Duddingston remained in the King’s hand, but ‘‘owing to the disturbed state of the country, he was unable to levy the usual feu of twenty-two marks on the town of Duddingston.”
Woe are not informed to whom the lands of Easter and Wester Duddingston were afterwards granted, or by whom they were held, until the time of James V. The chartularies are silent on the subject.
There is, however, an interesting instance of the strict feudal tenure under which they were held by the superior in a charter of the year 1420 granted by ‘‘ the Abbot of Kelso, with the common consent of his chapter.” The document is imperfect as regards names, etc., but it is to the effect that the proprietors, ‘‘ John, son of . . . . and Alice, his spouse, not having children,” had made s request ‘‘that the lands might pass over to the nearest heirs of the said Alice.” . . . But the Abbot declined to grant this, and decreed that ‘‘they make no perpetual alienation of the said lands of Wester Duddingston, nor assign them to anyone without the assent and freewill of the Abbey.” During the early part of the sixteenth century, the two formerly separate properties of Easter and Wester Duddingston were combined, and afterwards formed one Barony.
In connection with this, the family of the Bartons are the first to claim attention, followed by that of the Thomsons. In the seventeenth century the great families of Lauderdale, Dysart, Argyle, and Hamilton are conspicuous factors in our history ; while the following century brings us into contact with the no less distinguished names of Fletcher, Abercorn, Dick, and Dick-Cunningham.
A number of names of minor importance are to be found as owners of land in the parish which cannot be overlooked in such & notice as this, such as that of Murray, Ker, Lawson, Crichton, ete. These smaller lairds we will dispose of at once and very briefly, but the story of the families of the Barony and of Prestonfield we shall endeavour to unfold in some detail.
The Murrays of Cambrown or Cameron—sometimes styled as “of Balvaird” and sometimes of ‘‘ Arngask ”——held a portion of the land in the neighbourhood of Duddingston Loch, at the southern base of Arthur Seat. The earliest mention we have of this family occurs in the Lord Treasurer's accounts, where we find that James V., having laid out the extensive park of Holyrood,
