Series 5 > Miscellany [of the Scottish History Society] XIII

DUNFERMLINE GILD COURT BOOK
47
with a gild court of January 1550 (1551); but the entry fees of new
brethren listed on the recto side of folio B would not tally with this later
positioning. The folio is, therefore, best placed between fos 44 and 45;
the verso may have been left blank and added to a year later; and, indeed,
this seems even more likely when it is noted that the last entry on folio B
verso refers to the year 1574.
The recto side indicates that the full entry fee to enter the gild was still
40s; and that those who were liable to pay only ‘spice and wine’, because
of rights of entry through inheritance, paid merely 6s 8d.' It is interesting
that two brethren only were forgiven their entry fees—Thomas Stewart
and Patrick Halkett. Both became gild brothers in October 1548 (f. 42v.).
Thomas Stewart had no claim by inheritance to enter the gild. Patrick
Halkett was, however, the son of John Halkett of Pitfirrane. The latter
had been provost on many occasions from 1511 (f. 28v.) to 1530.2 The
excuse from payment of entry fees, an exceptional privilege, is explained
when it is noted that, by December 1549, Thomas Stewart was dean of
gild (f. 44) and Patrick Halkett was provost by January 1550;3 both were
possibly already in power by the time their fees were waived.
The verso side of the folio deals with routine financial matters: the
dean of gild and the kirkmaster both present their accounts for 1550. The
next entry was recorded at a later date—1573/4; and is not only a fairly
common use of empty paper, with insertions on a partially blank folio,
but is also typical of the workings of the gild in Dunfermline. There was
a close interweaving of the functions of burgh and gild, with the same
men holding office in both capacities. Often the same scribe recorded
both the burgh court matters and the gild dealings; and, at times,
specifically burghal affairs were inserted, probably erroneously, in the
gild book and vice versa.4 This entry is such an example; and is
confirmation that by this date elections to burghal offices were free and
open.5
Folio C
The recto side of the folio is dated January 1591 [1592], It appears to be
1 E. P. Torrie, ‘The guild in fifteenth-century Dunfermline’, in M. Lynch et al, (eds) The
Scottish Medieval Town (Edinburgh, 1988), 247.
2 The Burgh Records of Dunfermline, ed. E. Beveridge (Edinburgh, 1912), 223.
3 Ibid., 224.
4 Torrie, Gild Court Book of Dunfermline, p. xx.
5 Torrie, ‘Thesis’, 58; A. Shearer (ed.), Extracts from the Burgh Records of
Dunfermline in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Dunfermline, 1951), 3.