Deal sealed: Robert The Bruce land document sells for £25k
A RARE document featuring the seal of King Robert The Bruce, granting swathes of land to a loyal supporter nearly 700 years ago, yesterday fetched £25,250 at auction.
King Robert authorised the letters patent during a gathering at Scone, in Perthshire, on March 20, 1326 -- six years after the Declaration of Arbroath.
Written in Latin on velum and featuring the King’s own Great Seal, it granted lands at “Uthirtyre” (Auchtertyre) in the Sheriffdom of Forfar, in Angus, to Sir William Oliphant, a knight, in return for the feudal service of three archers in the King’s Scottish army.
The document, which was known to scholars but lost for almost a century, went under the hammer as part of Bonhams’ Scottish Sale, where it was bought by a mystery online bidder.
The letters patent, which had been in a private collection in England, was witnessed 695 years ago by a number of major figures of the period, offering a clue as to the importance of the meeting at which it was issued.
These witnesses included the Bishop of St Andrews, William Lamberton; Robert The Bruce’s son-in-law Walter Stewart, the High Steward of Scotland; the earls of Strathearn and Fife; and
Sir Gilbert de la Haye, the Lord High Constable and supreme officer of the Scots army.
Sarah Lindberg, Bonhams’ manuscript specialist, said: “This is a very important document, not only for its age and what it contains but also for its rarity.
“There are several documents pertaining to Robert The Bruce in institutions in Scotland but it is very rare to see something like this come on the market.
“Sir William Oliphant was a member of Robert The Bruce’s inner circle, present with the king on several occasions, and he put his seal on the Declaration of Arbroath.
“This [land] document has been in a private collection south of the Border, but it is a piece of important national heritage for Scotland.”
Sir William Oliphant of Dupplin and Aberdalgie was a veteran of the Battle of Dunbar of 1296 and the siege of Stirling Castle in 1304 when his cousin, also William Oliphant, was governor.
He was twice imprisoned by the English before finally returning to Scotland in 1313 and swearing allegiance to Robert The Bruce, possibly after the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314.
Oliphant was also among the nobles who put their seals to the Declaration of Arbroath in 1320.
He was present at Robert The Bruce’s Parliament held at Holyrood on March 8, 1326, just a few days before the gathering at Scone.
The lands he received, together with those acquired by inheritance and marriage alliances, that his family held substantial swathes of property across Perthshire and Forfarshire as well as estates in Fife, Kincardineshire and Midlothian.
Medieval historian Dr Fiona Watson, an expert on Robert The Bruce, said: “This is a legal document showing the King’s authority to grant this land to Oliphant, who was a part of a key cohort of followers of Bruce.
“It would have been written by a royal clerk and issued on behalf of the King, using King Robert’s Great Seal.
“In return, Oliphant provides three archers, which is part and parcel of Bruce’s revamping of a more modern army and would have been commensurate with the amount of land.
“This document lifts the lid on an important aspect of Bruce’s reign. Oliphant had been associated with the previous regime but he nonetheless proved his loyalty to King Robert, and was rewarded for that.
“The high-powered witnesses to this document show this was an important meeting in Scone, possibly a council meeting, during which a lot of business was done.
“I would love to see it stay in Scotland.
“These people played a part in such a pivotal time in Scottish history, so to have a document that they were party to would be great because we have so few.”