Series 3 > Early records of the Burgh of Aberdeen

INTRODUCTION
The earliest burghs on record in Scotland are the burghs
of Berwick and Roxburgh, referred to in a charter granted
by Earl David 1 a few years prior to his accession to the
throne.2 Significantly both these burghs are associated
with royal castles ; equally significantly, out of thirty-
three ‘ king’s burghs ’ known in 1286, all but two (Had¬
dington and Inverkeithing) were adjacent to castles of the
king.3 Or, to state these facts another way, when, in
November 1292, sasine of the ‘ kingdom and castles ’ of
Scotland was given to John Balliol, twenty-three castles
were named in the roll and we know that certainly twenty-
two of those castles had adjoining burghs.4
The ‘ castle ’ was something new in twelfth-century
Scotland. A mark of the new Norman administration
introduced by the sons of Malcolm and Margaret, the king’s
motte-and-bailey castle was his strongpoint in the out¬
lying parts of his land, a strongpoint held by a new officer,
the sheriff, who administered a ‘ castle area ’ (soon to be
called a sheriffdom) on behalf of the king 5 : and naturally
1 David comes : almost certainly ‘ of Huntingdon.’ But there is ample
evidence that David ruled in the south of Scotland with very wide powers
and a large slice of independence. The Glasgow inquisitio opens, ‘ David
vero Cumbrensis regionis princeps’ (L.C., No. l), and it was David who
confirmed Thor’s grant of Ednam to St. Cuthbert (L.C., Nos. xxxm,
xxxiv) although the original grant to Thor was made by Edgar (L.C.,
No. xxiv). The phrase ‘ in Scotia vel in Cumbria ’ used by Robert, Bishop
of St. Andrews, very early in David’s reign (L.C., No. i.xxxn) appears to
indicate a continuing definite administrative division between Scotland
and Cumbria.
2 L.C., No. xxxv=Xeteo, No. 1 (1119x1120). This charter has been
held to be a later confection of early grants (somewhat like a later charter
of confirmation), but there is no reason to doubt any of the grants contained
in it. Shortly after his accession David I speaks of ‘ my burghs ’ of Dun¬
fermline, Stirling, Perth and Edinburgh (L.C., No. lxii. 1124x1127).
3 Cf. S.H.R., xxviii, 156. There may have been royal castles at Hadding¬
ton and Inverkeithing (both important strategic points) of which all trace
and record have been lost. By 1286 Dunfermline had ceased to be a royal
burgh and had become an abbatial burgh (cf. infra, p. xxxvi, note 2).
4 Rotuli Scotia, i, H6-12a.
6 See, in general, Fife, App. D, Part n.
B