Dunscore ( / 'DUN-skur', less commonly / 'DUN-score') is a small village which lies northwest of

Dumfries Dumfries ( ; sco, Dumfries; from gd, Dùn Phris ) is a market town and former royal burgh within the Dumfries and Galloway council area of Scotland. It is located near the mouth of the River Nith into the Solway Firth about by road from the ...

on the B729, in

Dumfriesshire Dumfriesshire or the County of Dumfries or Shire of Dumfries (''Siorrachd Dhùn Phris'' in Gaelic) is a historic county and registration county in southern Scotland. The Dumfries lieutenancy area covers a similar area to the historic county. I ...

, in the District Council Region of

Dumfries and Galloway Dumfries and Galloway ( sco, Dumfries an Gallowa; gd, Dùn Phrìs is Gall-Ghaidhealaibh) is one of 32 unitary council areas of Scotland and is located in the western Southern Uplands. It covers the counties of Scotland, historic counties of ...

, southwest

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

. The village consists of about 150 people and has a church, a community run pub, and a hosted post office three times a week. The village hosts a gala event every August. It is the birthplace of the

Church of Scotland The Church of Scotland ( sco, The Kirk o Scotland; gd, Eaglais na h-Alba) is the national church in Scotland. The Church of Scotland was principally shaped by John Knox, in the Scottish Reformation, Reformation of 1560, when it split from t ...

missionary A missionary is a member of a Religious denomination, religious group which is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Tho ...

Jane Haining Jane Mathison Haining (6 June 1897 – 17 July 1944) was a Scottish missionary for the Church of Scotland in Budapest, Hungary, who was recognized in 1997 by Yad Vashem in Israel as Righteous Among the Nations for having risked her life to ...

, one of only ten

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

victims from Scotland. The

Dunscore railway station Dunscore (NX858840) was one of the four principal stations on the Cairn Valley Light Railway (CVR) branch, from Dumfries. It served the rural area of Dunscore in Dumfries and Galloway. The line was closed to passengers during the war in WW2.Awd ...

opened in 1905, and closed to passengers in 1943 and to goods in 1949. The station was on the Cairn Valley Railway which ran to

Moniaive Moniaive ( 'monny-IVE'; gd, Am Moine Naomh, ''"The Holy Moor"'') is a village in the Parish of Glencairn, in Dumfries and Galloway, southwest Scotland. It stands on the Cairn and Dalwhat Waters, north-west of the town of Dumfries. Moniaive ha ...

from

Craigenputtock Craigenputtock (usually spelled by the Carlyles as Craigenputtoch) is an estate in Scotland where Thomas Carlyle lived from 1828 to 1834. He wrote several of his early works there, including ''Sartor Resartus''. The estate's name incorporate ...

Estate is within the Civil Parish of Dunscore.

Etymology

The name Dunscore is of

Cumbric Cumbric was a variety of the Common Brittonic language spoken during the Early Middle Ages in the ''Hen Ogledd'' or "Old North" in what is now the counties of Westmorland, Cumberland and northern Lancashire in Northern England and the souther ...

origin, formed of the elements ''dīn'' 'fort' and ''*ïsgor'' 'fortification, rampart'.

William J. Watson William John Watson FRSE LLD (1865 – 9 March 1948) was a toponymist, one of the greatest Scottish scholars of the 20th century, and was the first scholar to place the study of Scottish place names on a firm linguistic basis. Life Watson ...

proposes the meaning "fort of the bulwark or rampart".

The Church

There is a parish church of Dunscore. The long abandoned

Dunscore Old Kirk Dunscore Old Kirk (NGR NX 92661 83241) was a pre-reformation kirk (church) situated on rising ground off a minor road to Merkland, Parish of Dunscore, Dumfriesshire, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland; about 3 km from Auldgirth. The church wa ...

was located near Fardingwell Farm, between

Robert Burns Robert Burns (25 January 175921 July 1796), also known familiarly as Rabbie Burns, was a Scottish poet and lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland and is celebrated worldwide. He is the best known of the poets who hav ...

Ellisland Farm Ellisland Farm lies about 6.5 mi/10.4 km northwest of Dumfries near the village of Auldgirth, located in the Parish of Dunscore, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland. The complex is a museum in the farm Robert Burns built, lived in a ...

and Robert Ferguson's "Isle Tower". In Thompson's 1832 map, Ellisland was spelt "Elliesland" and was next to Isle Tower. The ' Laird of Lag's Tomb' is located at the surviving "Dunscore Old Kirk" burial ground, as is the grave of Captain

Robert Riddell Captain Robert Riddell (1755–1794), Laird of Friar's Carse, near Dumfries. A friend of Robert Burns, who made him a collection of his poems which later became famous, and wrote a poem 'Sonnet On The Death Of Robert Riddell' in memory of him ...

of Glenriddell, a close associate of

. The church was rebuilt into a heritage centre in 2017, and features information on the Dunscore-born Jane Haining.

Lag Tower

Lag (or Lagg) Tower is a ruinous fortification lying on high ground north-east of Dunscore, north of the Laggan Burn. The structure dates from the 15th or 16th century and was originally four storeys high with a walled courtyard at its base. From the 14th Century, the site was the home of the Grierson family, which was responsible for building the tower. Roger Grierson of Lagg was killed at the

Battle of Sauchieburn The Battle of Sauchieburn was fought on 11 June 1488, at the side of Sauchie Burn, a stream about south of Stirling, Scotland. The battle was fought between the followers of King James III of Scotland and a large group of rebellious Scottish n ...

in 1488 and several family members were killed at the

Battle of Flodden The Battle of Flodden, Flodden Field, or occasionally Branxton, (Brainston Moor) was a battle fought on 9 September 1513 during the War of the League of Cambrai between the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland, resulting in an English ...

in 1513. In 1685 Robert Grierson of Lagg was a persecutor of the Covenanters.The Castles of Scotland by Andrew Coventry ISBN 1-899874-00-3

References

Villages in Dumfries and Galloway Dumfriesshire Parishes in Dumfries and Galloway {{DumfriesGalloway-geo-stub