OS1/15/25/39

Continued entries/extra info

[page] 39
Parish of North Berwick

[Continued from page 38]
"At a small distance to the S.W. [South West] of the town there are the ruins of a monastery. The eminence on which
they stand commands a delightful prospect of the Frith of Forth the coast of Fife and several
little islands which lie about a mile or two from the shore. The monastery was founded by Duncan
Earl of Fife who is supposed to have died A.D. 1154. It was governed by a prior and prioress
and possessed a very considerable property in Fife and Ayrshire. A small ruin supposed to have
been a chapel belonging to the monastery. or to an hospital stands a little to the east of the harbour.
The adjacent ground was probably a burial place of the family of Douglass. In 1788 a seal with
the inscription "Sigillum Willielmi Domini de Douglas" was found in one of the vaults. This Lord Douglas lived
about the year 1353. -- Sinclair's Stat. Acct. [Statistical Account] vol. [volume] 5 page 443.

"At North Berwick on the south western side of the town upon a commanding height which looks down upon the
Forth and upon the shore of Fife beyond it Duncan the Earl of Fife who died in 1154 founded a convent for Cistertian
[nuns.] The founder gave them some lands in his manor of North Berwick with the Patronage of its Church and various
[lands] and revenues in Fife. And they acquired the advowson of the Church of Largo of Kilconocher Kilbrachmont
[and] St Monance in Fife with some lands that belonged to each of them. The bishop of Dunblane gave them the church
Logie-Aithry near Stirling. Adam de Kilconacher the Earl of Carrick who was their zealous confirmed in 1266 to
[these] nuns the grants of his fathers. And they obtained various lands titles and revenues in East and west Lothian in Fife in
[Ayrshire] and in the shires of Berwick and of Roxburgh. In the ancient taxatiotio the lands which belonged to the nuns of
[North] Berwick were rated at £66.13.4. In 1296 the prioress of North-Berwick submitted to the overpowering Edward I. and
[in] return. she obtained from his policy writs to the several Sheriffs of Fife, Edinburgh, Haddington, Berwick and Roxburgh to restore the estates
of
[Continued on page 40]

Transcriber's notes

Words lost in fold of page.