Baron of Stobo

It is probable an Anglo-Norman lordship emerged during the turbulent period preceding the formation of the Scottish Marches, with its holder exercising customary powers of "pit and gallows, sake and soke, toll, team and infangthief".

[2] The Scoto-Norman Sir John Ker(r), the so-called "Hunter of Swynhope", has been tentatively identified as a likely early Lord of Stobo (circa 1140).

[4][5] The barony may have been acquired by the Church or gifted to the bishopric either by the Kerr family or the Crown as part of the so-called "Davidian Revolution".

The advowson of ‘Stobou’ was confirmed by the pope in 1216, and in 1319 Edward II of England, as Overlord of Scotland, claimed to exercise the right of patronage.

[9] The Reformation radically changed this position, with the Crown seizing and then re-granting the barony to James Douglas, 4th Earl of Morton.

He was executed in 1581 for his part in the murder of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, King Consort to Mary, Queen of Scots.

[15] Over the following century, ownership of the barony alternated between two competing sets of Stuart supporters: Maitland's descendants, the powerful Earls of Lauderdale,[16] chiefs of Clan Maitland and hereditary bearers of the National Flag of Scotland[17] and the Dukes of Lennox and Richmond,[18] chiefs of the Clan Stewart of Darnley and favoured kinsmen of James I, Charles I and Charles II.

[23][24] Lord Stobo's Lament, a traditional Scots air, commemorates this tragic episode in the history of the barony.

[30] The barony is situated in historic Peeblesshire, its southern boundary skirting the north bank of the River Tweed.

The baron’s arms registered in the Public Register of All Arms and Bearings in Scotland are described as: Sable, an escutcheon Argent within an orle of eight mullets Or on the escutcheon a rose Gules barbed and seeded Vert, with Crest issuing from a crenellated coronet of five towers Or, a banner saltire Argent and Sable in pale two roses Gules and in fess two mullets Or.