Smailholm Tower — The Ancient Codex

Smailholm Tower, Scottish Borders — Photo: Taken by User:Supergolden / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0

Smailholm Tower is a fortified place near Smailholm, Scottish Borders, Scotland.

What follows is drawn from published sources, with each claim labelled by how firmly it is established.

History

Smailholm Tower is a peel tower atop the crag of Lady Hill, around five miles west of Kelso in the Scottish Borders. It was built in the 15th or early 16th century by the Pringle family (originally Hoppringle), followers of the Earl of Douglas who held the lands of Smailholm from the early 15th century.

Like all Scottish peel towers it was built for protection against sporadic English raids. It was attacked by English soldiers in 1543, 1544 and again in 1546, when the garrison of Wark Castle sacked the tower and carried off prisoners and cattle. It was successfully defended against the English in 1640 by Sir Andrew Ker of Greenhead.

The tower passed to the Scotts of Harden — ancestors of Sir Walter Scott — who rebuilt parts of the tower and barmkin. It decayed in the 18th century after the family moved to nearby Sandyknowe. The last owner, the Earl of Ellesmere, placed it into state care in 1950; it was restored in the 1980s and now operates as a museum.

In June 2007 it was awarded the maximum 'five-star' tourist-attraction rating by VisitScotland, a rating then held by only eight other sites in Scotland. A 2010/11 restoration reinstated a turf roof over the structure following roofing experiments begun in 2006.

People

The Pringle (Hoppringle) family

Original builders and early holders of Smailholm, followers of the Earl of Douglas
Sir Andrew Ker of Greenhead

Successfully defended the tower against the English in 1640
The Scotts of Harden

Later owners (ancestors of Sir Walter Scott) who rebuilt parts of the tower and barmkin
Portrait: Henry Raeburn / Wikimedia Commons / Public domain

Sir Walter Scott

Author who visited his grandfather here as a boy; the tower inspired his writing and his uncle restored it around 1800
Earl of Ellesmere

Last private owner, who handed the tower into state care in 1950

Cultural influences

Scottish Border peel-tower tradition — Smailholm was built, like all such towers, to give its occupants protection from English cross-border raids, a defining feature of the lawless medieval and early-modern Borders.
The Romantic literary movement — through Sir Walter Scott, the tower became a touchstone of Borders Romanticism, drawing later artists and writers to the site.

Connections

Sandyknowe Farm

Neighbouring farm to which the Scott family moved; where the young Walter Scott stayed with his grandfather
Marmion / The Eve of St John

Works by Sir Walter Scott — Smailholm is the setting of the ballad and appears in the poem
Photo: Walter Baxter / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 2.0

Wark Castle

English stronghold whose garrison sacked the tower in 1546
Clan Pringle

The family (originally Hoppringle) that built and long held the tower

In culture

Smailholm inspired Sir Walter Scott, providing the setting for his ballad The Eve of St John and a presence in Marmion. J. M. W. Turner visited with Scott and sketched the tower for Scott's Poetical Works; Henry Fox Talbot later repeated Turner's itinerary, publishing Sun Pictures in Scotland, considered the first photographic travelogue.
The tower is the centrepiece of Margaret J. Anderson's children's novel In the Keep of Time and features in C. L. Williams's book Smailholm. It now displays an array of embroidered model figures illustrating its history and Scott's stories, created by two local artists.

What to look for

The four-storey rectangular tower (about 12.1 m by 9.4 m) of basalt rubble with walls 2.4 m thick, set on a rocky outcrop; the door is in a large red sandstone arch on the south side, with a turnpike stair in the south-east corner.
The hall above the vaulted basement, with a fireplace to the north featuring a carved human face.
The top floor's unusual elliptical stone vault supporting a stone-flag roof, with interrupted parapet walks along the north and south sides.
The surrounding barmkin (courtyard) wall enclosing the ruins of outbuildings, a small chapel, a 17th-century hall house and a two-roomed kitchen block; a defensive ditch protects the western approach.

Plan your visit

Location: 55.6045°N · 2.5762°W
Nearest settlement: Smailholm
Access: Paid entry — managed visitor site
Parking: Parking available nearby — see the official getting-here page.
Start point: Sandyknowe Farm · Kelso · TD5 7PG · National Grid reference: NT 638 346 · Telephone: 01573 460 365
Best time: 1 April to 30 September: Friday to Monday, 10am to last entry at 4pm (closes 4.30pm).
Start point: Smailholm Tower car park — Limited visitor parking at the tower (via Sandyknowe Farm). No accessible bays marked; no coach parking.
Sat-nav: TD5 7PG