Balbedie

Balbedie.

The old house of Balbedie, part-if of late 17th-century date and partly more recent, stands at the western extremity of the parish but is now ruinous. It consists of a long two-storeyed main block, running north-east and south-west, with two wings projecting towards the north-west, the more southerly of these being mainly of later date than the rest of the building and having a moulded entrance of late type. The original entrance, bolection-moulded, is centred in the western wall of the main block. The masonry is of rubble, harled; the windows are backset and the gables crow-stepped, while the chimney-stalks have dressed margins. The gable of the southern wing is part of an older structure that originally stood detached from, and westward of, the main block. Internally the only feature of interest that remains is part of a 17th-century moulded door-piece.

HISTORICAL NOTE. - The lands of Balbedie were of old separately possessed as a "sunny” (solaris) half and a "shady" (umbralis) half, belonging as a whole to the family of Colville of Balbedie. But in 1646 both parts passed into the hands of John Malcolm, chamberlain of the royal lands in Fife, and were erected into the barony of Balbedie, the manor-place of the eastern half to be the principal messuage (1). In 1662 he acquired the lands of Lochore ("Inchgall"), &c., which were incorporated in the barony of Lochorshire, with the manor house of Lochore as chief messuage (2). In Sibbald's day (1710) Balbedy "a pleasant house with gardens and inclosures," was "one of the seats of Michael Malcolm, second son of John Malcolm of Balbedy" (3).

RCAHMS 1933, visited 11 May 1928.

(1) Reg. Mag. Sig., s.a., No. 1686. (2) Ibid., s.a., No. 305. (3) History of Fife, etc. (ed. 1803), p.373.