Rozanne E Folk’s contribution is greatly appreciated. I look forward to her further input.

The entry is the earliest document now known to us, adopting the spelling, Caldwell. I had thought previously that the Latin spelling would be Caulduellis, as classic Latin lacked a “w.”

Perhaps someone can obtain a copy or peruse a similar document, “Registrumn Vetus Ecclesiae Cathedralis Glasguensis", in handwriting of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and "Liber Ruber Ecclesiae Glasguensis", with entries from about 1400 to 1476. The "w" is absent in the registery's reference to Glasgow as Glasguensis. These, along with other records, were in 1843 printed in a volume for the Bannatyne/Maitland Club under the title: "Registrum Episcopatus Glasguensis: Munimenta Ecclesiae Metropolitanae Glasguensis a sede restauratâ saeculo ineunte XII ad reformatam religionem," reprints of which are located at National Library of Scotland. These texts may mention a Caldwell, although it is unlikely that there will be any mention of William Caldwell, who served as Archbishop or bishop of Glasgow before he became the Lord High Chancellor of Scotland, 1349-1364. I say his because of the omission of the 14th century in these texts.

The nearest Caldwell place names during King Robert I's reign were Colwela in Northumbria, since ceased to exist, and Cauldwell in North Riding, Yorkshire. cf. G.W.S. Barrow, Kingdom of the Scots, Edinburgh University Press, 1973.

The only clue as to the date of the entry is mention of Robertus and Reginald Crawford. From this Rozanne E. Folk has reasoned that the entry was likely made during the time that Robert Bruce was King of Scotland, which she assumed began in the late 13th century. However, I would respectfully challenge this conclusion. It is a debatable issue. Robert Bruce served as King of Scotland between 1306 and 1329, which falls within the early 14th century. I do not know when it became custom to refer to him as Robert I. If the reference is only to Robertus, not Robertus I, and he acquired the title Robertus I only upon acquisition of Kingship, this would work against him being King when the entry was made. I read somewhere that Robert Bruce was Earl of Carrick and Baron of Renfrew during the 13th century. In AD 1297, William Wallace had defeated the English King Edward I and Robert had emerged as a Scottish leader dependent upon financing by the Scottish clergy. This entry may have been posted in the 13th century, before Robertus became king. The payment that the Abbey made for use of the quarry may possibly have been a means to conceal the real intent, to preserve Scottish independence. If Edward I had become King of Scotland, he would have likely dismissed many of the Scottish clergy. cf. G.W.S. Barrow, The Kingdom of the Scots, Chap. 10, “The Clergy in the War of Independence,” pp. 214-231. The absence of the entries for the 14th century in the Glasgow Register may have have been motivated by a similar desire to conceal incriminating evidence.

In 1296 Sir Reginald Crawford was appointed sheriff of Ayr.
His sister had decases earlier married Wallace of Elderslie and thus became the mother of William Wallace the great Scottish patriot. Needless to say, the Crawfords rallied to his cause. The Crawford clan motto is "Tutum te robore reddam" which means "I will give you safety by strength". http://www.rampantscotland.com/clans/blclancrawford.htm.

In e-mails to me, Rozanne E. Folk tells me that the entry refers to an Earl of Renfrew as the person who is granting access through his forest to a quarry on his land, bounded by Terra de Caldwell on the western and northwestern side. That title confuses me. I cannot find any mention of any Earl of Renfrew on the internet. “Earl” would mean that the person was a peer whose title is heriditary. A baron is not a peer, but among the nobility, whose title ends with his death. Did Robert have such heriditary status -- was he the only peer in Ayrshire and Renfrewshire? How did he become Baron of Renfrew, when that title was originally conferred upon Walter Fitz Alan by Scottish King David I, and designated as heriditary? There are online entries indicating that before he became king, Robert Bruce was Earl of Carrick and Baron of Renfrew.

The mention that the Terra de Caldwell (Caldwell Estate?) is adjacent to the forest of the Earl of Renfrew suggests to me the possibility that the original Terra de Caldwell may have been forest land, conveyed by either the Scottish King (who restricted forests for his exclusive use as a hunting reserve), or the Earl (Baron?) of Renfrew. This invites speculation that at some time in the past a knight had been awarded this tract of land for special services that he had rendered on behalf of either the Scottish King or the Baron of Renfrew.

In AD 1164, Somerled, the Gaeic speaking King of the Hebrides, sailed up the Clyde at the head of a fleet of 160 ships and 10,000 men, seeking a confrontation with Anglo-Norman King Malcolm Canmore IV. Somerled marched inland and made camp at a small hill, known as the Knock, located roughly midway between Renfrew and Paisley, where he received Walter Fitz Alan, then Baron of Renfrew, and steward to the King of the lowland Scots. The meeting was cordial and all retired peacefully. The next morning Somerled was found slain in his tent. Somerled’s three sons concluded that Walter Fitz Alan had one of his knights commit the murder. (Scottish Battles: From Mons Graupius (AD 84) to Culloden (1746), by John Sadler, Canongate Press, 1996 , p. 164; John Macleod, Highlanders: History of the Gaels, Septre, 1996, p. 76.)

The identity of this knight has never been confirmed. If this murderer were the future Lord Caldwell, possibly he did not acquire the title of Lord Caldwell until possession of the land was transferred to him. Caldwell might have been a place name assumed during the time this land was within the English Kingdom of Northumbria.

In the early seventh century the expanding English kingdom of Northumbria reached the Irish Sea and occupied much of Lowland Scotland. (Northumbria 500-1100: Creation and Destruction of a Kingdom by David Rollason, Cambridge University Press, 2003, p. 63; The Safeguard of the Sea: A Naval History of Britain: 660-1649, by N A M Rodger, p. 6.)

Relying largely on Venerable Bede’s account in AD 731 of the History of the English People, and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, originally compiled by King Alfred in AD 890, that extends up to AD 1154, the end of the reign of King Stephen, many historians assumed that this expansion likely ousted large portions of the indigenous Britons. Vede despised the Britons as a sinful pagan people devoid of worthy qualities, and exalted the Christian English-Speaking peoples who routed the Britons. The alternative explanation now increasingly popularized is that Anglicization resulted largely from assimiliation promoted by trade.

Northumbria’s English culture was distinct from that of the Celtic and Nordic amalgram of northern Scotland. (Internal Colonialism, by Michael Hechter, Transaction Publishers, 1999, p. 112.). By the middle ages, the Northumbria English dialect and culture were barely distinguishable from that spoken in lowland Scotland. (Northumbria 500-1100: Creation and Destruction of a Kingdom, by David Rollason, Cambridge University Press, 2003, p. 65.)

The English culture and speech tended to dominate the market-towns and dwellers along the trade routes with England and the Britonic culture and speech the rural land between these towns and in the backwater areas. (Id.) The Britons dominated the ancient hill-forts lying in difficult to reach areas.

The choice of Caldwell as the English place name for a settlement about 12 miles SW of Glasgow along the trade road from Glasgow to Irvine would fit this pattern of English dominance along well-established trade routes.

It was during the seventh and eight century that most of the settlements in Great Britain acquired the place names that remained with them to this date, including the dozen or settlements in England called Caldwell or variant spelling thereof listed in the Domesday Book of 1088 (e.g., Colwela, Cauldwel, Caldwylan, Calwalader, etc.)

According to Percy H. Reaney and M. Wilson, the surname Caldwell derives from Old English/Anglo-Saxon words meaning “cold spring or stream.” (A Dictionary of English Surnames, 3rd edition, by P H Reaney, M Wilson, 1991, p. 80.) Reaney and Wilson also mention that Caldwell has been used in Celtic to refer to a “dweller near the hazel trees.” (Reaney and Wilson, supra, p. 88.)

Contributor David Caldwell from Manitoba and Ayrshire contends that the Scottish surname Caldwell likely comes from the Celtic word for hazel. A similar claim was made in the Etymological Dictionary of Family and Christian Names, With an Essay on Their Derivation and Import, by William Arthur, M.A., Sheldon Blake & Co., New York, 1857, reprinted by Kessinger Publishing, 2005, P. 89, acknowledging Caldwell as a common English surname but attributing the local Scottish surname to “Col-wold,” i.e., the wood of hazels.

I wonder whether the naming of a place after the hazel might have a Celtic Druid origin. Of the trees revered by the Druids -- beech, oak, aspen, etc., the beech and hazel alone have new leaves at one-third turns to form a helical pattern on the stem to which they are anchored. The helical pattern permeates Celtic art, and is particularly noted on columns, where it is depicted as if it were a vine spiraling up the column. The angle of 137.5 degrees formed as new leaves advance around the stem is what is known as the Golden Angle, because the eye can pick out one spiral pattern flowing clockwise and another flowing counter-clockwise. (Mario Livio, The Golden Ratio, 2002, p. 112.)

About the late eighth or early ninth century, much of western Northumbria was retaken by Bretonic occupation, including Renfrewshire and Ayrshire. The Britons formed the Kingdom of Strathclyde. When this area was seized by the Scottish Kings at the end of 10th or early 11th century, the area was renamed Cumbria. Before becoming King of Scotland, David I held the title of Prince of Cumbria.

Beginning in the late 17th century, certain historians sought to interpret this history to create an Anglo-British identity for lowland Scotland. (Subverting Scotland's Past: Scottish Whig Historians and the Creation of an Anglo-British Identity, 1680-1830, by Colin Kidd, Cambridge University Press, 2003, p. 16.) Perhaps my own reasoning is infected by the same bias.