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Rating: 
Summary: Excellent architectural history, good family history, too!
Review: The term "manor house" is not particularly Scottish, nor is a Scots laird a "lord of the manor," but the feudal similarities are there -- at least until the Victorian period and the pervasive influence of Sir Walter Scott. In practice, the Norman feudal pattern arrived in Scotland very shortly after it was brought to England, and Queen Margaret and her sons formalized the system in the 12th century. A few Scots buildings date to the medieval period, such as Drum Castle in Aberdeenshire, which was erected during the reign of Robert Bruce, but even those houses that are only two or three centuries old are often the seats of families of ancient pedigree. Fenwick is, naturally, an architectural historian, and the bulk of this combination history and guide is given over to discussions of French and Dutch influence, the ubiquity of "doocots" (dovecotes), and the piling of Victorian Gothic ornamentation on facades of much plainer design. However, there is also a great deal of ethnography (e.g., the "separateness" of Fife) and family history threaded throughout, including notes on the Setons, Hopes, Clerks, Forbeses, Grants, Lindsays, and the Earls of Moray, among many others. Scores of black-and-white photos and pen-and-ink drawings of architectural exteriors add to this book's usefulness to the Scottish specialist.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent architectural history, good family history, too!
Review: The term "manor house" is not particularly Scottish, nor is a Scots laird a "lord of the manor," but the feudal similarities are there -- at least until the Victorian period and the pervasive influence of Sir Walter Scott. In practice, the Norman feudal pattern arrived in Scotland very shortly after it was brought to England, and Queen Margaret and her sons formalized the system in the 12th century. A few Scots buildings date to the medieval period, such as Drum Castle in Aberdeenshire, which was erected during the reign of Robert Bruce, but even those houses that are only two or three centuries old are often the seats of families of ancient pedigree. Fenwick is, naturally, an architectural historian, and the bulk of this combination history and guide is given over to discussions of French and Dutch influence, the ubiquity of "doocots" (dovecotes), and the piling of Victorian Gothic ornamentation on facades of much plainer design. However, there is also a great deal of ethnography (e.g., the "separateness" of Fife) and family history threaded throughout, including notes on the Setons, Hopes, Clerks, Forbeses, Grants, Lindsays, and the Earls of Moray, among many others. Scores of black-and-white photos and pen-and-ink drawings of architectural exteriors add to this book's usefulness to the Scottish specialist.
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