TRANSACTIONS OF THE GLASGOW ARCHEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. No. VI. PEEL: ITS MEANING AND DERIVATION. BY GEORGE NEILSON, F.S.A.SCOT. [Read at a Meeting of the Society held on 9th January, 1891.] THIS paper' is an attempt to trace the historical evolution of the word 'peel' -a name now practically appropriated to the small, strong rectangular towers of stone which, sometimes moated, sometimes surrounded by a 'barmkin' or exterior wall, stud the English and Scottish border with memorials of ancient international feuds. It is emphatically a word with a history, to which neither lexicographer nor antiquary has yet done justice. 1. NOTE OF EXPLANATION OF SOME CONTRACTED References. Bain=Calendars of Documents relating to Scotland. publication.) Bower Bower's Scotichronicon. Ed, Goodal. Ed. Joseph Bain. (Record Exch. Rolls Exchequer Rolls of Scotland. (Record publication.) L.Q. Liber Quotidianus Contrarotulatoris Garderobe, 1299-1300. Rolls series. Rot. Scot. Rotuli Scotia. (Record publication.) Stevenson Historical Documents Scotland, 1286-1306. Ed. Joseph Stevenson. (Record publication.) 2. Excellent general descriptions of these towers are given by Mr. C. C. Hodges in the Reliquary, v. pp. 1-10, and by Chancellor R. S. Ferguson, in his History of Cumberland, 236. See also an interesting sketch of the border tower system in Canon (now Bishop) Creighton's Carlisle, pp. 82-84. I differ from them all, however, as to the meaning and history of peel. As is not unusual in matters philological it is necessary at the outset to discard some preconceptions,' to get rid of the idea that peel meant from the first what it means now, and to be prepared to find that in the course of some six centuries the signification has altered. Was our peel always a tower of stone, as all previous writers on the subject have assumed? If not, what was it? Whence comes it-from Latin Phala, an oval tower;2 from Latin pila, a pile; from Celtic peel or pill, an earthen mound or castle 4 or from any of them? Before offering an answer I submit my evidence. I. PEELS OF EDWARD I. The oldest proper examples of the word known to me occur in the accounts of the costs of the Scottish wars of Edward I. The first peel on record is that of Lochmaben: the next is at Dumfries. Others soon follow at Linlithgow and Selkirk. 1. Lochmaben : Edward retiring from Scotland after the battle of Falkirk in 1298, had taken possession of the castle of the Bruces at Lochmaben, referred to as a castrums and as a chastel.6 That winter a considerable addition was made to its defensive strength, as appears from payments made to English labourers, sawyers and carpenters (ad faciendum pelum ibidem) for making a peel there. The entry as regards the sawyers is (ad sarranda ligna pro constructione peli) for sawing wood for the making of the peel. This leaves little doubt that the peel was essentially a wooden structure. Its character is further illustrated by an order issued in November, 1299, to provide for the 1 I begin with some of my own contained in Annandale under the Bruces, pp. 28-9. 2 Jamieson's Dictionary. 3 Professor Skeat in his Supplement to his Dictionary. 4 I think I have heard this derivation eloquently maintained by Professor John Veitch. 5 Trivet (English Hist. Soc.) 374. Probably this castle then stood on the old site now known as the Castlehill. The argument that chiefly persuades me into that belief is touched apon in my last note on Selkirk peel infra. 6 Stevenson, ii. 333. 7 Stevenson, ii. 361. 8 Stevenson, ii. 404, 405. Bain, ii. 1112, sure keeping of the close outside the castle, strengthened by a palisadecustodia clausi extra castrum de Loghmaban palitio firmati. This passage points with great clearness to the conclusion that the peel was this palisaded or stockaded close, forming an outer rampart extending the bounds and increasing the accommodation of the castle. In 1300 houses had been made in the 'piel,' and in 1301 the 'pele' was unsuccessfully assailed by the Scots. In the writs relative to Lochmaben Castle in subsequent years, very many of them conjoin the peel with the castle,3 the full name and style of which was castrum et pelum. In 1376 payments were made for planks and to carpenters at the new front called 'la Pele,' and the entry distinctly contrasts with that which follows for 'stanworke' of the castle itself. So late as 1397 English writs refer to the castle and peel. The nature of the peel of Lochmaben is thus tolerably definite. 2. Dumfries: Still more so is the evidence from Dumfries. A castle was there, just as at Lochmaben, before the peel was made by King Edward in the autumn of 1300. In September Friar Robert of Ulm and with him Adam of Glasham and many other carpenters were busy in the forest of Inglewood in Cumberland making the peel, as the account? phrases it, which was to be set up round about the castle of Dumfries. King Edward visited them one day. The queen visited them another. The exigencies of war demanded haste, and the work was pushed on with all possible energy. Soon we hear that the king has gone to Dumfries, perhaps escorting the workmen and the materials, Stevenson, ii. 408, Les maisons quil ad fait en le piel de Loghmaban. 2 Stevenson, ii. 432. 3 In 1300 L. Q. 120; in 1304 Bain, ii. 1525; in 1334-36-37-38,-41-56-60; Rot. Scot., i. 263, 264, 276, 280, 281, 399, 479, 550, 607, 793, 846. 4 Bain, iv. 231. 5 Bain, iv. 494. 6 Stevenson, ii. 333, 413; Exch. Rolls, i. 37; Rot. Scot., i. 7, 12. 7 L.Q. 165, Carpentariis facientibus pelum in foresta de Ingelwode assidendum circa astrum de Dumfres. 8 L.Q. 167. This entry repeats the phrase of the last one precisely. (pour lever son pel e efforcer le chastel) to raise his peel and strengthen the castle. Cordage and other necessaries were purchased to bind up the timber2 for conveyance to the peel, and other arrangements were made for the same purpose.3 Precise details are lacking as to the mode of conveyance, but whilst some of the material was transported by sea up the river Nith, it is probable that the bulk of it was conveyed by the workmen themselves under convoy of the expeditionary force, a part of which the king had revieweds at Carlisle on 15th October. On the 18th he appears to have reached Annan," doubtless, with a detachment of his army on the march. Possibly the work of erecting the peel at Dumfries began before his arrival there, for the accounts? leave it uncertain how much of the work of the carpenters and others at the peel was done at Inglewood Forest, and how much on the spot. By the 20th of October, at latest, the task was being pushed briskly forward by all hands at Dumfries. Ditchers, carpenters and smiths toiled hard at the digging of ditches and planting and rearing of beams and palisades. The wages account shews that from first to last the carpenters (on an average to the number of over 60, but sometimes over 100 being employed) laboured for 11 weeks. The ditchers, numbering about 250, worked for a fortnight only. There were about two dozen smiths. It is obvious, therefore, how greatly the carpenter-work predominated. The term employed in the entries describing these labours is usually very general-for work (circa pelum) about the 'peel.' We are not told very precisely what was done by the 1 Stevenson, ii. 296. There can be no doubt that Father Stevenson is in error in assigning this letter to August, 1298. There was no peel being raised at Dumfries then. All the circumstances point clearly to the letter having been written in October, 1300. See the letter, note its contents, and compare-Bain, iii. 1154, 1164, 1165, 1171, 1172, 1174, 1175; iv. p. 446; L. Q. 13, 73, 265. The matter cannot be discussed at greater length here. 2 L. Q. 74. 3 Bain, iv. 1783; L.Q. 265. 4 L. Q. 268. 5 L. Q. 260. 6 L. Q. 43. 7 L. Q. 264-5. 3 Operancium circa pelum de Dumfres, L. Q. 6, 7, 264, 268; Pro factura et operacione peli L.Q. 263; Pro factura peli, L.Q. 265, 268; Pro pelo faciendo, L. Q. 268. |