Guide · In Five Chapters
Robes and Chapeau
What a Scottish baron wore, in the words of the record.
Chapter I · 1455
The red robe
Parliament gave the lords of parliament and barons the same rank of red mantle open at the front. The earls’ was brown, furred with white.
“a mantle likewise of red, open at the front, lined with silk or furred with grey ‘gris’ fur or ‘pured’ fur”
Chapter II · 1606
Five buttons
In 1605 James VI gave dukes, marquises and earls crimson velvet lined with ermine, and “Lords” scarlet. The proclamation of 1606 named “Lordis, and Barronis” together, their robes “in red, lined white”. Below them, the freeholder’s mantle had three buttons; the baron’s had five.
“nather Commissioners of Burows nor Barons rode, for vant of furnitur”
Chapter III · 1650
The chapeau
The baron’s cap, red and turned up with white fur, is the ancestor of the heraldic cap of maintenance. When the Roslin vault was opened in 1650, the Baron of Roslin lay in his armour still wearing it.
“laying in his armour with a red velvet cap on his head … nothing was spoiled except a piece of the white furring that went round the cap”
red, furred ermine
representatives of baronial houses
the Baron of the Bachuil
Chapter IV · 1680
Supporters
The old barons bore supporters because they had been heritable counsellors to the King in Parliament, so only families who held their barony before 1587 have them. In 1673 “sundry barons” took the Lord Lyon to court to keep them.
“our old Barons, … hold only their Lands in free Barony, have Supporters in their Atchievement”
Chapter V · Since 2004
Today
Under the Lord Lyon’s guidance of 2010, a red chapeau already granted passes to the heir, and the blue chapeau and supporters stay with the representatives of baronial houses. A baron petitioning today receives the helm assigned to barons.
“the dignity of baron, though retained, shall not attach to the land”
What a baron wore was fixed by statute and by grant. Who is entitled to it depends on who holds the dignity, and that is what the Roll records.
Read further
Sources
- Innes of Learney, “The Robes of the Feudal Baronage of Scotland”, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 1945
- Act of 4 August 1455 on the habits of earls and lords of parliament · RPS 1455/8/12
- Sir George Mackenzie, Observations … as to Precedency, 1680
- Lord Lyon’s guidance on baronial additaments, 5 January 2010 (archived)
The arms that go with it
The helm, the banner and the four flags a baron may fly.