east-lothian-1924/05-020

Transcription

HISTORICAL MONUMENTS (SCOTLAND) COMMISSION.

Cuthbert went as bishop to Lindisfarne. In his time occurred the shattering
defeat of the Northumbrians by the Picts in 685 at Nechtansmere.
To what extent Northumbria was restricted in territory as the result of
the defeat is not quite clear. According to Bede a great part of the Britons
freed themselves from Anglian rule. Trumwin, a Northumbrian bishop for the
Picts, withdrew with his followers from the monastery at Abercorn, which was
in the "country of the English," that is Bernicia ; the Firth of Forth separ-
ating the lands of the English and the Picts. Late writers are rather more
definite but may reflect the conditions of their own time rather than continue
traditional accounts. One, of the early twelfth century, says that the Angles
" curtailed their territories from the north" ¹ ; another, of the middle of the four-
teenth century, affirms that the part of Bernicia between the Tweed and the
Firth of Forth, that is the district known later as Lothian, was wholly taken
from the Angles. ² Certainly in the course of the fifty years following Dunni-
chen the Picts were aggressive from time to time towards Northumbria,
making Lothian a channel of conflict, as in the battle of 711 " in the plain
of Manau ³ " between the Avon and the Carron. ⁴ But this eighth century saw
the gradual decline of Northumbrian power, largely owing to internal dissension.
The territorial possessions and power of the Church, too, had increased and
" the land of St. Cuthbert " or bishopric of Lindisfarne tended to overshadow
the political divisions. Beyond Tweed it was claimed to embrace all between
the Adder and the Leader as well as the land belonging to the Monastery
of St. Baldred (Sancti Balthere) at Tynninghame, which land stretched from
Lammermuir (Lombormore) to Eskmouth, that is, embraced the whole of what
is now East Lothian. ⁵
It was on a politically and socially weakened Northumbria that there
fell the assaults of ravaging Danes towards the close of the eighth century.
After the capture of York by Healfdene and his Danes in 867, a Danish rule
was based on that city as the Kingdom of York. But of this kingdom
Bernicia does not seem to have formed a recognised part. The Danes set up
a vassal king reigning over the Northumbrians beyond the (English) Tyne. ⁶
Within a few years the people there expelled him and substituted a king of
their own. There is no evidence that the Danes or Norse made settlement
in Lothian ; place-names embodying Norse elements are very few even in
County Durham, and such as occur in the Lothians are probably Anglo-
Scandinavian of a later date ; the absence of characteristic Norse geographical
terms e.g., beck, gill, breck, is much more significant. ⁷
On the other hand, Lothian becomes a goal for the aggressive activities
of the Scots of Dalriada, who had greatly increased their power by the
acquisition of Pictland c. 844. Kenneth mac Alpine, the first king of the

1 William Malmesbury, Gesta Regum I. p. 58.
2 John of Tynemouth in Raine's Historians of the Church of York (R. S.) I., p. 593.
3 In Campo Manand, Annals of Tighernach.
4 Hæfe and Cære A. S. Chron. (E).
5 Hist. S. Cudb. II., § 4.
6 Symeon of Durham, Hist Regum. § 92 ; Hist. Dunm. Eccl. cap. VI.
7 Moorfoot in the parish of Temple, Midlothian, which has given its name to the Moorfoot
Hills, embodies the Norse thwait. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries it is Morthuweit,
Morthwayt, Morffet, &c. In Blæu's Atlas (Pont's map) it is Morfoet, whence the modern form.
Personal names of Norse origin are preserved in Ormiston, Stenton (XVI. century Steinston),
Thornton &c.

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