Justiciar of Lothian

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The Justiciar of Lothian (in Norman-Latin, Justiciarus Laudonie) was an important legal office in the High Medieval Kingdom of Scotland.

The Justiciars of Lothian were responsible for the administration of royal justice in the province of Lothian, a much larger area than the modern Lothian, covering Scotland south of the Forth and Clyde, outwith Galloway, which had its own Justiciar of Galloway. The institution may date to the reign of King David I (died 1153), whose godson David Olifard was the first attested Justiciar. The Justiciars of Lothian, although not magnates of the stature of the typical Justiciar of Scotia, were significant landowners and not creatures of the kings.

[edit] List of Justiciars of Lothian, to 1306

David Olifard (c.1165–c.1170)
Robert Avenel, Richard Comyn, Robert de Quinci, Geoffrey de Melville (c.1170xc.1178)
Walter Olifard the Elder (c.1178–c.1188)
Patrick Dunbar, 4th Earl of Dunbar (d. 1232) (c.1195–c.1205)
David Lindsay the Elder and Gervase Avenel (d. 1219) (c.1206–c.1215?)
Alexander, Sheriff of Stirling and Walter Lindsay, Sheriff of Berwick (c.1206–c.1215?)
Walter Olifard the Younger (d. 1242) (c.1215–1242)
David Lindsay the Younger (c. 1241–1249x1251)
David Graham, deputy (1248, 1253)
Thomas de Normanville (c.1251–1253x1255)
Walter Murray of Bothwell (1255x1257)
Hugh Barclay (1258)
Thomas de Normanville and Stephen Fleming (1259)
Stephen Fleming (c.1260–1262?)
Hugh Barclay (c.1261–c.1279)
William de Soules (d. 1292x1293) (c.1279–1292x1293)
Geoffrey de Moubray (d. 1300) (1294–1296?)
Adam of Gordon and John de Lisle (1305–1306)

[edit] References

Barrow, G.W.S., "The Judex", in Barrow (ed.), The Kingdom of the Scots, (Edinburgh, 2003), pp. 57-67. ISBN 0-7486-1803-1
Barow, G.W.S. "The Justiciar", in Barrow (ed.), op.cit., pp. 68–111.