Irvine: The origins of this Scottish town are truly ancient

The Ayrshire town gave me the idea for the whole series and, having realised during my research that it is a fulsome subject, I will finish up with part 30 next week, also on Irvine, as it has a truly remarkable and disgracefully unknown history.

For those who think of Irvine only as Scotland’s fifth and last new town, please read on and prepare to be amazed this week and next at the vital role Irvine played in Scottish history, latterly because of its association with Robert Burns (below), which again is not fully appreciated and which I will chronicle next week.

(Image: University of Glasgow)

As previously explained, I have made Irvine the last town of the series because I was on a trip to the area when a friend from Irvine claimed that it had been a royal burgh and had once been capital of Scotland. A little research showed he was partially correct and that got me to thinking how many of our ancient towns had similar histories about which we knew little.

Quite a lot, as it turned out, so let me give you a list of all the locations I included in this series – if you missed any and are an online subscriber it is easy to read any of the past columns which are now in a special section under “History” on The National’s website.

In no order of importance or chronology, I have written about Dornoch, Forfar, Kilwinning, St Andrews (three columns), Stornoway, Elgin, Falkirk, Arbroath, Ayr, Paisley, Dumbarton, Dumfries, Lanark, Tain, Brechin, Rutherglen (two), Dunbar, Dunkeld, Haddington, Renfrew, Montrose (two), Linlithgow, Hamilton, and Kilmarnock.

READ MORE: How could I have overlooked this ancient Scottish town?

I set the criteria that towns needed have been founded before the Reformation in 1560 and needed to have played some part in Scotland’s history. Irvine absolutely qualifies.

In the course of my researches I have also discovered the important part some villages have played in our history and I will feature them in future columns.

After my second column on Irvine, over the following few weeks, as promised, I will be writing about arguably the most historic region of our country, the Scottish Borders, and will feature its towns, castles and famous locations and events.

If that mini-series is popular, I will move on to other ancient regions of our beautiful land as I try to create a picture of a Scotland that is not dwelling in the past but is genuinely aware of it. For I truly believe we need to know our past and learn from it if we are ever going to regain our independence.

READ MORE: When Scotland had its own Post Office and 'post towns'

Once again, one of today’s sources was book the New Statistical Account of Scotland (NSA) – compiled for the Church of Scotland by the Committee for the Society for the Sons and Daughters of the Clergy and published by Blackwood of Edinburgh in 1845.

I also consulted the works of Ayrshire historian AJ Morton, whose book The Lost Capital of Scotland convincingly made the case for a new appreciation of Irvine’s ancient past. Its history, as Morton pointed out, was all but dismissed after the creation of the new town in 1966.

The timing of this final column could not be more appropriate because the ancient festival of Marymass will be held in Irvine from August 15-26. I wish the Marymass Festival Committee, the Irvine Carters Society and all the people of the town every success with their celebrations which prove Scotland really does have a living history.

Irvine is truly an ancient town, so much so that it cannot be stated exactly where the name comes from. Is it from the Brythonic term meaning “green river” or a Celtic/Gaelic root meaning “west or west-flowing river”? In either case, the town gets its name from the River Irvine which flows into the Firth of Clyde at that part of Ayrshire. That strategic position on the river was recognised by the native tribes and possibly by the Roman invaders in the first and second centuries.

Though no evidence of Roman occupation has been found, definite remains of prehistoric human settlement, possibly dating as far back as 3500 BC, have been found in the area of Dreghorn just two miles east of the town centre, which also has signs of Iron Age hills forts.

Some claim that makes the area the longest continuously occupied settlement in Scotland and certainly a medieval village grew up at that location.

The strongest piece of evidence for the prehistoric existence of Irvine lies in the middle of the river in the town where the Granny Stane stands. Clearly visible when the water is low, there are two suggestions why it is there – it is either a volcanic “erratic” left behind after the last Ice Age, or part of a stone circle created by human hands.

Other similar stones in the river were removed long before modern methods of analysis became available. It seems the mystery of the Granny Stane must remain but I prefer the stone circle version.

It can be speculated, justifiably I think, that Irvine had a castle, an early version of Seagate Castle, adjacent to a harbour as far back as the beginning of the second millennium and there was certainly sufficient of a township for Irvine to attract royal attention.

(Image: NQ)

As with so many ancient towns of Scotland, it was the intervention of King David I (above) which really got the township going. In 1138, Hugh de Morville, an Anglo-Norman knight recruited by the king to help the royal military and governance of Scotland, was appointed Constable of Scotland by King David. He gave the De Morville family a large chunk of Ayrshire as their personal fiefdom.

As Lord of Cunningham, De Morville is known to have had a castle at Irvine and again I take that to be the forerunner of Seagate Castle.

As well as developing Kilwinning Abbey, he paid for monks to care for the faithful across his lands and that included Irvine where there was a church, possibly the forerunner of St Mary’s Chapel – no trace remains of that original church. The Carmelite Friary in the town was a much later foundation.

Like so many of our ancient towns, Irvine was recorded in ancient royal charters, as AJ Morton stated in an article for The National two years ago: “According to some of Scotland’s oldest royal charters, King David I and his court were at Irvine in 1124 (or 1128) directing the men of Dunfermline to ‘render … all the customary services … and co-operate in the work begun there without any delay’.

“In 1128 (or 1136) the king was back in Irvine granting the tenants of Dunfermline ‘free[dom] from all labour service on castles, bridges and other works’. These are remarkable charters. They confirm that the King of Scotland was able to maintain the country and issue legislation from somewhere in or around Irvine in the early 12th century.

“Before Edinburgh’s ascension as formal capital, Scotland’s capitals were wherever the Scottish king and court could formally (and comfortably) issue charters to the rest of the country. Perth, Scone, Stirling, Dundee, and St Andrews are widely celebrated as medieval administrative centres, along with many other Royal Burghs across Scotland.

‘THOUGH Irvine’s administrative record is still routinely uncelebrated today, King David I issued more charters from Irvine than from Aberdeen, Glasgow, and St Andrews. King Robert II issued five charters from Irvine in the first two years of his reign.

“He would sign four more and award a section of his ‘King’s Highway’ (in the centre of Irvine) for the development of a new Irvine court house, before his death (at Dundonald, overlooking the Irvine Valley) in 1390. His son, Robert III, issued more charters from Irvine than from Scone, Edinburgh, Linlithgow, and Stirling.”

If you accept that the title “capital” follows the residence of king and court, then you have to accept Morton’s assertion that Irvine was indeed the capital of Scotland.

(Image: Spencer Arnold/Getty Images)

Robert II also confirmed Irvine as a royal burgh in 1372, and there is some evidence that Alexander II had awarded a burgh charter around the year 1240 but it was Robert II’s grandfather, King Robert the Bruce (above), who helped make Irvine a name in history because after the area came into the hands of King John Balliol, when he was ousted by Edward I of England, Bruce took over the town and its castle in 1296.

Bruce was involved in another event that is less well remembered, the Capitulation of Irvine, a sorry episode when Bruce and most of the leaders of the Scots swore fealty to Edward I of England in July 1297, while Sir William Wallace’s rising was ongoing.

They could do little else, the huge English army in total control of the south west of Scotland and their own forces split on whether to join the uprising or not. They also possibly hoped to keep Longshanks at bay to allow Wallace and Sir Andrew Murray to organise their forces.

In the National Archives at Kew, the English still preserve a copy of the Capitulation of Irvine which stated: “Robert de Brus, earl of Carrick, James Stewart of Scotland, Alexander Lindsay, John, brother of the Stewart, and William Douglas make known that they, together with the community of their country, have risen against their lord, Sir Edward, king of England, lord of Ireland and duke of Aquitaine and against his peace, [and] have in his lordship and land of Scotland and of Galloway committed arson, homicide and divers robberies; they now submit themselves to the will of their lord the king, to make full amends, saving the terms contained in a document which they have from Sirs Henry de Percy and Robert de Clifford, captains of the army of the king of England in Scotland. They append their seals.”

Obviously not the Bruce’s finest hour but as Earl of Carrick and then King of Scots he was owed the loyalty of the people of Irvine and they did so much for him in the First War of Independence that he bestowed a charter on the town in 1308. That charter mentions that Irvine is of great antiquity.

READ MORE: Mystery surrounds much of history of this ancient Scottish town

So on royal charters alone, it can be seen that Irvine was a very important burgh – its status as such having been decreed by David I – which also means it must have had a castle or royal residence and some sort of religious institution. Again the archaeology does not allow for certainty but I think the Seagate Castle as it now stands was the site of that original castle.

I think AJ Morton is on less certain ground in suggesting that Irvine could be the “lost city” of Evonium described by the 16th-century historian Hector Boece in his Scotorum Historiae. Boece located his Evonium in the Lochaber area and the tradition is that if it existed – and I am very dubious that it did – Evonium somehow became associated with Dunstaffnage.

Let’s stick to the facts about Irvine. The NSA asserts that Irvine ‘ranks among the most ancient of the royal burghs of Scotland’ and that is certainly true. Next week I’ll show how Irvine developed from the 14th to the 19th centuries.