In the May issue of Family Tree I discussed records that may help with the research of properties and land in Scotland. To truly understand what is being recorded within such documents, however, it is necessary to understand some of the basics about the form of land tenure through which they were compiled. From the 12th century until November 2004, most Scottish land transactions were carried out through a form of tenure known as ‘feudalism’.
How feudalism arrived & evolved on British shores Feudalism was brought to England and Wales as a consequence of the Norman Conquest in 1066, and manifested itself throughout both realms through a series of land rights conveyed by the Crown as a ‘superior’ to a hierarchy of knights, barons and ‘lords of the manors’ as its ‘vassals’. In exchange it demanded fealty and regular tributes, including military support when called upon. By the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, feudalism had all but died out south of the border, but in Scotland, the show was just getting started.
The Norman conquest did not include Scotland, where feudalism was instead introduced through dynastic marriages between Scottish and Anglo-Norman nobles during the 12th century reign of David I. In this period, it was mainly the lowland and border areas that became affected, with regions such as the Gaelic speaking Western Isles and Highlands not feudalised until the collapse of the Lordship of the Isles some three centuries later. The Lordship of the Isles was a separate, independent Gaelic/Norse kingdom which had encompassed the north east of Ireland, the Isle of Man and the western seaboard of Scotland.
In other parts, feudalism had
