A Corpus of Scottish Medieval
Parish Churches

Historical outline

Dedication: unknown

The church of Hirsel was amongst properties granted to the nuns of Coldstream by Cospatric, earl of Dunbar, and his wife Derdriu, at the time of its foundation shortly before 1166.(1) It was confirmed to the nuns by Earl Waltheof as the gift of Derdriu his mother, with confirmation from his father, Earl Cospatric, and subsequent confirmations came from later earls into the late thirteenth century.(2)  Hirsel was confirmed to Coldstream by Bishop Richard of St Andrews around 1165x1166, which conveyed the church and all things pertaining to it to the nuns.(3)  There is no more specific grant in proprios usus surviving but it seems that Bishop Richard’s confirmation formed the basis for an annexation of both parsonage and vicarage, as the church does not appear in the 1270s rolls of the papal tax-collector in Scotland.  Beyond a note of the dedication of the church by Bishop David de Bernham on 31 July 1246, there appears to be no significant record evidence of the church throughout most of the remaining pre-Reformation period.(4)  At the Reformation, the lands of Hirsel were noted as pertaining to the priory of Coldstream, set for £20.(5)

Notes

1. Chartulary of the Cistercian Priory of Coldstream, ed C Rogers (Grampian Club, 1879), no.8 [hereafter Coldstream Charters].

2. Coldstream Charters, nos 15, 26

3. Coldstream Charters, appendix, no.I.

4. A O Anderson (ed), Early Sources of Scottish History, ii (Edinburgh, 1922), 526 [Pontifical offices of St Andrews].

5. J Kirk (ed), The Books of Assumption of the Thirds of Benefices (Oxford, 1995), 186.  

Summary of relevant documentation

Medieval

Synopsis of Cowan’s Parishes: Granted to the priory of Coldstream c.1166 by Gospatrick. Both the parsonage and the vicarage were annexed, and the cure was served by a chaplain.(1)

c.1166 Church with one carucate of land included in the foundation charter of the nunnery, granted by Gospatrick and his wife Derder.(2)

1166x78 Church confirmed as a possession of the nunnery by Richard, bishop of St Andrews.(3)

1182x124 Confimed by Waltheof, Patrick I, Patrick II, earls of Dunbar with lands, teinds, oblations and other rights.(4)

1435 Confirmation by James I of the gift of lands in Hirsal by the convent by Alexander Ellem de Butterdale.(5)

Post-medieval

Books of assumption of thirds of benefices and Accounts of the collectors of thirds of benefices: The Parish church pertains to Coldstream. Auldhirsal and other pertinent mentioned, set for £20.(6)

[No further references to the church found in the post-reformation records]

Notes

1. Cowan, The parishes of medieval Scotland, 82.

2. Chartulary of the Cistercian priory of Coldstream, no. 8.

3. Chartulary of the Cistercian priory of Coldstream, App, i, no. 1.

4. Chartulary of the Cistercian priory of Coldstream, nos. 15, 17, 26.

5. Chartulary of the Cistercian priory of Coldstream, App. i, no. 7.

6. Kirk, The books of assumption of the thirds of benefices, 186.

Bibliography

Chartulary of the Cistercian priory of Coldstream, 1870, ed. C. Rogers (Grampian Club), London.

Cowan, I.B., 1967, The parishes of medieval Scotland, (Scottish Record Society), Edinburgh.

Kirk, J., 1995, The books of assumption of the thirds of benefices, (British Academy) Oxford.

Architectural description

The church at Hirsel was granted to the Cistercian nunnery of Coldstream by Gospatric, earl of Dunbar at the time of its foundation, in about 1166. It appears that both the parsonage and vicarage were appropriated, with the cure served by a chaplain.(1) Bishop David de Bernham carried out one of his dedications here on 31 July 1246.(2)

The church had evidently passed out of use even before the Reformation, possibly being reduced to the status of a chapel dependent on Lennel/Coldstream, and by the seventeenth century it had been lost to sight and its existence was no longer remembered. But it had long been noted that ‘stone coffins and great quantities of human bones have been exhumed on the grounds’ of The Hirsel, the house of the earls of Home.(3)

When in June 1977 a number of worked stones were turned up by the plough, it was decided to investigate further. In 1978 a geophysical survey was conducted, followed by five seasons of excavation between 1979 and 1982.(4) As a result of this work the site of the church has been subjected to one of the most thorough archaeological investigations of any in Scotland.

The excavations at The Hirsel demonstrated that ecclesiastical sites can have very long and complex histories, and that the ecclesiastical use of the site may represent a relatively short phase of its human occupation. In this case pottery indicated some occupation of the site from the later Neolithic to the Bronze Age.

The first element of the church building, which was erected perhaps as early as the tenth century, was a small building of roughly square plan with rounded corners, which was presumably intended to meet the spiritual needs of the land-holder and his dependents. Probably by the time it was granted to Coldstream Nunnery an apse had been added to its east end. In successive subsequent phases a rectangular nave was built to the west of the existing church, and by the later middle ages the choir itself was evidently rebuilt to an externally rectangular plan.

Following demolition of the chancel, possibly at a date before the Reformation, the nave appears to have been converted for use as a barn. During that use it was burned down.

Notes

1. Ian B. Cowan, The Parishes of Medieval Scotland, (Scottish Record Society) 1967, p. 82.

2. Alan Orr Anderson, Early Sources of Scottish History, Edinburgh, 1922, vol. 2, p. 526.

3. Francis H Groome, Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland, vol. 4, 1883.

4. R. Cramp and C. Douglas-Home, ‘New Discoveries at The Hirsel, Coldstream, Berwickshire’, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, vol. 109, 1977–8, pp. 222–32; R.J. Cramp, Excavations at the Hirsel, Coldstream, Borders, (University of Durham and University of Newcastle Archaeological Report, vol. 8), Durham, 1985; Rosemary Cramp (ed.), The Hirsel Excavations (Society for Medieval Archaeology Monograph 36), London, 2014, particularly at pp. 49-82.