1 908-1909.] Old Dovecots {Scotland). 103 



Farnie (Cupar - Fife), 1860, p. 156. " Pigeon - houses (St 

 Monans). — A good stone-cast from the house of JSTewark 

 stands on the brink of the ploughed land an antique round 

 pigeon-house or, familiarly, ' dookit.' IS'ow the substantial air 

 of these pigeon -houses must surely have struck you before 

 meeting this one at Newark. Still further along the coast 

 they occur frequently — all bearing marks of antiquity, all 

 heavily built of good masonry, all situated apart from the 

 house to which they belong. They possess in the main two 

 shapes, being either round, as at Newark, or square with a 

 single sloping roof — the latter design reminding you of an 

 ordinary house sliced in two and whitewashed after the 

 operation. In those mysterious times — the Middle Ages — 

 a pigeon-house was only permitted to proprietors who owned 

 a certain quantity of land, and was therefore rather a valuable 

 privilege. He who possessed the necessary qualification took 

 very good care to erect his pigeon-house near the confines of 

 his property, so that his birds had every opportunity afforded 

 them of boarding upon his next neighbour's grain. Thus the 

 privileged proprietor of the pigeon-house had a certain satis- 

 faction, otherwise unattainable, in eating his pigeon-pie, which, 

 by the way, was a standing dish in all such establishments, 

 and so far as we know these pigeon-houses are still retained 

 under favour of the ancient statute thereanent." 



' A Sketch of the History of Fife and Kinross ' {M. J. G. 

 Mackay, 1890), p. 181. — "The dovecot or pigeon-house, still 

 so common an object in the Fife landscape, was once more 

 common. There were no fewer than 360, with 36,000 pairs 

 of breeders, making dreadful havoc among the grain, of which 

 they were supposed to consume between 3000 to 4000 bolls 

 a-year. As the profit of each pigeon-house could not be more 

 than ,£5 a-year, gentlemen were beginning to count the cost, 

 and many pigeon-houses were suffered to go to ruin. Many 

 of these now deserted, like the castles of their former owners, 

 give point to the saying which describes the possessions of 

 a Fife laird as consisting of ' a pickle land, mickle debt, a 

 dovecot, and a lawsuit.' 



" The two best specimens of the old dovecot yet remain- 

 ing may be seen at the Castle of Newark, near Crail,^ 



^ Nearer St Monans than Crail. 



