medieval-atlas/administration/193

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Sheriffdoms This map shows the expansion of the sheriffs in line with the development ofthe feudal settlement under William I (1165-1214). Early in hjs reign we find a sheriff of the province of Moray which by the beginning of the thirteenth century had apparently been divided into the sheriffdoms of Inverness and Invernairn. Probably by then, there were also sheriffs of Forres, Elgin, Banff and Aberdeen but no good documentary evidence of this survives. A single document refers to the sheriffs and bailies of Carrick, Galloway and Lennox in the I I 90s and it is possible that there was a sheriff of Dumfries by this period. The sheriffs of Selkirk, Traquajr and Meams were all connected principally with areas ofroyal forest, the sheriff of Ayr with a new castle and burgh. Some sheriffdoms djsappeared: Dunfermline (where the hng's burgh was also abandoned) and CraB (in the possession of the king's mother until 1178) were both subsumed in the new sheriffdom of Fife by 1214. Lauder represents a baronial sheriffdom. The functjons of the royal sheriff now clearly went beyond the administration of the king's afflilrs to the protection ofthe king's subjects -for example, by the recovery of fugitive serfs or the enforcement of teinds. There is evidence of a sheriff court. More and more the sheriffs were drawn from baronial famjlies with Anglo-French origins who were major landowners in the sheriffdom. But the office was not yet hereditary in nature; the only sheriffship certainly heritable at this period was that ofSelkirk, in the family of Sinton. Lanark 0 Lauder ~ Y162X177 Traquair • .~ 1184...,./7. Rox~urgh Ayr 1 Selkirk -' 1197 x 1207 x 1214/ ...// / ......, ..-- ...../ kms Forfar Sheriffdom recorded before 1165 o 25 50 7.5 Ayr 1197 x 1207 Sheriffdom recorded between 1165 and 1214, with dates I . , ,, , 100 Caput of royal sheriffdom (where known) o 10 20 30 40 50 60 o• Caput of baronial sheriffdom miles Sheriffdoms recorded by 1214 HLM 193

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