THERE is a corner of a Scottish castle that is forever Canada, but now heads are being scratched about what would happen if Canadians went there to assert their forthcoming rights to smoke dope.
The castle is the most famous in the land, Edinburgh Castle itself, and it has long been popularly held that part of its famous Esplanade was consecrated as Canadian soil as far back as 1625.
With new Prime Minister Justin Trudeau having committed his government to legalising marijuana, as Canadians call cannabis, does that mean consumers of the drug will be immune from prosecution if they stand on Canadian territory?
The intriguing possibility has been raised on social media and websites and comes about because King James VI and I was eager for income when he moved to London after the Union of the Crowns in 1603.
Sir William Alexander of Menstrie, the Earl of Stirling, had been given the right of possession of the land between Newfoundland and New England, and he intended to call it New Scotland, or Nova Scotia in Latin. In order to raise money for the settlement of a colony at the Royal Province of Nova Scotia, the Crown authorised the sale of baronies that gave the holders the right to call themselves Sir – they would not be allowed into the peerage, but their hereditary rank would be above ordinary knighthoods.
It was a lucrative business, made even more so when someone, probably the earl himself, came up with the wheeze of turning a slice of Edinburgh Castle into part of Nova Scotia – or so the legend has it.
Most of the new baronets had no intention of heading across the Atlantic to claim their new title by the symbolic action of merely standing on Nova Scotian soil, so instead, King James authorised that baronets could take ‘sasine’ or lawful possession of their territories and titles merely by going to the castle.
In a feudal ceremony, the new baronets would then take their possession of ‘earth and stone’ from Nova Scotia delivered by a representative of the king, who by 1625 was now Charles I who enthusiastically adopted his father’s scheme. The ceremonies went on for 12 years for Scottish baronets, and since 1637, so the story goes, no one has ever rescinded the royal decree that made that small area of the castle part of Nova Scotia.
So it follows clearly that Canadians standing on Canadian territory will soon be able to ingest cannabis – purely for recreational purposes, of course. It’s a good story, but what a pity about one small detail: it is simply not true that any part of Edinburgh Castle was ever permanently designated as being the soil of Nova Scotia.
Historians know that the ‘earth and stone’ from Nova Scotia was only temporarily scattered on the site so that the new baronets could stand on it and claim their title.
The confusion arises from a plaque on the Esplanade which marks the spot where baronetcies were dished out but it clearly makes no claims to being Canadian territory.
A spokesperson for Historic Environment Scotland made it clear our Canadian friends would not be able to smoke cannabis legally at the Esplanade: “I can confirm that this would not be the case. Edinburgh Castle and the Esplanade is entirely in the ownership of Scottish Ministers.”
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