Lauriston Castle stands on a clifftop site near the Aberdeenshire village of St Cyrus and just over a mile inland from the North Sea coast of Scotland.

[2] Lauriston’s first charter is dated 1243 and it soon developed into a classic courtyard castle which was savagely fought over during Scotland's Wars of Independence and strengthened by King Edward III in 1336 as part of the chain of strongholds which he hoped would prevent a French landing in support of the Scots.

[3] The eloquent Declaration of Arbroath, the famous letter of 1320 to Pope John XXII, sealed by the nation’s earls and barons, has as its final signatory the name of Alexander Straton.

The barons of the Mearns had been complaining about the high-handed behaviour of John Melville of Glenbervie, Sheriff of Kincardineshire, and King James’s Regent, the Duke of Albany, exclaimed in exasperation that he would not mind if they "biled the loon and suppit the bree".

Taking this as royal licence, a group of barons lured Melville to a hunting party, tipped him into a cauldron or kettle of boiling water and, to seal the conspiracy, supped the broth.