Mary Mildmay Fane, Countess of Westmorland, wrote letters to her daughter Grace Fane, Countess of Home, discussing her health and hopes of pregnancy.1 Grace lived in Scotland at Dunglass Castle. As noted in the catalogue of the Moray Papers, the six surviving letters include some court news and a few lines of code or cipher.…
Six letters from Mary Mildmay Fane, Countess of Westmorland, to her daughter Grace, Countess of Home (died 1633), survive in the Moray papers, probably kept as keepsakes by her sister-in-law, Margaret Home, Countess of Moray (died 1683). The Countess of Westmorland wrote to Grace on 9 January 1626/7 describing Christmas at Apethorpe in Northamptonshire. The…
An array of household lists were made after the death of Anna of Denmark, for accounting wages and payments. One of them (TNA SP 14/107 f.124) allots extra reward payments and gives lengths of service. It mentions Edward Ashburner, yeoman of the leash (15 years service), Richard Polhill (15 years), yeoman of bows and lymehounds,…
When James VI travelled to Denmark to meet his bride Anna of Denmark, he sent the royal master of work William Schaw to Edinburgh in March 1590 to make preparations for his return. Accounts of payments made from the queen's dowry record that Schaw returned with a Danish or German turner or wright. One entry…
Catherine Tollemache was a daughter of Lionel Tollemache and Elizabeth Murray (later Duchess of Lauderdale). In 1677, she came to Edinburgh with her mother and the Duke of Lauderdale and stayed at Moray House in the Canongate. The Duke was the uncle of James Stuart, Lord Doune, and Catherine married him in December 1677. After…
William Fowler (died January 1572), an Edinburgh merchant, served as a treasurer of the French revenues of Mary, Queen of Scots.1 He was also a textile merchant, and his registered will lists his merchant stock of fabrics and ready made items such as hats, bonnets, belts, and "counterfeit pearls for masking".2 I've transcribed much of…
Lady Mary or Marie was a daughter of Anne Gordon, Countess of Moray. A record of her mother's income and expenditure survives in a series of accounts covering a part of the 1620s and 1630s. The accounts have a lot to say about Lady Mary, her parrot, wool bought for a frame used for a…
William Schaw was master of work to James VI and Anna of Denmark, and chamberlain of her Dunfermline estates. He was in charge of royal buildings, signing accounts and receipts, and was probably the designer of the 1594 Chapel Royal at Stirling Castle.1 Schaw was responsible for refurbishments at the Prince's Tower at Stirling around…
Birrel's Diarey (sic), an important source for Edinburgh's early modern history, and published as long ago as 1798, says that George Heriot was appointed as goldsmith to Anna of Denmark on 27 July 1597, and proclaimed by trumpet in this role at the Mercat Cross. He displaced a French craftsman "Clei". Heriot's appointment is also…
Payments for food for the household of Catherine de' Medici were recorded daily, on long narrow strips of parchment. Usually the strips were signed by her Italian master of household J-B Seghiro or Seghizo (or Seghiso). Originally from Modena, he died in 1571 aged 84 and was buried in Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois, Paris.1 Joa Bapta Seghizo,…
When Mary Dudley, Countess of Home, died in London in March 1644, her body was shipped to Dunglass for burial and £300 sterling was allocated for her monument, according to her will. Settling the will was a convoluted and protracted process, in part because her son-in-law John Maitland, Earl of Lauderdale was declared delinquent, and…
