Commons 1640-1660

The ‘kingdom’ of Fife, between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth and bounded to the east by the North Sea, was separate in identity as well as geography from the rest of Scotland. Its smaller appendage, the inland shire of Kinross, was sandwiched between Fife and Perthshire. Fife was dominant, both in size and wealth, and in the assessments of the later 1650s was rated at nearly 40 times the levy imposed on Kinross. A. and O. Fife was also the more aggressive of the two when it came to politics and religion.

Inverness-shire stretched about 120 miles from the city of Inverness in the east, down the Great Glen to Inverlochy on the west coast, and across to the Isle of Skye and the Outer Hebrides. Worcester Coll. Oxf. Clarke xlvii, unfol.: 5 Mar. 1656. Bounded by Ross and Cromarty to the north and Argyll and Perthshire to the south, Inverness-shire formed the heart of the highland region of Scotland, and was controlled by a number of important clans, such as the Frasers, McIntoshes, Camerons, Urqhuarts, McLeods and the McDonalds of Glengarry, Clanranald and Sleat.

Dumfriesshire, between Roxburghshire and the stewartry of Kirkcudbright, was an area of strategic importance, including not only the ports of Dumfries and Annan but also the main roads into the Scottish interior from Carlisle. Historically, the shire was divided into three more-or-less equal parts, named after the three valleys which led from the mountains southwards into the Solway Firth – Eskdale, Annandale and Nithsdale – and each division became the powerbase for an influential earldom in the middle ages.

As the name suggests, Edinburgh Shire surrounded the Scottish capital, but it also covered a large area of prime agricultural land between the Firth of Forth to the north and the foothills of the Pentland, Moorfoot and Lammermuir ranges to the south. Atlas Scot. Hist. 27. In the assessments of the 1650s, Edinburgh Shire was the third most heavily taxed shire in Scotland, exceeded only by Fife and Perthshire. A. and O. ii.

The shires of Ayr and Renfrew in the south west of Scotland had much in common. They were geographically contiguous, although Ayr was by far the larger of the two, paying nearly three times the assessment of Renfrew in the 1650s; and in the middle ages both shires had been incorporated into the Stewart principality, divided (from north to south) into the baronies of Renfrew, Cunningham and Kyle Stewart, and the earldom of Carrick. Acts Parl. Scot. vi, pt. 2, p. 837; A. and O.; Atlas Scot.

The ‘Banff Burghs’ comprised the towns of Banff and Cullen and the city of Aberdeen, situated on the north-east coast of Scotland. All three had been royal burghs since the twelfth century, but Aberdeen, as an important centre for trade, religion and education, soon outstripped its neighbours in size and prosperity. Young, Parliaments of Scot. ii. 767, 769, 771. This disparity was reflected in the rates set by the government for the general assessment in 1657: Cullen was to pay £1 10s., Banff £3, and Aberdeen £66 12s. A. and O. ii.

The five burghs which made up the ‘Linlithgow Burghs’ – Linlithgow, Stirling, Perth, Queensferry and Culross – were scattered across three shires in the centre of Scotland, where the highland region met the lowlands. The burghs varied greatly in size and wealth – from Perth, taxed at £39 19s 3d in the general assessment of June 1657, to Culross and Queensferry, which each paid less than £5 – and before the 1650s they had little in common. A. and O. The five burghs can be divided into two loose groups.

The archipelagos of Orkney and Shetland, and the shire of Caithness on the Scottish mainland, form the most northerly part of the British Isles. In 1654-9 they were the largest constituency to return members to the Westminster Parliament: from the far north of Shetland to the south of Caithness is a distance of over 200 miles. Despite this geographical spread, the conglomeration made some historical sense, as all three parts were Norse, rather than Scottish, in culture, and remained dependent on the sea for travel and trade, especially with Scandinavia.

Lanarkshire, a large county in the central lowlands, consisted of a mountainous region to the south, and a more prosperous lowland area, including the valley of the River Clyde, to the north. Atlas Scot. Hist. 226-8, 273-6. The proximity of the city of Glasgow no doubt strengthened the economy of Lanarkshire, which was one of the most heavily taxed of the Scottish shires in the 1650s, paying rates which were almost the same as those imposed on Edinburgh Shire. A. and O. ii. 1143-4, 1240-1, 1360-1. Historically, Lanarkshire was Hamilton country.

Roxburghshire was at the centre of the Scottish border with England, lying between Dumfriesshire to the south west and Berwickshire to the north east. The shire was relatively prosperous, being assessed at £307 in the general assessment of 1657, and its agricultural wealth encouraged the cross-border raiding, theft and lawlessness which characterised its history before the union of the crowns in 1603. A.