Field Visit
Date 9 February 1923
Event ID 1087928
Category Recording
Type Field Visit
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1087928
Within the grounds of Seton House, a modern mansion built on the site of the 16th century palace of George, fourth Lord Seton, 2 miles east-northeast of Preston pans, is an interesting and unusually complete example, as far as it goes, of 15th century Scottish ecclesiastical architecture - the Collegiate Church of Seton (fig.160 [SC 1127347]). The church, which was dedicated in the names of St. Mary and the Holy Cross, was laid out with choir, transepts and nave, but the last division, as in several other instances, has not been built (fig. 161 [plan]). The crossing is surmounted by a square tower terminating in a truncated broach spire, a type of spire not usually found in Scotland. From the north wall of the choir there projects an oblong revestry. The tuskings for the lateral walls of the nave and the weather table for its roof can be seen on the west face of the tower; the other divisions of the church are entire and in an excellent state of preservation, the late proprietor having in 1878 reserved the fabric to be the burial place of his family. Although the structure is homogeneous in design, the various divisions were manifestly not built at one time.
The site was originally occupied by a parish church. To this building Catherine Sinclair of Hermandston,’ widow of William, first Lord Seton who died c. 1409, added a south aisle. Her grandson George, third Lord Seton, who died c. 1478, built the present choir and apparently roofed the eastern rib vaulted portion (‘ biggit the queir of Seytoun, and pendit it sa fer as it is, with rymbraces’) (3). His son, George, fourth Lord Seton, who died in 1508, completed the vaulting of the choir (‘pendit the queir from the rymbrasis but’*) built the vestry (‘revestre’) or sacristy, vaulting and roofing it with stone (3), and rendered the establishment collegiate c. 1493. George fifth Lord, who fell at Flodden 1513, covered the choir roof with stone slabs, provided the choir with glazed windows (‘glaising windois’), paved it and furnished it with stalls (‘daskis’) and ‘cylerings* above the altar’. His work was continued by his widow Lady JanetH epburn, who died in 1558. She built the north cross aisle, removed Lady Catherine Sinclair's south aisle because the side of it was parallel with the side of the church, and rebuilt it in correspondence with the north aisle ‘to make it ane perfyt and proportion at croce kirk’. She likewise built the steeple, which she did not quite finish, and it remains incomplete to this day. In the vestry she had a loft inserted with locked cupboards, and, founding two prebendaries, built ‘thair chalmaris upon voltis’ (i.e. over vaults).
RCAHMS 1924, visited 9 February 1923.
See RCAHMS 1924 115-121 for a full architectural description and historical note.
*‘but’ as in ‘but and ben’; the eastern part of the completed portion was the ‘ben’.
**i.e. a canopy, usually in Scots as ‘sylure’.
(3) History of Seytoun, p. 34-40.
