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GLANCE AT
THE MATERIAL AND SOCIAL CONDITION OF DUMFRIESSHIRE AND ITS CAPTIAL DURING
THE MIDDLE AGES – THE PRIMITIVE FORESTS – THE NATIVE HERDS AND FLOCKS –
THE HUSBANDRY OF THE DISTRICT – WAGES, LABOUR, AND PROVISIONS – STATE OF
THE HUMBLER CLASSES – HOUSE ACCOMMODATION, AND DEFENSIVE STRUCTURES.
TURN we
now from the narration of events, to glance at the social and material
aspect of Dumfriesshire and its capital during the middle ages, up till
the period at which was have arrived; and for much of this view we must be
indebted to the learned and industrious author of “Caledonia.” In the
thousand years which elapsed after the invasion of Agricola, no
perceptible impression seems to have been made on the original woodlands
of the County. When the Scoto-Saxons settled within its vales, they found
clumps of forestry in all directions; and hence the frequent occurrence,
throughout the district, of the Saxon term
weald, which signifies
“a woody place.” Familiar instances are found in the names Ruthwald,
Mouswald, Torthorwald, and Tinwald; and in the following, where the work
appears in its modern form: - Locharwood, Priestwood, Kelwood, Netherwood,
Meiklewood, Norwood, Blackwood, Kinmontwood, Dunskellywood, Woodhall,
Woodlands; and in others, such as Hazelshaw, Blackshaw, Cowshaw, Laneshaw,
and Bonshaw, in which a synonymous word for “wood” is introduced. The
oaks, firs, and birches embedded in the mosses of Nithsdale and Annandale,
afford abundant evidence of the same fact; and fine natural wood, the
progeny of primitive forests, still fringes many of the rivers and
streams. The parishes of Morton, Durisdeer, and much of the neighbourhood,
were in ancient times covered with trees – the resort of the wild boar,
the wolf, the stag, and other animals of the chase, to hunt which was the
favourite pastime of our ancestors. We read in the beautiful ballad,
“Johnnie of Breadislee,” how
“Johnie busk’t up his gude
bend bow,
His arrows ane by ane;
And he has gone to
Durrisdeer,
To hunt the dun deer
down.”
Of a
far-stretching forest in Moffatdale, another fine old lyrical effusion,
“The Lads of Wamphray,” makes mention as follows: -
“ ‘Twixt Girth-head and
the Langwood en’,
Lived the Galliard and
the Galliard’s men;
But the lads of
Leverhay,
That drove the
Crichtons’ gear away.”
An
ancient manuscript informs up, that near to the old Castle of Morton,
which figured so much in the early history of Dumfriesshire, “there was a
park built by Sir Thomas Randolph, on the face of a very great and high
hill, so artificially, that, by the advantage of the hill, all wild
beasts, such as deers, harts, roes, and hares, did easily leap in, but
could not get out again.” The writer quaintly adds: “And if any other
cattle, such as cows, sheep, or goats, did voluntarily leap in, or were
forced to do it, it is doubted
if their owners were permitted to get them out again. [MS. Account of the
Presbytery of Penpont, drawn up and transmitted to Sir Robert Sibbald, the
well-known antiquarian writer, by the Rev. Mr. Black, minister of
Closeburn.]
On the 3rd
of March, 1333, Edwrd III. appointed John de la Forest Bailiff of the Park
or Forest of Woodcockayr, in Annandale, an office which the Maxwells
acquired afterwards, and were in the enjoyment of in the reign of James
VI. Dalton Forest, on the west bank of the Annan, Loganwoodhead Forest,
between the Sark and the Kirtle, Blackberrywood Forest, in Upper Eskdale,
are mentioned in official records; and we read of Robert I. and David II.
granting lands in “free forest” within Dumfriesshire.
The
manner in which the abounding woods of the County were tenanted may be
inferred from such names as Wofstane, Wolfhope, Wolfcleugh, Raeburn,
Raehills, Hartfell, Harthope, Deerburn, Hareshaw, Todshaw, and
Todhillwood. As the Scoto-Irish, like the British aborigines, whom they
succeeded, delighted in woods, they were sparing in the use of the axe,
The forests furnished them with shelter, food, and the means of
recreation; and their rural economy was in keeping with their tastes in
this respect, seeing that it consisted rather in the feeding of herbs and
flocks than in the cultivation of the soil.
When
another race – the Saxons – began to mingle on the banks of the Nith with
the Scoto-Irish natives, they did not materially change the husbandry of
the district, though after their appearance the plough was brought into
greater request: vast herds of cattle were still seen browsing under the
woodland shade; multitudes of swine battened on the mast which fell
plentifully from oaken boughs; and countless “woolly people” continued
bleating and nibbling in the glades. These and other domestic animals
abounded greatly in the County; and no stronger proof of the prevalence of
pasturage could be desired than is furnished by the fact, that when
Malcolm Canmore and David I. reigned, the Crown dues in Dumfriesshire were
paid in swine, cows, and cheese. The latter monarch granted to the monks
of Kelso a share of cattle and pigs he thus received from Nithsdale; but
as such payments were found to be inconvenient, Alexander II. allowed the
same fraternity a hundred shillings instead of the “vaccarum et porcorum
et coriorum” which they were wont to receive from the “Valle de Nyth.”
Hunting, more than farming, was the occupation of the landowners; but the
latter business was pursued with considerable success by the monks: “and
as they,” says Chalmers, “were the most skilful cultivators, as well as
the most beneficial landlords, during the twelfth, thirteenth, and
fourteenth centuries, it is to be lamented that they did not possess in
those times more extensive districts in Dumfriesshire.”
There was
no great religious house within its bounds; but the monks of Holywood
owned lands in Nithsdale, the Priory of Canonby drew rents from estates in
Lower Eskdale, and the Monasteries of Melrose and Kelso were enriched by
revenues drawn from the Shire, the former having extensive property in
Dunscore and Upper Eskdale, and the latter lands in other districts, which
were tilled by bondsmen belonging to the brethren. From the rental of
these ecclesiastical farmers we may form a pretty accurate idea of the
land-rent paid at a time when acres were relatively more plentiful than
gold pieces. During the thirteenth century, the monks of Kelso gave to
Adam de Culenhat a lease of the tithes of the parish of Closeburn, for the
yearly rent of fifty-three merks and a half; the tenant, however, being
obliged, in addition to this money payment, to supply the Abbot, on his
visits to the parish, with fuel, litter, hay, and grass. In the beginning
of the fourteenth century, the same body of monks had forty acres of land,
with a brew-house and other appendages, in Closebure, which rented for two
merks yearly; and about the same time they had for tenant of their whole
lands in the Parish of Dumfries one Henry Whitewell, a burgess of the
town, who paid them twelve shillings sterling annually for the same. [The
value and the denomination of money, down till the reign of Robert I.,
continued the same in Scotland and England; and the Scottish money was not
much depreciated for a century or more afterwards. The silver merk was
value 13s. 4d. – Tytler’s
Scotland, vol. ii., p. 325.]
The
monks, in some instances, as has been stated, rented their lands to
freemen; “and they had thereby,” says Chalmers, “the honour of beginning
the modern policy of a free tenantry in Dumfriesshire;” but the great body
of cultivators were bondmen attached to the glebe. The free tenants
frequently enjoyed long leases, by which they were encouraged to apply
greater skill and labour on their farms. During the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries, the land divisions of the Shire were the same as in England,
giving rise to the carrucate, the bovate, the husbandland, and the acre.
In the charters of Robert I. and David II. we read of pound-lands,
merks-lands, shilling-lands, penny-lands, half-penny-lands, and
farthing-lands, from which valuations many farms derived names that some
of them still retain.
The
author whom we have repeatedly quoted, and been guided by in this inquiry,
sums up his account of ancient agriculture in the Shire, by saying “The
barons, the monks, and the tenants had inclosed fields; they had hay; they
had mills of every sort; they had brew-houses; they had fish-ponds; they
had the usual appendage of orchyards from the prior Britons [The Britons
along the Annan, the Nith, and the Clyde delighted in apple trees; while
they loved the cider, as we know from the elegant writer of the
“Avellenau.” We may learn, indeed, from the names of places, how early
they had orchards in Annandale. The hamlet and church of Applegarth,
signifying “an orchard,” had its name, in the twelfth century, from an
orchard. A few miles above this, a farm had long been called Orchyard.
Appletreethwaite, signifying “a small inclosure of apple trees,”
Appledene, or Applevale, and Appletree, are all mentioned in charters of
Robert I. There were in former times several orchards at Dumfries. The
monks of Holywood had a fine orchard at that monastery. There was also an
orchard at the Priory of Canonby. –
Caledonia, Note on p.
122, vol. iii.]; they had salt-works on the Solway [There were salt-works
at various places on the shores of the Solway at this period. The monks of
Melrose had one at Renpatrick, or Redkirk, which they let in 1294 to the
monks of Holm-cultram, who had several of their own on the Galloway side
of the Solway. In the parish of Ruthwell there were many salt-works; and
there was one in Carlaverock parish at a place which obtained, on that
account, the name of Saltcot-knowes. –
Inquisit, Special, p.
16.]; and they had wheel-carriages, with artificial roads: all during the
early part of the thirteenth century.”
Throughout the entire Scoto-Saxon period, till the doleful succession war
began, in 1296, the people of Dumfriesshire continued to improve in all
that could make them more affluent, civilized, and comfortable. That war
not only stopped further progress, but made everything retrograde; and the
family feuds which followed ruined much that the foreign enemy had spared
– each of these adverse influences operating for ages. It need scarcely be
remarked, that the manners of the people were rendered ruder by the
perpetual collisions of battle and the broils of faction; and that the
refinement that was beginning to spring up suffered a sad blight when the
atmosphere of the district breathed constantly of war. While the
inhabitants were involved in all the national quarrels with England, and
generally had to bear the first brunt of the fray, their proximity to “The
Debatable Lands” of the Border, and the turbulent ambition of their local
magnates, kept them in a chronic state of warfare, even when a truce
existed between the kingdoms.
Other
counties of Scotland enjoyed at times lengthened periods of repose; but
Dumfriesshire, for several reigns prior to that of James I., had only
brief, fitful seasons of rest. How, under such circumstances, could the
tillage of soil, the operations of trade and commerce, and the arts, which
civilize and refine, get a fair chance of success? Here, as in other parts
of the kingdom, a considerable foreign trade existed in the prosperous and
peaceful reigns of Malcolm Canmore and Alexander III.; but little traces
of it remained, and it must have been, in fact, all but annihilated, till
Bruce ascended the throne, about which time many adventurous Flemish
merchants settled in the country, and gave a powerful stimulus to its
commerce, which the wasting wars that succeeded seriously weakened, but
did not altogether destroy.
Whatever
aspect of the Vale of Nith may have presented in the Arcadian times of
Alexander III., much of it must have worn a bleak and wasted look, only
partially relieved by large stretches of luxuriant woodland verdure, and
patches of yellow grain, during the succession war, and for at least a
century afterwards.
In 1300,
the neighbouring province of Galloway grew vast breadths of wheat, that
sufficed to sustain the English army of invasion, as well as the native
inhabitants; but very little wheat was sown in Nithsdale or Annandale at
that unsettled period. The cereals chiefly cultivated were oats and bere,
or barley – the latter for furnishing the national beverage, ale; but
often before the peasantry could make meal of the one crop and malt of the
other, both were burned up – “the reaper whose name is Death” being sure
of a rich harvest on such occasions. Edward I., however, usually
interdicted, for his own sake, such acts of incendiarism; and there is an
instance on record in which he gave compensation for loss of grain caused
by his troops. A cavalry having destroyed eighty acres of oats, the King
compensated their owner, William de Carlyle, by a present of two hogsheads
of wine, value about £3 sterling. [The Wardrobe Accounts, p. 126.] To the
oaten diet of the common people was, however, added a goodly proportion of
animal food: in this latter respect, the humbler classes of Dumfriesians
being better supplied, perhaps, than their descendants of the present day.
It was more easy then to breed cattle and sheep profitably than to grow
corn, as, on the approach of an enemy, the herds and flocks could be
driven off to the woods for safety, or penned within the lower story of a
baronial keep. Fish, too, were plentiful in the rivers that ran into the
Solway: the red deer which roamed the neighbouring forests furnished
venison without stint for the tables of the rich; and not seldom, through
favour or by stealth, that dainty article of diet found its way to the
cottages of the poor. Altogether, in spite of the chronic infliction of
war, the phrase of “the good old times” is, we think, not altogether
inapplicable to the mediæval period in Nithsdale and Annandale. This
opinion is strengthened by what is known as to the low market value of
food. The wardrobe accounts of Edward I. show the current rates of cattle
and produce in Dumfriesshire and Galloway at the period of his visits
(1300-1308). An ox of large size could be purchased for 6s.; a fat hog for
2s. 2d. to 3s. 9d.; a quarter of wheat for 7s.; a quarter of barley for
4s. 4d.; a quarter of oats for 3s. 6d. These prices are relatively much
lower, as compared with the value of labour, than prices in the present
day. A labourer then could earn as much money in eight days as would buy a
quarter of oats; but he would have to give now more than his wages for
three weeks, in exchange for the same quantity of grain. Liquors were
equally cheap – ale selling at 12s. to 18s. a butt (108 gallons); a good
wine, £1 10s. per hogshead (54 gallons): while there was a commoner kind –
having in it, we dare say, only a small modicum of grape-juice – that was
retailed at less than a penny per gallon.
All the
houses in town or county, except those occupied by barons, were built of
wood or clay, roofed with straw or heather. “Generally,” says Tytler, “we
connect the ideas of poverty, privation, and discomfort with a mansion
constructed of such material [as timber]; but the idea is a modern error.
At this day (1829), the mansion which Bernadotte occupied as his palace
when he was crowned at Drontheim – a building of noble proportions, and
containing very splendid apartments – is wholly built of wood, like all
the houses in Norway; and, from the opulence of the Scottish burghers and
merchants during the reigns of Alexander III. and David II., there seems
good reason to believe that their mansions were not destitute either of
comforts, or what were then termed the elegancies of life.” [History of
Scotland, vol. ii., p. 391.] For ages afterwards, this perishable material
continued to be put to the same use. Streets so formed could easily be
destroyed by an enemy; but, then, they could be restored at a much less
expenditure of time and labour than if stone had been employed. The
Dumfries of Bruce’s day was a town of timber. The freestone quarries at
Castledykes and Locharbriggs had been partially drawn upon, but only for
building the Castle, the bridge, and the few ecclesiastical structures of
which the Burgh could boast; and stone tenements for any but the middle
and upper classes were rare within it till the reign of James III. About
that time houses began to be erected with the ground story of stone, and a
projecting upper one of wood – a style which continued long in favour with
the burgesses.
The
Border strengths were of three classes: the large, massive fortresses of
Carlaverock and Lochmaben occupying the first rank; the smaller, but still
powerful, Castle of Dumfries, Morton, Lochwood, Torthorwald, Sanquhar,
Durisdeer, Dalswinton, Tibbers, Closeburn, and Buittle being included in
the second rank [Torthorwald is placed in the second rank, not because of
its size, for that was small, but on account of its strength and accessory
defences, in which respects it was not excelled by some of the first class
fortresses. “The building,” says Grose (vol. i., p. 149), “seems to have
consisted solely of a tower or keep of a quadrilateral figure, 51 feet by
28, the largest sides facing the east and west. The walls were of an
enormous thickness; the ceiling vaulted. In the northeast angle was a
circular staircase. It is supposed to have been last repaired about 1630;
a stone taken from it, and fixed up against the out-offices of the manse,
having that date cut upon it. An ancient man not (1789) living at
Lochmaben remembers the roof of this building on it.” The castle was
anciently surrounded by a double ditch. The appearance of the ruin at
present differs little from the picture of it given by Grose, the lapse of
seventy-eight years having made scarcely any impression upon it.]; a
numerous array of keeps or fortalices forming the third, of which
Amisfield and Comlongan may be deemed fair representatives. Even the
humblest of these strongholds had walls varying in thickness from seven to
twelve feet. Lime made of burnt shells, slightly intermixed with sand, was
generally used in their erection; and the fluid mortar, poured in hot
among loose pebbles, placed between the outer and inner blocks, bound all
together so as to make a wall of adamantine strength. [The walls of
Lochmaben Castle, as shown by its crumbling ruins, must have been from ten
to twelve feet thick, and built with run shell-lime. The place where it
was prepared is still known as Limekilns. Both the outside and inside
courses were of polished freestone, evidently brought from Corncockle
Quarry, regularly squared. – Grahm’s
Lochmaben, p. 73. The
Castle of Sanquhar was surrounded be a double fosse. The walls are of
great thickness; and masses of them have fallen from the top without being
separated into pieces. This shows the immense strength of the mason work.
– Dr. Simpson’s History of
Sanquhar, p. 23.] The fortlets of the commoner class consisted of a
square tower, with subterranean vaults for stores and prisoners; a ground
floor for a guard-room; an upper story, where the family resided; the
whole surmounted by battlements, within which warlike operations were
mainly carried on in a time of siege. A series of similar towers, with
surrounding walls, moat, and ditch, went to make up a leading baronial
castle. No where in Scotland was there a more perfect specimen of
castellated architecture to be seen, in the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries, than that of the Maxwells, with its triangular, shield-like
shape – its narrow curtained front – its gateways protected by a
portcullis – its immense machicolated towers on each angle – its deep
fosse – the Solway sweeping past, at no great distance, on one side – the
impenetrable swamps of Lochar helping to protect it on the other. |
