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DE QUINCY.-Obtained from William the Lion the manors of Travernant, in East Lothian, and Leuchars, in Fife. Near the village of Leuchars is a motte with some slight remains of a stone keep, a deep well in the centre, and an entrenched bailey, known as the site of the castle of Leuchars.1

Ross. Godfrey de Ros, a vassal of Richard de Morville, held of him the lands of Stewarton, in Ayr. The caput of the lordship was Castletown, where Le Mote is spoken of in 1451 (N. and C.). The De Ros were also the first lords of the barony of Sanquhar. A little lower down the river Nith than the later castle of Sanquhar is a mote called Ryehill, and a place anciently manorial. (N.)

SOMERVILLE.-William de Somerville was a Norman to whom David I. gave the manor of Carnwath, in Lanarkshire. There is a very perfect entrenched motte at Carnwath (N. S. A. and O.M.), and Le Moit de Carnwath is mentioned in 1599. (N.)

DE SOULIS. Followed David I. from Northamptonshire into Scotland, and received Liddesdale, in Roxburghshire, from him. The motte and bailey of his original castle still remain, very near the more celebrated but much later Hermitage Castle.2 (Fig. 44.)

VALOIGNES. Philip de Valoignes and his son William were each successively chamberlains of Scotland. One of their estates was Easter Kilbride, in Lanarkshire, where they had a castle. In this parish is an artificial mount of earth, with an oval area on top, about mile from the present house of Torrance. (N. S. A.)

1 Proceedings of Soc. Ant. Scotland, xxxi., and N. S. A.

2 See Armstrong's History of Liddesdale, cited by MacGibbon and Ross,

i., 523.

3 Round, The Ancestor, No. 11, 130.

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VAUX-WALLACE

319

VAUX, or DE VALLIBUS.-Settled in Scotland under William the Lion. Held the manors of Dirleton and Golyn, in East Lothian. Dirleton has been transformed into an Edwardian castle, but from the pictures it appears to stand on a natural motte of rock. But about 3 miles from Dirleton the O.M. shows a large motte called Castle Hill, which may possibly be the original castle of the De Vaux.

WALLACE, or WALLENSIS.-Richard Walensis was the first of this family, and acquired lands in Ayrshire in David I.'s time. He named his seat Riccardton, after himself, and the remains of his motte are still there, a small oval motte called Castle Hill, on which the church of Riccarton now stands, but which is recognised as having been a "mote hill." (G.)

To this list must be added a number of royal castles known to have been built in the 12th century, which, as they were built on mottes, must in the first instance have been wooden castles.

BANFF. It seems clear that Banff Castle had a motte, because the doggerel rhymes of Arthur Johnstone in 1642 say:

A place was near which was a field until

Our ancestors did raise it to a hill;

A stately castle also on it stood.

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The Gazetteer says: "The citadel occupied a mount, originally at the end though now near the middle of the town." The site is still called Castle Hill. (N. S. A.) CRAIL, Fife. The O. M. does not show a motte here. The N. S. A. says "there was a royal residence here, upon an eminence overlooking the harbour." That this "eminence" was a motte seems clear from the Register of the Great Seal, quoted by Mr Neilson, which speaks of "Le Moitt olim castrum" in 1573.

CUPAR.-There seem to be two mottes here, both raised on a natural "esker"; the one formerly called the Castle Hill is now called the School Hill, the school having been built upon it. The other and higher hill is called the Moot Hill, and is said to be the place where the earls of Fife used to dispense justice. justice. (N. S. A.) Mr Neilson states that both are mentioned in the

Registrum.

DUMFRIES.

Here there were two mottes, one being now the site of a church, the other, called Castle Dykes, a short distance S. of the town, on the opposite side of the river. Both no doubt were royal castles, and Mr Neilson has suggested that as an old castlestead is spoken of in a charter of William the Lion, it implies that a new castle had recently been built, possibly after the great destruction of the royal castles in Galloway in 1174.1 The Castle Dykes appears to be the later castle, as it is spoken of in the 16th century. (N.)

DUNSKEATH, Cromarty.-Built by William the Lion in 1179. The castle is built on a small moat overhanging the sea. (G.)

ELGIN.-Built by William the Lion on a small green hill called Lady Hill, with conical and precipitous sides. (N. S. A. and G.)

FORFAR." The castle stood on a round hill to the N. of the town, and must have been surrounded by water." (N. S. A.) It was destroyed in 1307. It is called Gallow Hill in the O.M., and is now occupied by gasworks.

1 Benedict of Peterborough, i., 67. See Mr Neilson's papers in the Dumfries Standard, June 28, 1899. Mr Neilson remarks: “It may well be that the original castle of Dumfries was one of Malcolm IV.'s forts, and that the mote of Troqueer, at the other side of a ford of the river, was the first little strength of the series by which the Norman grip of the province was sought to be maintained."

FORRES-LANARK

321

FORRES. The plan in Chalmers' Caledonia clearly shows a motte, to which the town appears to have formed a bailey.

INVERNESS.-Built by David I. when he annexed Moray. The site is now occupied by a gaol, but the O.M. shows it to have been a motte, which is clearly depicted in old engravings.

INNERMESSAN.-As the lands here appear to have been royal property as late as the time of David II., the large round motte here may have been an early royal castle, a conjecture which finds some confirmation in the name "Boreland of Kingston," which Pont places in the same parish. (N. S. A.)

JEDBURGH.-Probably built by David I. The site, which is still called Castle Hill, has been levelled and completely obliterated by the building of a gaol. Yet an old plan of the town in 1762, in the possession of the late Mr Laidlaw of Jedburgh, shows the outline of the castle to have been exactly that of a motte and bailey, though, as no hachures are given, it is not absolutely convincing.

KINCLEVEN, Perth.-The O. M. shows no earthworks connected with the present castle, but on the opposite side of the river it places a motte called Castle Hill, which may very likely be the site of the original castle.

KIRKCUDBRIGHT.-Dr Christison marks a motte here, to the W. of the town. The place is called Castle Dykes. Mr Coles says it has an oblong central mound and a much larger entrenched area.1

“On

LANARK.-Ascribed traditionally to David I. a small artificially shaped hill between the town and the river, at the foot of the street called Castle Gate, and

1 "Mottes, Forts, and Doons of Kirkcudbright," Soc. Ant. Scot., xxv.,

1890.

still bearing the name of Castle Hill, there stood in former times beyond all doubt a royal castle." (N. S. A.) Mr Neilson says, "It certainly bears out its reputation as an artificial mound."

ROSEMARKIE, Cromarty.-Was made a royal burgh by Alexander II., so the castle must have been originally royal. 'Immediately above the town is a mound of nearly circular form, and level on the top, which seems to be artificial, and has always been called the Court Hill." (N. S. A.)

Even if we had no other evidence that motte-castles were of Norman construction, this list would be very significant. But taken in connection with the evidence for the Norman origin of the English, Welsh, and Irish mottes, it supplies ample proof that in Scotland, as elsewhere, the Norman and feudal settlement had its material guarantees in the castles which were planted all over the land, and that these castles were the simple structures of earth and wood, whose earthen remains have been the cause of so much mystification.

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