Polmood to Drumelzier

Now that the horses have been changed we can move on - on past a Hunting Seat of the Scottish Kings.  This is Polmood where another Tweed tributary, Polmood Burn, rushes down between the steep sides of Great Hill and Polmood Hill.

Close by, in the words of Burns: Willie Wastle dwalt on the Tweed, ... The spot they ca'd it Linkumdoddie, ... but nothing to tell you that here must have lived Willie's Wife:


Some five miles from this spot the Tweed turns towards the East and in a little distance passes Drumelzier (pronounced Drumelyer) where Merlin is buried

Near here are the ruins of Tinnis Castle built about the 15th century within the ruins of an iron age fort. The Castle once belonged to the Tweedies who were the Lairds of Drumelzier from the 14th century and is in an unassailable position.

For this reason, no doubt, it was destroyed by Royal Warrant in 1592 but some people believed that it was blown up as a result of a feud. This was a feud between the Flemings of Biggar and the Tweedies which had started in the early part of the 16th century when Lord Fleming was murdered by a Tweedie.

An apocryphal story to account for the name of Tweedie is told and is worth passing on for its sheer audacity.

In an earlier century the Laird of Drumelzier returned from The Crusades to find that his wife had had a fine young son who could not possibly have been his. She explained to him that she had been walking by the Tweed one day when the spirit of that Water appeared and compelled her to yield to his embraces.

The Laird accepted this explanation and the child grew up within the family, acquiring the name of his spirit father. The Tweedies grew into a feared and powerful border family who sustained feuds with families other than the Flemings, as you will hear shortly.

Meantime please consider as you pass this place that there was a time when you would have to have paid a "mail" or toll to as you passed through this land. This was an amusing diversion for the Laird, Sir William Tweedie, until one day he bit off rather more than he had bargained for. Shouting violent threats, he pursued a traveller who had ignored the custom only to find that the man he had been abusing was none other than his liege lord and monarch: James V

© 1996 Douglas Gregor