"Attested Coppie Contract of alienation and Disposition betweixt: William Earl of Lothian and William Elliott of Stob

[SCOTLAND]. [KERR], William, 1st Earl of Lothian (1605?-1675). Scottish nobleman, soldier, and politician. MANUSCRIPT: "Attested Coppie Contract of alienation and Disposition betwixt William Earl of Lothian and William Elliott of Stobs. 10th & 16th Augt. 1648. of the Lands and Barony of Fewelrule [Fewrule], reg. Septm 8th 1648." [cover title]. 35pp., folio, with marginal notes in another hand., stitched, uncut. [Edinburgh & Jedburgh, 1648].

Coincidentally, this sale was concluded the day before Cromwell's victory over the Royalists and Scots at the Battle of Preston (17-19 August, 1648). The 1st Earl of Lothian sells several properties in the parish to William Elliott of Stob[b]s and his eldest son Gilbert Elliott; significant lands in the ancient feudal barony of Fewrule (Roxburgh), a name with various spellings. The sale included a number of towns or villages, some in the parishes of Kirktown and Cavers. The barony was at one time included in the barony of Cavers. King James IV granted properties in the baron of Fewroule in 1496. Written by one John Mair, the manuscript is signed on every page by two notary publics, and is signed and witnessed at the end. Neither the ownership of this land by the earl of Lothian, nor its sale are recorded by George Tancred of Weens, Rulewater and Its People: An Account of the Valley of the Rule and Its Inhabitants (1907), where the Earl of Lothian is mentioned several times, as is William Stobb and members of his family, pp. 33-4; nor Origines Parochiales Scotiae: The Antiquities Ecclesiastical and Territorial of the Parishes of Scotland (1850), but see vol. I., pp. 351-3. For Kerr, see OBNB. Covers soiled, some corners curled, internally fine.