80; Arms of the Royal Burgh of Sanquhar. 



Dumfries. The name of the town was then spelled Senewar. 

 The account in question refers to the property (bona) found 

 on the two men, who are said to have been put to death in 

 the time of Stephen of Flanders (bona duorum hominum de 

 collatorum apud Senewar tempore Stephani Flandrenris 

 justicarii). Stephen Fleming was the King's "justiciar" 

 for the Lothians. The men beheaded must have been of 

 fairly high social standing since the property of the one 

 amounted to ;^4 7s 6d, and of the other to 12s 6d, large 

 sums at a time when a working man earned only a penny a 

 day. The charter of 1484 is evidence too that from a time, 

 then considered ancient, Sanquhar had been a free Burgh of 

 Barony and that at least two charters had been granted to 

 the overlord on her behalf by Scottish Kings. I am now 

 able to put forward definite evidence that in the reign of 

 David II. Sanquhar was a Burgh. In 1334 Edward Baliol 

 had acknowledged Edward III. of England as overlord, and 

 evidently the English monarch wished to claim the estates 

 of all those who had refused to support the puppet King 

 Baliol. One of those whose lands were claimed was Thomas 

 Dickson, son of Thomas Dickson, who possessed fine 

 Burgages of land in Sanquhar (Quinque Burgages), which 

 were valued at i6s 8d in the time of peace, but which in 

 1334 were yielding no revenue, having been laid waste 

 (Bain's Calendar). A Burgage is land held from the King 

 or other lord within a Burgh, and the use of the word here 

 shows us that the town must have been a Burgh then. 

 Thomas Dickson's share of the Burgh lands must have been 

 considerable when we take into account the fact that the 

 rental of the whole Barony of Sanquhar at this time was 

 only 200 merks. The rental given leads one to think that 

 there may be some truth in the old stories of the large 

 amount of land held by the Burgh in former days, stories 

 which allege that the town lands went at one time far past 

 its present boundaries. There seems little doubt, too, but 

 that Bruce was in our neighbourhood on at least one occa- 

 sion. We find in the accounts of Edward I. of England 

 under date 1306 that there was a force under Sir John de 

 Butetourte, consisting of among others 19 knights, 51 



