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                  Your Scottish Archives Glossary

                  The Your Scottish Archives Glossary defines archaic words and phrases, mostly Scots law terminology, commonly found in documents and records in Scotland’s archives. If you think a word or phrase should be added to the glossary, or an existing entry could be defined better, please contact us at your@scottisharchives.org.uk.

                  You can also use the Dictionary of the Scots Language as a further resource at https://dsl.ac.uk/ for Scots words and phrases (including legal terminology).

                  To find a term within the glossary, click on the initial letter of the word you are looking for, then select the relevant syllable segment displayed below.

                  Example: to find the term “roup” select section “R” then sub-section “Ro”

                  A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W Y
                  Ba Be Bi Bl Bo Br Bu
                  Bul Bur

                  bull

                  loosely used for any papal document, but strictly speaking, a written grant of privilege by a Pope.

                  burgage holding

                  or ‘burgage tenure’ or just ‘burgage’, the conditions of holding property in royal burghs.

                  burgess

                  a citizen or freeman of a burgh.