James VI of Scotland, confirmation charter for Kilwinning, manuscript on parchment [Scotland, 1585]

James VI, king of Scotland, royal confirmation charter, reproducing the entire charter issued at Kilwinning, 24 June 1558, by the commendator and chapter of the Abbey of Kilwinning, granting lands in Ayrshire to John Gemmill, in Latin, single sheet manuscript on parchment[Scotland (Kilwinning, North Ayrshire), dated 24 April 1585] Five associated copies and translations of the same document, the most important: (a) the royal confirmation charter in favour of the Abbey of Kilwinning, with 42 long lines in a secretarial hand, crucial words in larger version of same, with elaborate penwork flourishes to ascenders in the top line, one large penwork initial, seal tags but without seal, eighteenth- and nineteenth-century endorsements on reverse, some discolouration to surface and folds, else in fair and legible condition, 235+30 by 540mm.; plus four copies of the same text made between 1787 and early nineteenth century: (i) one in Latin, on a single paper bifolium, (ii) a translation into English dated 1787, on three paper bifolia, (iii) a more modern copy of the previous, on 2 paper bifolia, (iv)the copy of the document in Latin with English translation as used to register it at the Council and Session Office in Edinburgh, initialled "W.B." and dated 11 April 1810 Provenance: 1. John Gemmill, son of Thomas Gemmill of "Auckinmaid" (nearby Auchenmade, now surviving only as a farm name), this most probably his copy issued by the Benedictine Abbey of Kilwinning, Ayrshire in 1585. The house was founded in the twelfth century by either Hugh de Morville, constable of Scotland, or Richard de Morville, one of the murderers of St. Thomas Becket, and belonged to the rare Tironensian Order, created by St. Bernard of Ponthieu (d. 1117), from the Abbey of Tiron, to the west of Chartres, as a reform movement within the Benedictine Order. It grew quickly under noble and royal patronage and throughout the Middle Ages was one of the most opulent and flourishing Scottish monastic houses. Its last abbot was a firm supporter of Mary Tudor, and hence was murdered in Edinburgh in 1571, with the abbey suppressed soon after.2. By around 1800, the property and this growing collection of documents recording its ownership, had passed to John Smith of "Swinridgemuir" (Swindridgemuir, which was owned by John Smith in the last decades of the eighteenth century after his return from the American War of Independence, and until his death in 1838): his endorsement in tiny script of the original charter. By 1810 it had changed hands again, and William Patrick endorses the copy of that date.3. Jeremy Griffiths, Oxford, acquired from a private owner in April 1995. 4. Schøyen Collection, London and Oslo, their MS 2001; acquired from Griffiths. Text:These charters are probably all that remains of the archive and library of this large and influential Scottish medieval monastery. A cartulary of the house survived until 1608 when it was seen by antiquary Timothy Pont, but is now lost and probably destroyed, and no extant codices or fragments of them are recorded from its library.