isle of May exclusive fishery rights around their own shores; that he conferred on the community of Holy rood the tithe of his own share of the larger fish caught along the southern shore of the Forth, from the Avon to Cockburnspath; and that he made over to the monastery of Dunfermline every seventh one of the seals caught at Kinghorn, after his own tithe had been set aside. To his successor, Malcolm IV, the same house owed the remarkable grant of “the heads of porpoises caught in the Forth, except the tongues”; and that of Kelso of “the half of the fat of the royal fishes which might come into the Forth on either shore”.

In some cases, the privileges conferred by the King did not involve the absolute surrender of his own rights. For instance, Alexander I expressly reserved them in the charter that entitled the monks of Scone to fish in the Tay, near which their house was situated. There were also restrictions as to space, for the measurement of which the stretch of water that could be fished by one net and one cobble was taken as the unit, and was itself called a “net”. That explains what the chartularies mean when they record that David I gave two “nets” in the Tweed to the monks of Holy rood; that Malcolm IV granted two “nets ” in the Tay and one ‘‘net in the Forth to those of Scone; and one in the Findhorn to those of Kinloss; and that King William allowed those of Arbroath a “net” in the North Esk and another “in the Tay which was called the Stocke”.

It may be presumed that where “nets” were granted, the fishing was by means of the seine. Another contrivance consisted of the “ yair which is described as “ an enclosure stretching into a tideway, for the purpose of detaining the fish when the tide ebbs The material of which it was constructed is indicated in the permit which the Earl of Lennox gave to the monks of Paisley, in 1273, authorizing them to take wood from his forests and stone from his grounds for the repair of their fishing yairs on the Leven. The grant of yairs, like that of nets, occurs frequently in mediaeval charters. Their extent was regulated by a statute of Alexander II which, by reason of its quaintness, has become famous. It was to the effect that the mid-stream should be left sufficiently wide for a well-fed swine of three years to be able to turn round in it without touching the yair with either snout or tail.

Fishing by means of stell-nets, along the shelving seashore and near the mouths of rivers, appears to have been practised at a very early date. What he calls “ane uncouth maner of fisching ” is described by Boece, and is stated by him to have been, in his day, peculiar to Moray. The people, he says, made a long basket, narrow-necked and wide-mouthed, with many stakes inside. Into this the fish threw themselves and could not get forth again; and as soon as the sea ebbed they were taken dry in the creels. If, as has been thought, this refers to “the contrivance of cruives and yairs ”, Boece could scarcely have been so unfamiliar with it as to call it uncouth, and to assign it to one special district. As regards rod-fishing, what, so far as we know, is the earliest mention of it, occurs in 1632, when the father of Duncan Campbell in Creitgarrow became caution for his son, that he should not “ put out a wand on the water of Tay”.

The primitive way in which shell-fish were caught, is described by John Major. “In Lent, and in Summer,” he says, “at the winter and the summer solstice, people go in early morning from my own Gleghornie and the neighbouring parts to the shore, drag out the polypods and crabs with hooks, and return at noon with well-filled sacks. At these seasons the tide is at its lowest, and the polypods and crabs take shelter under the rocks by the sea. A hook is fastened to the end of a stick, and when the fish becomes aware of the wood or iron, it catches the same with one of its joints, thus connecting itself with the stick, which the fisherman then at once draws up”.

In spite of Boece’s statement as to the number of continental fishing fleets that annually visited the North Sea, there is evidence to prove that foreigners, far from being welcome or even tolerated in Scottish waters, ran the risk of being treated like pirates. It may not be true that James V, having dispatched one of his ships of war to capture some Dutch fishermen who had ventured to fish within 28 miles of the mouth of the Forth, put the offenders to death, and sent a barrelful of their heads to Holland. But, the story was told by the Town-Clerk of Edinburgh to Secretary Coke, in 1630; and it illustrates the popular feeling of the time as regards fishery rights.

(LA Barbe, 1919)

A comparative view of the lengths of the principal rivers of Scotland with a comparative view of the height of the falls of Foyers and Corba Linn.

Drawn by W.H. Lizars. Published by John Thomson of Edinburgh in 1831.

SEE FULL SIZED IMAGE

Printed and published by John Bartholomew & Son Ltd. in Edinburgh, Scotland, estimated date 1962.

The map is decorated with the coat of arms of the main cities and towns, as well as principal Scottish family and clan chiefs. Places and events in Scotland’s history are illustrated on this map. Shows sites of cathedrals, abbeys, castles and battles.