dumfries-1920/04-117

Transcription

CUMMERTREES.] -- HISTORICAL MONUMENTS (SCOTLAND) COMMISSION. -- [CUMMERTREES.

upper floor has been reached by a ladder.
This room, measuring 14 feet by 10 feet 8
inches, is now fitted up as a dovecot. It is
lighted by a narrow loophole in each wall,
and a fireplace is formed in the north-west
angle; the upper part is enclosed with a
semicircular stone vault below the flagged
roof. From the level of the second floor a
stone stair, starting on a corbelled projec-
tion intruding on the room below and resting
partly on the east wall, leads to the low
doorway which gives access to the parapet
walk.
The origin of the superscription REPENTENCE
has been connected with a certain chain of
episodes in the career of John, Master of Max-
well, afterwards Lord Herries, about the
middle of the 16th century. ¹ The same
person seems to have built Hoddom Castle.
One of his proposals in 1579 to the king for the
proper rule of the Borders definitely fixes the
character of the building: "The wache toure
upoun Trailtrow, callit Repentance, mon be
mendit of the litill diffaceing the Englische
army maid of it (? 1570); and, according to
the formar devise, the greit bell and the fyir
pan put on it; and ane trew man haiff ane
husband land adjacent for the keping of the
continuall wache thairupoun." ² At this time
tower and lands were the property of Lord
Maxwell, who had purchased the feu from
Lord Herries. ³ The "devise" in question was
no doubt that engrossed in the Border Laws,
which enjoined "ever in Weir and in Peace,
the Watch to be keeped on the House-head;
and in the Weir the Beaken in the Fire-pan
to be keeped, and never faill burning, so long
as the Englishmen remain in Scotland; and
with ane Bell to be on the Head of the Fire-
pan, which shall ring whenever the Fray is, or
that the Watchman seeing the Thieves dis-
obedient come over the Water of Annand, or
thereabout, and knowes them to be Enemies;
And whosoever bydes fra the Fray, or turns
again so long as the Beaken burns, or the
Bell rings, shall be holden as Partakers
to the Enemies, and used as Traitors to
the Head-Burgh of the Shyre, upon ane
Court-day." ⁴

1 Transactions, Glasgow Archæol. Society,
1896; Repentance Tower and its Tradition, by
George Neilson, p. 340 ff.; -- 2 Register of Privy
Council, iii. p. 81; -- 3 ibid., p. 84; -- 4 Leges Mar-
chiarum, p. 198.
lvii. S.W. -- 14 August 1914.

90. Hoddom or Hoddam Castle. - This castle
(fig. 33) stands on the eastern edge of a plateau
on the right bank of the River Annan, 6 miles
south of Lockerbie. The buildings are en-
closed on west and south by a courtyard wall,
much modernised but showing traces of 17th-
century detail.Outside the south wall is a
deep artificial ditch.
The castle is built of reddish ashlar and
towers above the modern additions which
encompass it on all sides save the north and
east. It is built on an L plan (fig. 34), the
shorter wing lying to the west. Externally it
measures 51 feet from north to south and the
same from east to west; the longer wing is
36 feet broad, the shorter 29 feet. The former
contains four storeys beneath the wall head,
where it terminates 52 feet above the ground
in a parapet walk, within which rises a slated
roof containing a garret; the other wing is
carried up to a height of 72 feet, where it
terminates in a flat roof within a parapet; it
contains the main staircase. The parapet of
the larger wing is borne on a continuous
moulded corbel course of a late decorative
type, with moulded interspaces and corbels,
which breaks upward and returns around the
staircase wing at a higher level; rounds are
set at the angles of the lower parapet, and
turrets of slight projection rise at the western
angles of the higher corbel course to above the
flat roof covering the staircase wing, where they
terminate in conical roofs. Around this flat
roof runs a parapet, largely modern but pro-
vided with embrasures and with rounds at the
eastern angles, as on the main tower. The
entrance to the castle is in the short arm of the
re-entering angle by a doorway with an arched
head of segmental form; on the jambs and
head is wrought a bold quirked edge-roll
moulding with a fillet; the label takes the form
of a monstrous cable with knotted stops, now
mutilated. The lower storey is unlit save by
two gun-loops in the east wall; the other floors
are lit by windows of moderate size, some of
which have been heightened; the edge-roll
moulding is repeated on the jambs and
lintels.

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