Newburn is a civil

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

in the

County A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...

Fife Fife ( , ; ; ) is a council areas of Scotland, council area and lieutenancy areas of Scotland, lieutenancy area in Scotland. A peninsula, it is bordered by the Firth of Tay to the north, the North Sea to the east, the Firth of Forth to the s ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

. It is located on the north coast of the

Firth of Forth The Firth of Forth () is a firth in Scotland, an inlet of the North Sea that separates Fife to its north and Lothian to its south. Further inland, it becomes the estuary of the River Forth and several other rivers. Name ''Firth'' is a cognate ...

and bounded by the parishes of

Kilconquhar Kilconquhar (, locally also ) is a village and parish in Fife in Scotland. It includes the small hamlet of Barnyards. It is bounded by the parishes of Elie, Ceres, Cameron, St Monans, Carnbee, Newburn and Largo.Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotl ...

and Largo. It was originally a rural parish with no major settlement, but with the development of Leven as a seaside resort in the late 19th century, the population of the parish grew considerably. According to an 1857 description, "The parish is bounded on the north & east by Kilconquhar, on the south by Largo Bay and on the west by Largo. It is from north to south and in breadth. Its area is , all under cultivation except 350 under pasture and 130 under wood. The land surface near the shore is sandy, forming extensive links which are kept in pasture. The land ascends from the shore to the northwards, reaching its greatest height at Gilston. The soil, with the exception of the links, is very fertile. The rent of land averages £2-12-0 per acre. The parish schoolmaster's salary is £30, plus £14 of fees, besides which there is an allowance for teaching a certain number of Poor children, from a fund left by John Wood of Orkie in 1659. There is 1 public house in the parish; sobriety and industry prevail. The nearest market towns are

Colinsburgh Colinsburgh is a village in east Fife, Scotland, in the parish of Kilconquhar. History The village is named after Colin Lindsay, 3rd Earl of Balcarres (1652–1722), who gave the land on which it was built. It was here that the first meeting of ...

and Largo. Balchristie is the only hamlet in the parish, containing a few houses".

Etymology

The name ''Newburn'' was first recorded in 1150 as ''Nithbren'' and may be of

Pictish Pictish is an extinct Brittonic Celtic language spoken by the Picts, the people of eastern and northern Scotland from late antiquity to the Early Middle Ages. Virtually no direct attestations of Pictish remain, short of a limited number of geog ...

origin. The second element may be either ''*bren'' meaning "hill, hill-side" (cf.

Welsh Welsh may refer to: Related to Wales * Welsh, of or about Wales * Welsh language, spoken in Wales * Welsh people, an ethnic group native to Wales Places * Welsh, Arkansas, U.S. * Welsh, Louisiana, U.S. * Welsh, Ohio, U.S. * Welsh Basin, during t ...

''bryn''), or ''*pren'' meaning "tree" (Welsh ''pren''). The first part, ''*nith'', could be a Pictish

ethnonym An ethnonym () is a name applied to a given ethnic group. Ethnonyms can be divided into two categories: exonyms (whose name of the ethnic group has been created by another group of people) and autonyms, or endonyms (whose name is created and used ...

. Early documents refer to it as "Newburn of Old Drumeldrie" an ancient parish north of Largo in the control of

Dunfermline Abbey Dunfermline Abbey is a Church of Scotland parish church in Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland. The church occupies the site of the ancient chancel and transepts of a large medieval Benedictine abbey, which was confiscated and sacked in 1560 during the S ...

. There is no strong reason to think the settlement is of Pictish origin and the village name seems simply English: New Burn (the stream is artificially straightened); New Barn; or New Berm.

Newburn Churchyard

The church was dedicated to St. Serf in 1564. Its ministers were: Thomas Jamieson (1564-1566); George Lundie (1568-1574); Andrew Hunter (1588-1592); David Mearns (1588–89); John Carmichael (1595-1603); John Dykes (1604-1610); Ephraim Melvill (1611-1617); John Foreet (1619-1628); George Hamilton (1628-1650); James Fleming (1650-1651); Robert Honyman (1653-1657); George Hamilton (1659-1662); John Auchenleck (1663-1665); William Ogilvie (1666-1679); William Syme (1679-1681); Andrew Youngson (1682-1685); James Hay of Naughton (1685-1690); George Hamilton (1692-1696); George Cleland (1696-1700); Arthur Fairfoul (1700-1704); David Myles (1705-1734); James Smith (1734-1768); John Richardson (1769-1778); Archibald Bonar (1779-1783); James Brown (1783-1786); James Mitchell (1787-1793); Thomas Laurie DD (1793-1843); Alexander Urquhart (1843-1885); George Geekie (1883-1913); William Neil (1914-?).Fasti Ecclesistae Scotia p.224/5 The tiny and long-abandoned church acts as a magnet to burials of note. These include: * Sir Raymond Patrick Hadow * Prof

James Lorimer (advocate) James Lorimer of Kellyfield, FRSE LLD (4 November 1818 – 13 February 1890) was a Scottish advocate and professor of public law. He was an authority on international law. He has been credited with coining the concept of international organi ...

* Sir

Robert Lorimer Sir Robert Stodart Lorimer, Order of the British Empire, KBE (4 November 1864 – 13 September 1929) was a prolific Scotland, Scottish architect and furniture designer noted for his sensitive restorations of historic houses and castles, f ...

architect *

John Henry Lorimer John Henry Lorimer (12 August 1856 – 4 November 1936) was a Scottish painter who worked on portraits and Genre works, genre scenes of everyday life. Life Lorimer was born in Edinburgh, the son of James Lorimer (jurist), James Lorimer, who ...

artist *

Leonora Jeffrey Rintoul Leonora Jeffrey Rintoul FRSE (1878-1953) was a Scottish ornithologist and rare female member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. In authorship she is known as L. J. Rintoul and is closely associated with her "constant partner" and co-author E. V. ...

ornithologist, a rare female Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was establis ...

Notable residents

* Rev George Hamilton (1635-1712)

Moderator of the General Assembly The moderator of the General Assembly is the Chair (official), chairperson of a General Assembly (presbyterian church), General Assembly, the highest court of a Presbyterian or Calvinism, Reformed church. Kirk sessions and presbytery (church pol ...

in 1699 * Mr Andrew Hunter, (d. 1638) Minister of Newburn and chaplain to

Francis Stewart, 5th Earl of Bothwell Francis Stewart, 5th Earl of Bothwell (c. December 1562 – November 1612), was Commendator of Kelso Abbey and Coldingham Priory, a Privy Counsellor and Lord High Admiral of Scotland. He was a notorious conspirator who led several uprisings aga ...

* Rev Prof John Cook

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and Literature, letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". ...

(1739–1815) Professor of Moral Philosophy at

St Andrews University The University of St Andrews (, ; abbreviated as St And in post-nominals) is a public university in St Andrews, Scotland. It is the oldest of the four ancient universities of Scotland and, following the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, t ...

, co-founder of the

in 1783 * Rev Prof George Cook

(1772–1845), son of the above, Professor of Moral Philosophy at

(following in his father's footsteps), Moderator of the

General Assembly of the Church of Scotland The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland is the sovereign and highest court of the Church of Scotland, and is thus the Church's governing body.''An Introduction to Practice and Procedure in the Church of Scotland'' by A. Gordon McGillivray, ...

in 1825.

References

{{reflist Parishes in Fife