The fifteenth century, the age of revived letters and intelligence through Europe,1 was the chief era of Scotch University foundations. The University of St. Andrews was founded in the beginning of the century, Glasgow in the middle, and Aberdeen at its close. The last, like the former two, owed its birth to the Bishop of … Continue reading Aberdeen University, pp.254-324. →

THE Universities of Scotland are the legitimate offspring of the Church. They alone of our existing institutions carry us back to the time when the clergy were the only supporters of schools, and the bishop of the great diocese was the patron and head, as well as the founder, of its university. The annals of … Continue reading Glasgow University, pp.220-253. →

The beautiful valley of Strathearn has some peculiar points of interest for the Scotch historian and antiquary. It contains, in the forts scattered over it lower district, and in the remarkable "round tower" of Abernethy, among the oldest vestiges of civil dominion and of ecclesiastical antiquities that remain to us. The earldom ascends to a … Continue reading Inchaffray, pp.204-219. →

No other spot of Scotch ground has witnessed such changes as the river bank where Teviot falls into Tweed. A town once stood there, of such importance as to form one of that remarkable Burgher Parliament, known as "the Court of the Four Burghs of Scotland," of which not a house, not a trace, remains. … Continue reading Kelso, pp.172-203. →

The date of the foundation of Arbroath is of some interest in church and public history. Thomas à Becket, the high church archbishop, was slain at the altar of his own church of Canterbury, on the 29th of December 1170. Two years afterwards, in 1173, he was canonized; and within five years of his canonization, … Continue reading Arbroath, pp.144-172. →

The situation of Newbattle is of that kind which the Cistercians most of all affected. The South Esk, escaped from the green hills of Temple and the woody ravines of Dalhousie, widens its valley a little to give room for a long range of fair level "haughs." At the very head of these meadows, and … Continue reading Newbattle, pp.125-144. →

THE monastery of Scone, a foundation of Culdees of unknown antiquity, was re-formed by King Alexander I., who, with his queen Sibilla, wishing to adorn the house of God and to exalt His habitation, established in it a colony of canons regular of the Order of St. Augustine, brought from the church of St. Oswald … Continue reading Scone, pp.121-125. →