Ferniehirst castle overlooks the Jed Water to the south of Jedburgh in the Borders and once commanded the road from Edinburgh to Otter burn and Newcastle, a key invasion and marauding route. In its early days, it witnessed all the violence to be expected of a frontier fortress, but, today, it is a scene of tranquillity and peace, a monument to the cultural and economic blessings brought by the Union of the Crowns and their two ancient kingdoms. A succession of three castles has been recorded on this hillside site since the 15th century, but the spot may have been first occupied as a forward stronghold, north of Hadrian’s Wall, by the Romans.
The medieval castle was founded by the Kerrs, a Borders clan reputedly descended from Vikings and recorded in Jedburgh Forest from the 12th century. By the 15th century, the family had two main branches, the Kerrs of Cessford (continued through the female line in the Duke of Roxburghe) and the Kerrs ‘of Ferniehirst’, so described by 1470, who are represented today in a direct male-line descent by the Marquess of Lothian as their clan chief. Lord Ralph Kerr, the present laird of Ferniehirst, is the younger brother and heir presumptive of the 13th Marquess of Lothian, better known as the MP Michael Ancram, former chairman of the Conservative Party and Minister of State for Northern Ireland, who now sits in the House of Lords as a life peer. Lord Ralph’s wife, Marie-Claire, who comes from a Fife family, is a leading portrait and landscape painter, several of whose works hang in the castle.
Denne historien er fra March 03, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra March 03, 2021-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
