| He gave the lands of Fauope to the Abbey of Melrose before 1179, among the witnesses to his charter being Swan, the son of Thor, and Arosinus de Lindsay. Both Earlston, where he gave other lands before 1170, and Crawford, which he possessed at the close of the century, were first held under Swan, the son of Thor, a south-country magnate whose family acquired lands in Perthshire, and took the name of Ruthven. William de Lindsay was one of the hostages for King William in 1174, described by Wyntoun as 'the greatest that of our land were seen'. His marriage to a great English heiress can be approximately fixed at that date, for their son and heir was a Justiciar in 1208, and his son a minor in 1214. In 1180 William sat in Parliament as Baron of Luffenac (Luffness), and he witnessed many royal charters down to near 1200. After 1187, if not before, he is found acting as Justiciar. He confirmed to the Church of Binning a donation of Durandus his 'antecessor' (which Durandus was Sheriff contemporary with the first Lindsay), and granted lands at Binning to Cambuskenneth, and in Crawford to Newbattle, to which last abbey a succession of grants was made by his issue. In 1188 he was certified by the Sheriff of Northumberland as having right in lands which had belonged to Randolph de Lindsay, who had obtained a great estate by marriage with Etheldreda, a granddaughter of Gospatrick, first Earl of Dunbar, which Randolph was a benefactor of the Priory of St. Bees.8 |