Pitscottie is a village in the Parish of Ceres, Fife, situated on the Ceres Burn at a road junction to the south of

Dura Den Dura Den is a small, 3 km-long wooded gorge that is located near Cupar in northeastern Fife, Scotland. This narrow cleft follows a course between the villages of Kemback to the north and Pitscottie to the south. A small stream, named the Ce ...

and 3 miles (5 km) southeast of Cupar. The nearby Pitscottie Moor was a favourite meeting place of

Covenanter Covenanters ( gd, Cùmhnantaich) were members of a 17th-century Scottish religious and political movement, who supported a Presbyterian Church of Scotland, and the primacy of its leaders in religious affairs. The name is derived from ''Covenan ...

s during the late 17th century and during the 1820s the village became a centre of

flax Flax, also known as common flax or linseed, is a flowering plant, ''Linum usitatissimum'', in the family Linaceae. It is cultivated as a food and fiber crop in regions of the world with temperate climates. Textiles made from flax are known in ...

spinning. There is an 18th-century bridge over the Ceres Burn.

Robert Lindsay

It was the home of

Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie (also Lindesay or Lyndsay; c. 1532–1580) was a Scottish chronicler, author of ''The Historie and Chronicles of Scotland, 1436–1565'', the first history of Scotland to be composed in Scots rather than Lati ...

, who wrote the first vernacular prose history of Scotland entitled The Historie and Cronicles of Scotland, 1436 - 1565.

Frances Groome

In 1882–4, Frances Groome's Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland described Pitscottie like this:

"Pitscottie, a hamlet in Ceres parish, Fife, on the right bank of Ceres Burn, 1½ mile NE of Ceres village and 3 miles ESE of Cupar. It takes its name, signifying the 'little hollow,' from its position between two confronting rising-grounds at the entrance to Dura Den; and two flax spinning-mills were erected at it in 1827. A 'countrie hous covered with strae and ried,' which stood on a small adjoining plateau, now occupied by the modern farmstead of Pitscottie, was the residence of Robert Lindsay, author of the quaint Chronicles of Scotland from 1436 to 1565. Pitscottie Moor, in the immediate neighbourhood, was a frequent meeting-place of the Covenanters for field preachings; and is named in a decree of 1671 against certain ousted ministers."

Sources

*—Ord. Sur., sh. 41, 1857. {{authority control Villages in Fife