Henry Maule's Notes on the Peerage of Scotland

The volume contains notes on the Scottish peerage, divided into three sections, each foliated separately. The first section consists of various lists of mentions of Scotland's peerage in the rolls of the Scottish Parliament, including abstracted information relating to peers on attendance, the creation of new titles, the levelling of treason charges and the distribution of land. These date from, at the earliest, the end of Robert I's reign (1306-1329) to 1707 when the Act of Union dissolved the independent Scottish Parliament. Other sources used in this section are the Charters and Patents of Honour under the Great Seal and the Chancery rolls. The second section consists of more detailed notes on the abstracted information in the first section, as well as some verbatim transcripts of some charters. At the end of this section is an index of peers mentioned in the first two sections. Finally in the third section is a list of lesser barons who sat in the Parliaments and Convention of Estates of James I to the 11th Parliament of James VI, [1467-1587] when the system of electing commissioners of the shires to Parliament as representatives of the lesser barons was created, reducing the need for personal attendance.

Henry Maule of Kellie was the third son of George Maule, 2nd Earl of Panmure, by his wife Lady Jean Campbell, eldest daughter of John, earl of Loudon, lord high chancellor of Scotland. In his youth he travelled on the continent, and spent much of his time at the courts of England and France. He was a member of the convention of estates in 1689, but left that assembly when he found it was determined to declare that James II had forfeited the crown.

In 1709 he was Lyon Clerk and Keeper of the Records and later Deputy Lord Lyon, King of Arms for Scotland. In this capacity, he declared George I King in Edinburgh on 5 August 1714, in spite of his strong Jacobite sympathies. He quickly broke with the Hanoverians and joined the Jacobite rising of 1715, fighting at the indecisive battle of Sheriffmuir. The Jacobite ballad on the battle commemorates Maule's rescue of his brother James, 4th Earl of Panmure, from royal troops. As a consequence of his support for the rising he was obliged to flee to Holland in 1716, where he devoted his time to the study of the civil and canon laws.

Maule returned to Scotland with his family in 1719 under the general amnesty of that year and the recovery of his estates became his chief pre-occupation. Both before and after his return he corresponded frequently with the leading adherents of the Jacobite cause and other prominent men. He was also, like his older brother, a dedicated antiquarian and collector of chronicles, cartularies, and documents that related to the history of Scotland. In his latter years he increasingly occupied himself in this historical interest, mainly residing in Kellie Castle near Carnoustie, Angus. Maule died at Edinburgh in June 1734, and was buried in Holyrood Abbey. He was often called Harry Maule and was sometimes styled as the Earl of Panmure, a title to which he would have succeeded on his brother's death but for the 1716 attainder.

The manuscript is available for consultation by any accredited reader.

Purchased by Mrs Enriqueta Rylands, on behalf of the John Rylands Library, in 1901 from James Ludovic Lindsay, 26th Earl of Crawford.

Description compiled by Henry Sullivan, project archivist, with reference to:

• Julian Goodare, 'The Admission of Lairds to the Scottish Parliament', English Historical Review, vol. 116, issue 469 (Nov 2001), pp. 1103-31, for information on the attendance of the Lesser Barons in the Scottish Parliament.
• Genealogical website for the Maule family: http://www.maulefamily.com/brianarchive/biog2.htm (last viewed 21/04/2004).

Catalogued in the Hand-List of the Collection of English Manuscripts in the John Rylands Library, 1928 (English MS 11).

Formerly part of the Bibliotheca Lindesiana, the Library of the Earls of Crawford and Balcarres, from Haigh Hall, Wigan, Lancashire. On the inside cover is written a note that identifies a Mrs Clarke, daughter of a Mr Baron Maule, who in turn was the son of the author of the work, giving the manuscript as a gift to a Mr J.A. Veitch. Any previous ownership or a connection between Mr J.A. Veitch and the Earls of Crawford is currently unknown but more information could possibly be found in the Crawford archives held at the National Library of Scotland.