Hatton Castle (Angus)
Hatton Castle is a castle on the lower part of Hatton Hill , the easternmost of the Sidlaw Hills , south of the village of Newtyle in the Scottish county of Angus . From the castle one can see the wooded Den of Newtyle ; the view extends over the Strathmore valley to the Ben Lawers and the Schiehallion and the hills of Angus and Glenshee . The castle from the 16th century was built in the style of a typical Scottish residential tower with a Z-shaped floor plan as a fortified country house or castle . He used to give a castle called Balcraig Castle about half a mile from the current building, also on Hatton Hill .
Origin of name
The name "Hatton" was taken from the nearby farm. "Hatton" is a contraction of "Hall-Toun", which means "farm near the (country) house" in Scottish . So the country house or castle must have been there first and the name "Hatton" actually refers to the nearby farm, which is now called Hatton Farm . Hatton Castle was probably originally called "Newtyle Castle" after the property. In Scottish, the word "Tyle" meant tile or roof slab. At Tay at Dundee , there are hollow bricks - and tile factories , but the name "Newtyle" probably refers to the degraded there sandstone , which is used extensively for construction of houses and walls and covering roofs. It also served the production of Pictish symbol stones , as they are shown in the Meigle Sculptured Stone Museum . The name "New" style rather indicates that there must have been another place ("Old Style") where sandstone was quarried earlier.
history
The early history of the area shows that Picts lived there. For example, the discovery of the Eassie cross-slab nearby shows that skilled Pictish stonecutters introduced Christianity around AD 600 .
In 1317 King Robert the Bruce lent the lands to Sir William Oliphant , the 8th chief of the clan. Robert the Bruce's daughter, Elizabeth , married Sir William Oliphant's son, Sir Walter Olifard , who inherited the Newtyle estate. The castle was built in 1575 by order of Lawrence , the 4th Lord Oliphant (1527–1593). What is unusual about Hatton Castle is that a rectangular staircase with straight stairs was built into the original Tower House. Such a detail was usually only incorporated into larger houses. The 4th Lord Oliphant also had another of his many castles, Kellie Castle in Fife , which is very similar to Hatton Castle, built.
After the Oliphants, many other people lived in Hatton Castle, e.g. B. at least one bishop . Marian McNeill reports that the old Scottish custom of “obligatory hospitality” was also maintained at Hatton Castle: “The Lords Oliphant had aimed a cannon in the street by their old castle to force the warriors to come in and be feasted. “There is still a cannon there today. Hatton Castle was more the home of the Masters of Oliphant than their fathers, who mainly resided at Aberdalgie Castle and Dupplin Castle .
Hatton Castle was stripped of its roof around 1720 after the Jacobite Rebellion of 1715 and replaced by the Italian- style Belmont Castle in Meigle , where the Church of Scotland now resides. Hatton Castle was slowly being overgrown with ivy and pigeons and jackdaws lived there until it was sold by the Kinpurnie Estate for rebuilding. This was done jointly by the brothers Roderick and Richard Oliphant of Oliphant with the help of Historic Scotland . The castle's charm remained as it was in 1575, framed in lead with handcrafted glass from Edinburgh . Underfloor heating was installed so that no radiators can be seen. The outside of the lock was painted with the traditional, pale pink glue paint.
There is also the fortified room in the castle, which used to be a bank for the valuables of the local people - one of the functions of a castle. There is a priest's hole in the lord's former bedroom. However, this was probably not used so much for persecuted priests, but rather for young women who needed a secret escape route. Hutton Castle has an interesting knight's hall , almost in the shape of a square measuring 10.34 meters × 5.17 meters × 5.17 meters, the acoustics of which are admirable. As in the 16th century, music is played in the great hall on most days; some notable dances and house concerts have already been performed. Traditional Scottish musicians, especially from the creative network '' Fiddle Force '', regularly gather there. House concerts by many different artists take place on a non-commercial basis, e.g. B. the Poozies , by Barbaby Brown and John Kenny (Sardinian triple bagpipes and Carnyx ), Park Stickney ( jazz - harp ), Philip Higham ( Bach - cello etc.), Cathie Fraser from Australia , Fiddlelore from New Zealand , Douglas Lawrence , Gregor Borland and Sandy Brechin , Jarlath Henderson and Man's Ruin . In 2007 the first performance in Europe took place at Hatton Castle with a Japanese biwa and a singing group, supported by the Scottish Harvenduo Sileas . The American cellist Abby Newton recorded her Scottish traditional album Castles, Kirks and Caves in her group Ferintosh in the great hall of Hatton Castle together with David Greenberg , Corrina Kewat , Mairi Campbell , Dave Francis and Scott Pepito . Hatton Castle is now the family home and the current owners have continued the restoration work with the help of chateau and castle restorer Gordon Matthew of Midmar .
Gardens
The original gardens of Hatton Castle are not recorded, but a house of this size certainly had beautiful gardens in the 16th and 17th centuries. The buildings of the Hatton Farm probably stand on the former gardens south of the castle. Until the 1990s, when the current owner took it over, Hatton Castle stood on a sloping field full of sheep, cattle and geese from the adjacent curling pond . Sir James Cayzer of the neighboring Kinpurnie Estate had normal trees planted in the surrounding parkland and a garden with a 3 meter high wall now extends around Hatton Castle. This is the work of the dike master Duncan Armstrong . A grove of old Scottish apple and mulberry trees has been planted and the sunken vegetable garden contains fig trees and artichokes . To the east, the Dundee and Newtyle Railway , the first railway line in northern Scotland, borders the garden of Hatton Castle. It was built to transport daffodils and other flowers grown on the Newtyle farms to Dundee and then ship them on to Edinburgh. The Bulb Factory was next to the Newtyle train station, which still exists today.
Individual evidence
- ^ The Castallated and Domestic Architecture of Scotland, from the twelfth to the eighteenth Century . D. Douglas. P. 48, 1892. Retrieved September 7, 2017.
- ↑ C. Michael Hogan: Eassie Stone in Andy Burnham: The Megalithic Portal . October 7, 2007. Retrieved September 7, 2017.
- ^ Gordon McGregor: The Red Book of Perthshire .
- ↑ James Balfour Paul (Editor): The Scots Peerage, Founded on Wood's Edition of Sir Robert Douglas's Peerage of Scotland . Volume VI. David Douglas, Edinburgh 1909. pp. 536-537.
- ^ Nigel Tranter: The Fortified House in Scotland . Volume 4. James Thin, Edinburgh 1986.
- ^ A. Hislop: Book of Scottish Anecdote, quoted in Marian McNeill: The Scots Cellar .
Web links
Coordinates: 56 ° 33'23 " N , 3 ° 8'15" W.