154 Transactions. 
the Priory of Guisborough in 1119, and the Brus family* in 
Annandale, as elsewhere, reserved their generosity for that house. 
Otherwise Annan might have become the seat of a bishopric or 
great monastic institution. 
THT. St. Malachi’s Curse (1148). 
One ancient legend breaks the monotony of the earliest annals 
of Annan. Its narrator} was the writer of the Chronicle of 
Lanercost,{ believed to have been a Minorite Friar of Carlisle. 
Malachi O’ Morgair, a renowned Irish bishop of great sanctity, 
afterwards canonized, was passing through Annandale on a journey 
towards Rome. Probabilities point to 1148 asthe date. On his 
way he paused for rest and refection at Annan, which the 
chronicler tells us was a small town, the capital of the district, 
Anandia caprtanea rllius patriae villula. Inquiring where he 
could best seek hospitality he was directed to the hall (aula) of 
the lord of the place, Robert de Brus, son of the original grantee 
of Annandale. A robber was on the point of being hanged. On 
this coming to St. Malachi’s ears as he sat under the Brus’s roof, 
he said to the Brus that the judgment of blood had never yet 
desecrated his presence, and he claimed as a pilgrim that Brus 
should grant him the malefactor’s life. To this Brus, by a nod, 
seemingly consented, but quietly went outside and ordered the 
thief to be hanged there and then. When St. Malachi resumed 
his journey he saw the dead body dangling on the neighbouring 
gallows. The saint had, before setting out, invoked a blessing on 
the Bruce and all his house. This spectacle caused a revulsion of 
feeling ; the blessing was revoked and a curse denounced instead. 
This strange narrative, whilst incidentally styling Annan a city, 
adds the remarkable observation that in consequence of the 
saint’s malediction not only did the descendants of Brus long 
suffer a blight but the town itself, Annan, “lost the honour of a 
burgh.” 
The miraculous element in the story concerns us little here, but 
it is too interesting te be passed without notice. The curse of the 
saint the chronicler assures us, lay on the line of Brus for several 
*See this remarked upon in Guisborough Chartulary (Surtees Society), 
pref. xvii. 
+The story has been dealt with in detail in my article, entitled ‘‘ Saint 
Malachi’s Curse,” Scots Lore, p. 124. 
tOhronicon de Lanercost (Maitland Club), 160-161. 
