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Field Visit
Date 2 June 1914
Event ID 1086967
Category Recording
Type Field Visit
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1086967
2. Aberlady Parish Church.
This church is situated at the western extremity of the village, overlooking Aberlady Bay. The tower at the western end (fig. 33) is a 15th century construction 18 feet square on plan; it rises unbroken, save for a projecting string-course, to an intake 30 feet above the ground. Ten feet above this it terminates in a corbel course supporting a plain stone parapet, within which it is roofed with a slated pyramidal spire. The ground floor is vaulted and this and the two intermediate floors are lit by narrow slits; the fourth floor has two-light windows with semicircular heads and modern mullions. The walls are 3 feet 6 inches thick.
The two burial aisles on the north were built c. late 16th and early 17th century. The north windows imitative of "plate" tracery are of some interest. The empty panel space above a door in the eastern aisle may not belong to this structure but to Kilspindie Tower (RCAHMS 1924, No.4).
In the Statistical Account, vi., p. 548 it is recorded that the church was built in 1773 replacing an older building 100 feet in length,16 ½ feet in breadth and between 10 and 11 feet in height with walls partially built of mud. The later structure in its turn has been restored within recent years and is in use and in good condition.
MONUMENT: To the east of the church within the graveyard is an elaborate freestanding monument of the 17th century, designed in the Renaissance style.
HISTORICAL NOTE: The lands of Aberlady, including the church, belonged to the bishop of Dunkeld. In 1454 all the lands south of the Forth possessed by that bishop were incorporated in the barony of Aberlady-these lands being Aberlady, Preston, Cramond and Abercorn (1). Bishop Thomas Lauder (1452-76) erected the vicarage into a prebend of the cathedral church (2) and in 1469 granted, with the consent of his chapter, 6 merks annually from the prebend for the support of chorister boys in the cathedral, a grant confirmed by James III. in 1472 (3). There was a chapel dedicated to the B. V. Mary within the cemetery of the parish church (4).
RCAHMS 1924, visited 2 June 1914
(1) Reg. Mag. Sig. s.a. No. 600; (2) Rentale Dunkeldense, p. 337; (3) Reg. Mag. Sig. s.a. No. 1056; (4) Inquis. Spec.
OS map ref. i. Hadd. No. 1.
