Abbey St Bathans () is a parish in the Lammermuir district of

Berwickshire Berwickshire (; ) is a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area in south-eastern Scotland, on the English border. The county takes its name from Berwick-upon-Tweed, its original county town, which was part of Scotland at the ...

, in the eastern part of the

Scottish Borders The Scottish Borders is one of 32 council areas of Scotland. It is bordered by West Lothian, Edinburgh, Midlothian, and East Lothian to the north, the North Sea to the east, Dumfries and Galloway to the south-west, South Lanarkshire to the we ...

. Unique in its topography, it is situated in a long winding steep wooded valley that follows the

Whiteadder Water Whiteadder Water is a river in East Lothian and Berwickshire, Scotland. It also flows for a very short distance through Northumberland before joining the River Tweed. In common with the headwaters of the Biel Water it rises on the low hillside ...

. The parish had a population of 106 at the 2011 Census.Census of Scotland 2011, Table KS101SC – Usual Resident Population, published by National Records of Scotland. Website http://www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk/ retrieved Apr 2018. See “Standard Outputs”, Table KS101SC, Area type: Civil Parish 1930, Area: Abbey St Bathans

History and Kirk

Abbey St Bathans was originally a

priory A priory is a monastery of men or women under religious vows that is headed by a prior or prioress. They were created by the Catholic Church. Priories may be monastic houses of monks or nuns (such as the Benedictines, the Cistercians, or t ...

Cistercian Nuns Cistercian nuns are female members of the Cistercian Order, a religious order of the Catholic Church. History The Cistercian Order was initially a male order. Cistercian female monasteries began to appear by 1125. The first Cistercian monastery ...

established in the 12th century. It was sanctified and then used as a retreat by the sisters who formed the community at Haddington and at Nunraw, under the patronage of Ada, Countess of Dunbar and her husband Patrick, Earl of Dunbar. Though the original location of the monastic accommodation is unknown today, there is a stone on one side of the glen known as the Abbey Stone. While there are no religious houses in the village today, there is a small church in the square. A clergyman is shared with nearby hamlet of Longformacus. The dedication is to St. Bathan—

Baithéne mac Brénaind Baithéne mac Brénaind (also known as Saint Baoithin and Saint Buadán) was an Irish monk, one of Saint Columba's followers who accompanied him to Scotland around 563, and was the first successor as Abbot of Iona Abbey. The Annals of Tigernach ...

—the second abbot of Iona. While there is no priory today there is a small church, or

Kirk Kirk is a Scottish and former Northern English word meaning 'church'. The term ''the Kirk'' is often used informally to refer specifically to the Church of Scotland, the Scottish national church that developed from the 16th-century Reformation ...

, in private ownership situated in the centre of the village. The Kirk was rebuilt in the 18th century and incorporates, in the east and north walls, late 14th century remains of the Church of the Priory of St Mary - the original Cistercian priory founded in the late 12th or early 13th centuries (exact date unknown) and secularised in 1622. Abbey St Bathans Kirk

In the mid-1960s, a deposit or "midden" was found by the existing Kirk, on the river bank where such a "tip" would logically be located . This contained many shards of pottery which were identified as medieval by the Royal Scottish Museum, Edinburgh. This suggests that the priory was located in the riverside meadow area around the existing Kirk, and a dig would probably reveal some of the structure. This deposit was discovered and excavated by Mrs. E. K. Robb, whose family used to holiday in the village. The dedication is to Saint Bathan () the second abbot of Iona. A Minister used to be shared with nearby hamlet of Longformacus. There is evidence that Abbey St Bathans has been inhabited for at least 2,500 years with the discovery of Bronze Age artefacts including a Bronze Age dagger , and the presence of the nearby Edins Hall Broch, an Iron Age defensive structure.

The village

Abbey St Bathans village is situated beside the

. The village is centred around the Kirk, a footbridge (known locally as the 'Gurkha bridge' after the Gurkha Soldiers that built it in 1987), sheep sheds, a post box, telephone exchange, phone box and housing. Further up the valley north of the Kirk is the village hall which holds regular events and occasional exhibitions. Downriver, south of the Kirk can be found a fish farm, car park, café and small sawmill. The Southern Upland Way and the Sir Walter Scott Way pass through the village. There are several footpaths for walkers including to the nearby Edins Hall Broch and Cockburn Law hill. The village is also on a bicycling route. The SYHA used to have a youth hostel in the village known locally as the Rest House, however it has been closed for over ten years. The

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

township of Saint Bathans is named after the village.Reed, A.W. (1975) ''Place names of New Zealand.'' Wellington: A.H. & A.W. Reed. p. 371

Abbey St Bathans House

The house began, probably in the early 19th century (a date stone of 1694 is of unknown provenance) as a thatched

cottage orné dates back to a movement of "rustic" stylised cottages of the late 18th and early 19th centuries during the Romantic movement, when some sought to discover a more natural way of living as opposed to the formality of the preceding Baroque and Neo ...

, set at the base of a knoll with the ground falling away steeply to the north to the

. It was built for the Turnbull family. This earlier core is identifiable at the centre of the entrance front as a two-bay section with first-floor dormers rising through the eaves, and with a salient gabled section at its northern end terminating the north-west range. Later extensions, especially in the 1870s, retain something of the original character, if not the scale, in the plethora of traceried

bargeboard A bargeboard or rake fascia is a board fastened to each projecting gable of a roof to give it strength and protection, and to conceal the otherwise exposed end grain of the horizontal timbers or purlins of the roof. The word ''bargeboard'' is pr ...

dormer A dormer is a roofed structure, often containing a window, that projects vertically beyond the plane of a Roof pitch, pitched roof. A dormer window (also called ''dormer'') is a form of roof window. Dormers are commonly used to increase the ...

s, and barley-sugar chimneystacks. The detailing of the north-west front is more overtly

baronial Baron is a rank of nobility or title of honour, often hereditary, in various European countries, either current or historical. The female equivalent is baroness. Typically, the title denotes an aristocrat who ranks higher than a lord or knight ...

, having a central tower-like pavilion with chamfered corners at the upper levels, a tall pyramidal roof, and a quadrant

bartizan A bartizan (an alteration of ''bratticing''), also called a guerite, ''garita'', or ''échauguette'', or spelled bartisan, is an overhanging turret projecting from the walls of late-medieval and early-modern fortifications from the early 14th c ...

at the north-east angle. There are attractive interiors, particularly the stair with twisted

baluster A baluster () is an upright support, often a vertical moulded shaft, square, or lathe-turned form found in stairways, parapets, and other architectural features. In furniture construction it is known as a spindle. Common materials used in its ...

s and timber arcading. Many fittings were moved here in the 1880s by Dorothea Veitch from Bassendean House. On the estate are a picturesque lodge, stables and groom's cottage, and an artfully composed Z-plan complex including gamekeeper's cottage and kennels. In 2019, the house was in multiple occupation.

References

Cruft, Dunbar & Fawcett, ''The buildings of Scotland: Borders'', 2006, p. 90 {{authority control Villages in the Scottish Borders Berwickshire Parishes in Berwickshire

History and Kirk

The village

Abbey St Bathans House

See also

References