3 may be an exception, where there seems to have existed an extensive forest; but elsewhere, wood was a scarce and valuable commodity. Peats formed the common fuel of the country, and a right to a peatary was of great importance. Even at Preston, now so surrounded by coal mines, wood was used as fuel for the salt pans. Coal is not mentioned in this collection of the transactions of Melros till the reign of Robert II.". It was undoubtedly worked at an early period in Scotland, but probably only in the easiest levels and in small quantities, from the imperfection of machinery and engineering; and its use must have been confined to a narrow circle from the difficulty of carriage. The preservation of game, and the whole economy of the forest, were necessarily of prominent importance in an age when the time of the free-born was divided between war and the chase. The lands of Melros, both on the eastern Border and in Ayrshire, were bounded on all sides by the territories of great lords, jealous of all encroachment on their rights of forest, and sometimes it would seem, attempting to counteract the former munificence of themselves or their ancestors, which had lavished on the favourite religious house rights of game as well as all other property. Hence originated many of the disputes and subsequent reconciliations recorded in this collection. At first perhaps, only the occasional trespassing of the cattle and sheep of the Abbey interfered with the pasture or the necessary quiet of the forest game; but in process of time the monks, escaping from the strictness of the Cistercian rule, asserted and exercised in their turn rights of game and forest, which they defended against encroachment with all the machinery which the law then put in their power. When the Abbey acquired that wide territory in Eskdale which was the gift of King David I. to the family of Avenel, the game was carefully reserved by the successive granters in such express terms that even the names of the valued animals are specified. The lords of Avenel reserved hart and hind, boar and roe, the aeries of falcons and tercels, and their right to the penalties of trespasses within the forest, and the amercements of those convicted of theft. The monks were expressly excluded from hunting with hounds or nets, from setting traps, except only for wolves, and from taking the aeries of hawks. Even the trees in which the hawks usually built were to be held sacred, and those in which they had built one year were on no account to be felled donec in anno proximo perpendatur si in illis arboribus velint aeriare vel non 3. 66 The early grants to Melros of their great territories in Ayrshire by the successive Stewards, expressed the same reservation in fewer terms: " hoc solo excepto "quod monachi nec conversi nec aliqui alii illorum auctoritate venabuntur nec accipitres capient in eadem foresta: hoc enim illorum ordini non convenit nec "illis credimus expedire ;" t—" salva eadem foresta mea tantum in bestiis et avi"bus." " But notwithstanding this reservation, grounded on the rigid rule of the Cistercians, we find the monks soon after in full possession of the rights of game and the forest, in the territory of Machlyn, which their munificent benefactors had at first withheld; and a few generations later, the family of Graham, who inherited the possessions of Avenel, gave up in like manner to Melros the whole privileges of hunting, fishing, and hawking in Eskdale, which had been originally so jealously guarded *. Even the cognizance of offences committed within the forest bounds was devolved on the monks; and it was only provided that malefactors condemned to death in the court of the Abbey should be executed at the place of doomy, and by the bailie, of the temporal lords of the manor. The ancient names and boundaries of lands are chiefly interesting to those locally connected with the district, but many of the meres so minutely described in these venerable evidences are of general curiosity, and if still to be traced in the names or in the features of the country, may throw light on the early language and other interesting antiquities, as well as on the ancient condition and extent of property. So early as the Reign of William the Lion, boundaries are found marked by such objects as "the old elm, "oaks on which crosses 66 were made a," "the white thorn "," "the green ditch," "the ozier bed ¿," "the crosses and trenches made by King David ." It is not to be hoped that many of these marks and memorials should have escaped the ravages of time and the plough. Some however may still remain even of this more perishable description; and fortunately a more enduring sort of boundary marks will serve in many districts to illustrate the state of property as it existed six centuries ago. The rivers and lakes forming the natural divisions of the country can be recognized without difficulty in the slight variation from their modern names. Fountains and springs, the summits of the hills, and the highest levels of the moorlands f, "sicut descensus aquarum dividunt" are in most cases not to be mistaken, although the present names of the hills on the Southern Border are mostly of unaccountably modern origin, while their older appellations in the charters have, it is believed, disappeared 5. Another class of meres occurring in these charters cannot escape notice. They point to monuments of antiquity far beyond the records or the foundation of the Abbey, but no expression of the parties shows the slightest knowledge or interest concerning their origin. A charter of Elena de Moreuil in the reign of William, gives for one of its bounding marks "the ancient castle "," probably one of those mountain forts of unknown history, antiquity, and use, which are thickly scattered over the pastoral hills of the borders. Anselm of Molle gives land in that territory bounded at one point " per quosdam magnos lapides veteris edificii quod est super unum parvum cundos i.” The great Roman ways which intersect the district are frequent boundaries in the more ancient charters; at least these seem to be the roads described under the various names of "Derestrete k," "Herdstrete," "Magna strata m," "the "way towards Lauder by the causeways called Malcolmsrode "," "Calceia or "Calceia," or the great causeway. It appears that the roads mentioned by the terms "viridis via," "via alta," "via magna," "via regia" or "regalis" are always to be distinguished from them. The practice which we find to have prevailed in the earliest periods of this record, of setting up great stones, and sometimes stone crosses, to mark the boundaries of adjoining territories, may account for some of those monuments which have long exercised the ingenuity of antiquaries P. In other instances, such monuments of past ages as were conveniently situated were adopted as boundary marks, instead of constructing new marks 7. These are frequently designated by the name which is still the popular term in Scotland for such monuments of unknown or conjectural use, " the standing stones." The occurrence of early examples of the spoken language, which must interest the philologist in all countries, is more than usually interesting in Scotland, whose original inhabitants and successive invaders have afforded such abundant matter of controversy. It has already been noticed, that there are in the present collection indications of the language and people of Galloway. With the exception of that province, there is no reason to believe that a Celtic language was in use in any district with which the Abbey of Melros was connected during the period embraced by this Chartulary. It will be found that the great benefactors of the Abbey, with the exception of the Lords of Galloway, and the great Earls of Dunbar, were of Norman descent and name. Several persons occur of Saxon families, and others whom we may conjecture to be of Danish or Norse origin; but with the exceptions above stated, no charters are granted by persons whom there is any reason to believe of Celtic race. Most of the Norman settlers had either previously fixed seignorial surnames, or soon assumed local designations from the territories acquired by them in Scotland. n N. 101, 102, 108. o N. 108, 109. p Thus, on occasion of a grant of lands in Maxton by Robert de Berkeley, the monks set up a great stone as one of their boundaries,magnam petram in testimonium erexerunt." N. 90. "Per petras que positæ sunt ad divisas." N. 92. 66 Lapides grandes quos tunc perambu"lando posui." N. 87. "Per lapides qui positi sunt ad divisas inter nos et ipsos monachos The Saxon and Norse usque ad magnum lapidem subtus quercum.” N. 64. q Thus, one of the boundaries described in the royal charter fixing the marches between the Constable and Melros in the forest of Wedale is " de Pot usque ad standande stan." N. 111. r As De Vesci, De Morevil, De Valoniis, De Brus, &c. s As de Wittun, de Ridale, de Molle, &c. colonists, being perhaps usually of inferior rank and power, remained longer without that which soon became a badge of gentility. From them were named most of the places which bear the Saxon termination of town, and these, by a curious alternation, in a short time afforded surnames to their proprietors', when the fashion of territorial surnames became almost universal. The names of places occurring in these charters, excepting those of Galloway, are for the most part purely Saxon. It may be, that the great features of the country, its mountains, valleys, and rivers, bore Celtic names. Very few of these occur. The names of estates however, and their boundaries, coeval with the dawn of civilization, wherever indicating any meaning, were all Saxon "; and the few words of early vernacular language, thinly scattered over the older documents of this collection, all show the same origin, and leave no doubt that a t Thus, Orm gave name to Ormistun, Leving and Doding to Levingston and Duddingstone; Elfin, Edulf, and Edmund to Elphingston, Edilston, and Edmonston; and most of these in turn were assumed as the territorial surnames of well known families. A personage who figures in the early charters, Maccus, chose to call his town by its Norman term, and "Maccus-vil" (which is merely another shape of Maccustun or Maxton) in time passed into the familiar surname of Maxwell. The name of this family has of late undergone the same combination which was applied some centuries ago to its founder's own name, and by this triple process we arrive at the name of Maxwelltown. Thus Hartshead, Hellesden, Mossyburnrig, Brownrig, N. 56. Thus also all names ending in town. So Milkeside, Threpwood, Bireburn, Cuckowburn, Brownknoll, Elwaldscalesloning, Holemede, Ravensfen, Herehowden, Fuleford, Kingstrete, and many others. r The small number of vernacular common words preserved in the more ancient charters of this collection, are sometimes disguised by a Latin termination. Some of the Latin words occurring in them are peculiar to Scotland, and not to be found in the dictionaries of the Latin of the middle ages. Of both these classes, such words as seemed to require explanation are collected below, along with examples of the spoken language occurring previous to the middle of the fourteenth century. Aeriare, N. 111, to build aeries as hawks. Brueria, N. 90, a thicket of broom. Burna, N. 66, 69, 130, a burn or brook. Cobella, N. 242, a coble, or flat fishing boat. Forisveia, Forsveia, N. 198, 199, a penalty for Gile, N. 54, 63, a Gill, still used in the north Halghes, Halkahs, Halechs, Halues, Hauhwes, Hogus, N. 54, Hogh, English, a hill or mount. Lecche, N. 66, a ditch. Ful-leche, ibid. a foul Logia, N. 101, lodges. Mereburne, N. 99, 108, a bounding rivulet. Nysus sororum, N. 139. French Niez, an Peta, Petaria, N. 101, 480, peats, a peatary or peat moss. Scalinga, N. 111, a shealing or summer hut used by shepherds. Sicus, N. 54, a syke or ditch. Stagnum, N. 266, a yare or wear in a river. (In this sense it had occurred to Du Cange, who seems unwilling to admit it as a genuine term.) |