White Castle

Nunraw is an estate in East Lothian, Scotland. It includes the White Castle, a hillfort, situated on the edge of the Lammermuir Hills, two miles south of the village of Garvald, (, , OS Landranger No.67.) Nunraw House was formerly used as the Guesthouse for retreatants at Sancta Maria Abbey the Cistercian monastery on the hillside nearby. Sir James Balfour Paul, Lord Lyon King of Arms, writing in 1905 stated that Whitecastle and Nunraw are the same place and that the lairds there were often referred to by one or the other of these territorial designations. White Castle It is likely that the White Castle was first settled by the ancestors of the Votadini tribe, whose main eastern capital was Dunpender, due north. The fort is ideally placed to strategically control the northern end of one of the main passes through the Lammermuirs, along the Whiteadder Water. With the further fortifications three miles further east at Blackcastle and Greencastle it would have been ideally placed for a beacon to alert the tribe in case of an invasion from the south. The hillfort was excavated over four years between 2010 and 2013 by Murray Cook and David Connolly of Rampart Scotland http://www.rampartscotland.co.uk/, and dates to the second half of the 1st millennium BC, though there was also evidence of limited Neolithic and Early Bronze Age activity. Nunraw It is thought that the first 'modern' feudal superior of the lands of Nunraw was the Church. The name Nunraw denotes the nuns' row or hamlet, and Martine adds that "old nuns came from Italy and settled down at Nunraw". The Lauder of The Bass family appear to have later held it as a feu. Acta Dominorum Concilii, July 1501, records a dispute between Jonet, prioress of the Convent of Haddington, (represented by David Balfour of Caraldstone) and Robert Lauder of The Bass, knight, regarding the lands and chapellany of Garvald, and also damage made to Sir Robert Lauder's house at Whitecastle. The case was remitted to Patrick Hepburn, 1st Earl of Bothwell, for his consideration and adjourned until 15 October 1501.