Life on the Edge : The Cistercian Abbey of Balmerino, Fife (Scotland)

The small Cistercian abbey at Balmerino on the southern shore of the Firth of Tay in north Fife has long languished in relative obscurity, consigned to a supporting role in Scottish monastic studies with dismissive comments based on the fragmentary nature of its physical and documentary history. Current research has demonstrated how wrong this interpretation is, for a monastery is not just the cluster of buildings enclosed within the monastic precinct; it is also the community - religious and lay - who inhabited it, the complex of lands, rights and privileges assembled to sustain that community, and the interaction with notables and neighbours whose influence helped shape its history. These chapters will present a diametrically opposed view of the significance of the surviving record and its value as a source of evidence for the social, economic and environmental history of Balmerino Abbey specifically and the wider region more generally.