east-lothian-1924/05-030

Transcription

INVENTORY OF MONUMENTS IN EAST LOTHIAN.

In the south-east corner of the county Dunglas became the property of
Sir Thomas Home or Hume by his marriage with the heiress of the family
of Pepdie or Papedy, whence came the popinjays or parrots quartered on the
arms of Home. His grandson, Sir Alexander was the founder of the collegiate
church of Dunglas (cf. No. 124). Dunglas was originally held of the
Earl of Dunbar and March, but in 1451 the lands of Home (or Hume),
Dunglas, etc. were united into the free barony of Home in favour of Alexander
Home, eldest son of Sir Alexander Home and afterwards first Lord Home,
to be held of the King. There were other Homes of Spot.
Tynningham was a lordship or barony belonging to the see of St. Andrews,
of which the Lauders of the Bass were long tenants and baillies (cf. p. xxii). In the
years before and following the Reformation, however, it passed through several
hands, returning to Sir Robert Lauder in 1568, but finally (1627) finding a
place in the capacious grasp of the first Earl of Haddington. ¹ The parish of
Aberlady belonged to the diocese of Dunkeld. (cf. No. 2).

III.
MILITARY HISTORY OF EAST LOTHIAN.

Though after 1018 the history of the province of Lothian merges in that
of the Scottish kingdom, yet the special characteristics of its position gave it
from time to time a place apart in that record. This specialisation affected
more particularly the counties of Berwick (cf. Inventory of that county) and
East Lothian. Berwick was a march district or borderland, and East Lothian
lies just behind ; the Earl of Dunbar soon appears also as Earl of March and
held lands in both counties as well as, previous to the War of Independence,
in Northumberland. His commanding position in that quarter for so long
was thus analagous to that of a Carolingian duke endowed with both the
march and a county behind.
Another result of its position was that Lothian served as an eastern
corridor into Scotland. What was of old the more convenient route from the
border, that up Tweeddale and Lauderdale, skirted the western limit of
East Lothian, but the coast route by Cockburnspath passed behind Dunbar,
was bridged over the Tyne at East Linton and was bifurcated by the ridge
terminating in the Garleton hills into a continuation that followed the coastal
plain on one side and on the other the Tyne valley to Haddington and
beyond. The latter route was that taken by Edward III. very early in 1356
" with great power and majesty," when he stayed in Haddington and the
vicinity for ten days, burnt the burgh and with it the church of the Friars
Minor " the choir of which, because of its singular beauty and clear lighting
was commonly called The Lamp of Lothian," whence he carried his in-
cendiary and destructive march " through Lothian " as far as Edinburgh. ²
For the fleet which brought his supplies he probably used the port of Aberlady,
as the English and French did two centuries later in the operations about the same
place, a service which gave importance to the adjoining castle of Luffness. This

1 Earls of Haddington i. pp. xxxi-iii.
2 Scotich. Lib. xiv. cap. xiii.

-- xxv