Margaret Purves and George Litilljohn had a booth on Edinburgh’s royal mile, selling hats and textile accessories. They also supplied goods to stallholders known as “cramers” for resale. Much of their stock was imported from Flanders and debts for merchandise in Flemish money are listed in Margaret’s 1606 will. The business model seems very similar to Edinburgh merchants with a much larger turnover whose stock lists include a wider variety of imported fabrics.

John Sering, the Lutheran minister of Anna of Denmark, had been a witness at the baptism of Margaret’s daughter Lucretia on 29 May 1597.¹ It has sometimes been argued that Sering’s sympathy towards Presbyterianism alienated him from the queen, so this is at least evidence that he was an occasional churchgoer.²

One of Margaret and George’s sons was called Adrian. Only a few children in Edinburgh at this time were baptised as Adrian or Hadrian, and all can be connected to the Dutch diplomatic resident Adrian Damman, the Flemish clockmaker Adrian Bowdoings or the Flemish portrait painter Adrian Vanson.

The will includes a debt from Susanna de Colone, apparently the widow of the portrait painter Adrian Vanson. Susanna had remarried to John Robertson, a master butcher from a family who had “furnished” the royal household.³ The sum was probably a loan. This probably had been a money lending transaction. The last known payment to Adrian Vanson was for a painted arch commissioned by the Dutch community in London for the 1604 royal entry, so his widow, if this is she, must have married again soon after his death.⁴

A painter mentioned in this will, James Warkman, owed money to Littiljohn and Purves, confirmed by a “decreit” of the baillie’s court. Records of these judgements survive in Edinburgh City Archive, in several recently rebound volumes (ECA SL234).⁵ James Workman’s painter work is very well documented, including preparations for Anna of Denmark’s entry to Edinburgh.⁶

When Margaret Purves died in 1606, an inventory was drawn up of the couple’s assets and debts, and this was copied into the register of the commissary court. This is a handy index of the stock of their booth (their shop) on Edinburgh’s royal mile and of their network of customers and commercial contacts, including suppliers in Middelburg. These extracts give some flavour of the document. The names can be rather hard to make out.

NRS ECC8/8/42 pp. 612-614, 29 January 1607

Margaret Purves … spous to George Littiljohne merchand burges of Edr … deceisit 1606 … gevin up be the said George Litiljohne hir spous as fader & la[wf]ull administrator to Adriane, Jane, & Lucretia Littiljohne his laull barnes …

In the first … pertening to thame … Item within the merchand buith, 2 hattis lynit with velvot at £4 the pece … mair 2 hattis lynit with taffetie … mair 3 bairnes hattis at 2mks the pece … ane pund sewing silver price 30 li … 2 pund thrawin pasmentis at xx li the pund … 4 pund of waltingis … certane remains of paper prenis [pins] estimat to 30 s … certane neidles estimate to 30 s … 2 pund wecht … 2 pund wecht of cullours of silk lillikin pasmentis … ane pund blak freinzeis of silkis … ane half pund wecht of [?harbwt] pasmentis of blak silk … ane pund cullours freinzeis … certane remains of buttonis … certane remains singill burrat … 2 pund wecht cullors of silk … blak silk … half ane pund of cullours of [?harbiet] pasmentis of silk … ginger … Item 20 pund wecht of [p. 613] brumstane [sulphur] … Item 3 dozen of blak louping of silk at 15 s the doz … ane dozen of skins of parchment … 7 peces blak buckrum … Item, mair certane Danskin thread estimat to xxx li Item of redy mony the soume of lx li …

Item ther was awen to the said Margaret Purves & hir said spous by James Littiljohn, sone and air to George iij c li. Item be Elspeth Gibson cramer [a pedlar, shopkeeper, stallholder] … be Bessie Hendersoune cramer … be Andro Beattie in Esdaile … Item be Susanna Declony spous to Johne Ro^tsone m^r flescheour the soume of xxxiij li vj s iiij d … by James Forman in Leith baillie … by John Traill merchant in Forfar … Alex Stewart’s wyf … umqle James Bowar … Alex Huntar tavernour in Edr … George Ireland servitour to my lord collector … Wm Murray … James Warkman painter conforme to ane decreit befoir the provest & baillies of Edr 19 li 6 s 8 d … by Robert Rig broder to the laird of Carbarrie … Wm Mar wrycht in Edr xij li ix s viij d Item be M[argare]t Prestoun … by Nicoll Penstoun … Wm Vallance tailyeor … be the tutor of Murthlie vij li iiij s … be umqle Alex Bower … airis of umqle John Seytoun of Kirkcaldie of byrun annlls …

Item, ther wes awand be the said umqle [deceased] M[argare]t Purves and her said spous to Johnne Porterfield eldar burgess of Edr half ane yeiris mail … Item to James Grahame younger conform to his obligation nyne scoir pundis, Item mair be [sic, ‘to’] him xx pundis Flemis money at vij li Scottis the pund [p.614] summa in Scottis mony vijxx li [£140]. Item, to [?Micheil] van straet, [?tedrrye man] xlij li Flemis money price of the pund greit in Scottis mony vij li. Item, to [?] Blaikburne merchand for merchandrie … Item to [?] [?Qinkeberge, or, Qinkeber the] [? saitler] man in Middleburgh for merchandrie vij li xs in Flemis money …

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1. NRS Old parish registers births 685/1 Edinburgh. ‘w[itnesses]. Zounghar Hans eler and Joannes Seringes minister’ ↩︎
2. Maureen M. Meikle & Helen M. Payne, “From Lutheranism to Catholicism: The Faith of Anna of Denmark”, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 64:1 (January 2013), p. 58: Jemma Field, “Anna of Denmark and the Politics of Religious Identity in Jacobean Scotland and England”, Northern Studies, 50 (2019), p. 90 fn. 10. ↩︎
3. John Robertson supplied meat as the king’s butcher to both royal households in the 1590s, Exchequer Rolls, 23, p. 169. ↩︎
4. Gervase Hood , “A Netherlandic Triumphal Arch for James I” , in Susan Roach, Across the Narrow Seas : Studies in the History and Bibliography of Britain and the Low Countries (London, 1991), p. 78: Martin Wiggins and Catherine Richardson, British Drama: 1533-1642: 1603-1608 (Oxford, 2012), p. 86: David A. H. B. Taylor, “Damnatio Memoriae”, Steven J. Reid, The Afterlife of Mary Queen of Scots (Edinburgh, 2024), p. 35. ↩︎
5. The registers or books of decreets are unpublished, but are examined in Cathryn Spence, Women, Credit, and Debt in Early Modern Scotland (Manchester, 2016). Marguerite Wood described them with some excerpts in Castle and Town (Oliver and Boyd, 1928), pp. 208-212. Some details of costume from the books are discussed in this blog. ↩︎
6. Michael R. Apted and Susan Hannabuss, Painters in Scotland: A Dictionary (Scottish Record Society, 1978), pp. 108-110. ↩︎