Mossgiel

Mossgiel
Farm in Mosgiel
Coordinates	55 ° 32 ′  N , 4 ° 24 ′  W Coordinates: 55 ° 32 ′  N , 4 ° 24 ′  W
Mossgiel
administration
Post town	MAUCHLINE
ZIP code section	KA5
prefix	01290
Part of the country	Scotland
Council area	East Ayrshire
British Parliament	Kilmarnock and Loudoun
Scottish Parliament	Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley

Mossgiel is the name of a farm in the parish of Mauchline , East Ayrshire in Scotland , known as the temporary residence of Robert Burns (1759–1796), Scottish writer and poet , and as the birthplace of Thomas Burns (1796–1871), pastor , Colonialist , co-founder of Dunedin in New Zealand and founder of the First Church of Otago .

geography

The Mossgiel farm is located in the wide plain of Ayrshire, at the north-western exit of Mauchline directly on the A76 trunk road .

history

According to Kirk, the name Mossgiel was first mentioned in 1527, but with " Mossgaviel " in a slightly different spelling. Watson, on the other hand, tried to derive the meaning (leased flat land) from the spelling " Mosgavill " from 1588.

In 1784, after the death of their father, the brothers Robert and Gilbert Burns tried to create a livelihood by farming. They leased the Mossgiel farm with 118 acres of land for £ 90  a year. In 1786, only two years later, Robert gave up the hard country life and transferred his shares to his brother Gilbert. Gilbert Burns continued the Mossgiel farm and married Jean Breckenridge in 1791 , with whom he had numerous children. The third son was then Thomas Burns, who was born in 1796. Two years later, in 1798, Gilbert Burns also gave up the farm.

The farm as namesake

With the colonization of other countries, names and designations were always taken with them and placed in the “new world”. This is also what happened with the name Mossgiel, which Thomas Burns used in memory of his place of birth as Mosgiel for a place in Otago in New Zealand , ten kilometers from Dunedin . Or in New South Wales in Australia , where Mossgiel gave a place, a county and a plant its name to the Mossgiel Daisy (Brachyscome papillosa).

today

Even today, Mossgiel is nothing more than a farm and would not have been known to the world if Robert Burns had not lived there and his nephew Thomas Burns had been born there. Not far from the farm on the outskirts of Mauchline is the National Burns Monument , a tower-like building that was built and furnished in honor of Robert Burns, and the Burns House Museum itself invites you to a history lesson.

literature

• WR Kirk, Pulse of the Plain - A History of Mosgiel , Mosgiel Borough Council, 1985. ISBN 0-9597755-0-1

Individual evidence

1. ^ Mossgiel Farm . Education Scotland , archived from the original on January 16, 2016 ; accessed on January 16, 2016 (English, original website no longer available).  
2. ^ WR Kirk, Pulse of the Plain - A History of Mosgiel , Mosgiel Borough Council, 1985, p384.
3. ^ WJ Watson, The Celtic Place-Names of Scotland , Birlinn Limited, Edinburgh, 2004, first published 1926. ISBN 1-84158-323-5
4. ^ Brachyscome papillosa - Mossgiel Daisy - Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts , Australia
5. ^ Mossgiel Daisy - profile - Department of Environment and Climate Change
6. ^ The National Burns Monument & Mossgiel Farm . 197 aerial photography , accessed January 16, 2016 .