Ayton and Burnmouth Parish Church is a member church () of the

Church of Scotland The Church of Scotland (CoS; ; ) is a Presbyterian denomination of Christianity that holds the status of the national church in Scotland. It is one of the country's largest, having 245,000 members in 2024 and 259,200 members in 2023. While mem ...

, serving the communities of Ayton and

Burnmouth Burnmouth is a small fishing village located adjacent to the A1 road on the east coast of Scotland. It is the first village in Scotland on the A1, after crossing the border with England. Burnmouth is located in the Parish of Ayton, in the ...

in 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 ...

. The church is situated on the side of the B6355 road, just off the main A1 road, south of the village centre and north-west of

Berwick upon Tweed Berwick-upon-Tweed (), sometimes known as Berwick-on-Tweed or simply Berwick, is a town and civil parish in Northumberland, England, south of the Anglo-Scottish border, and the northernmost town in England. The 2011 United Kingdom census recor ...

, at .

History

There are charters of the late 11th and early 12th centuries granting the lands of Eiton, as Ayton was then known, to Coldingham Priory. The lands were granted by King

Edgar of Scotland Edgar or Étgar mac Maíl Choluim ( Modern Gaelic: ''Eagar mac Mhaoil Chaluim''), nicknamed Probus, "the Valiant" (c. 1074 – 8 January 1107), was King of Alba (Scotland) from 1097 to 1107. He was the fourth son of Malcolm III and Margaret o ...

(ruled 1097–1107). By the end of the 12th century, the monks of Coldingham had built a chapel dedicated St. Dionysius. The church later received an altar dedicated to the Virgin Mary, with endowments of various acres and rigs in the Lordship of Ayton. The old chapel, which had been extensively altered and renewed over the years up to the 18th century was, originally, a simple rectangular building, but changed to a T shape with the addition of the north aisle. Many of the early Norman features were altered or even removed in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Chapel of St. Dionysius was an important place in medieval Scotland, it played host to several meetings of commissioners from Scotland and England, in their efforts to come to treaty, including those in 1380, 1384 and 1497. The meeting of 1497 involved the Spanish diplomat

Pedro de Ayala Don Pedro de Ayala also Pedro López Ayala (died 31 January 1513) was a 16th-century Spanish diplomat employed by Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile at the courts of James IV of Scotland and Henry VII of England. His mission to S ...

on behalf of

James IV of Scotland James IV (17 March 1473 – 9 September 1513) was List of Scottish monarchs, King of Scotland from 11 June 1488 until his death at the Battle of Flodden in 1513. He inherited the throne at the age of fifteen on the death of his father, James I ...

with representatives of

Henry VII of England Henry VII (28 January 1457 – 21 April 1509), also known as Henry Tudor, was King of England and Lord of Ireland from his seizure of the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death in 1509. He was the first monarch of the House of Tudor. Henr ...

, and the outcome was a seven-year truce. St. Dionysius' Church continued as a Roman Catholic place of worship in the hands of the monks of Coldingham until the

Scottish Reformation The Scottish Reformation was the process whereby Kingdom of Scotland, Scotland broke away from the Catholic Church, and established the Protestant Church of Scotland. It forms part of the wider European 16th-century Protestant Reformation. Fr ...

, when it became part of the reformed church. left, The kirkyard and part of the ruined St. Dionysius' Church

Post-Reformation

The old church buildings continued with several alterations and renovations (see above) until it no longer was fit for purpose. In 1864, a new church was built just outside the village, adjacent to the ancient church. The church was built by eminent 19th century architect James Maitland Wardrop, in the " First Pointed" style of

Gothic architecture Gothic architecture is an architectural style that was prevalent in Europe from the late 12th to the 16th century, during the High Middle Ages, High and Late Middle Ages, surviving into the 17th and 18th centuries in some areas. It evolved f ...

, and is a near T-shape with a 3-stage square-plan tower. The 19th-century Ayton Parish Church is a category A

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

, the highest level of protection for a historic building in Scotland, while the ruined St. Dionysius' Church is listed at category B.

List of Post-Reformation ministers

*1574 John Kent *1604 William Hog *1653 William Home *1667 John Bethune *1712 Thomas Anderson

References

External links

St. Dionysius : Defending the Faith
{{Authority control Category A listed buildings in the Scottish Borders Churches in the Scottish Borders Listed churches in Scotland