Hill of Beith Castle
| Hill of Beith Castle | |
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| Beith, North Ayrshire, Scotland GB grid reference NS255564, 620506 |
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Substantial foundations of the castle tower
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 Hill of Beith Castle
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| Coordinates | 55°45′08″N 4°36′54″W / 55.752332°N 4.614919°W |
| Type | Tower Castle |
| Site information | |
| Owner | Private |
| Open to the public |
No |
| Condition | Foundations only |
| Site history | |
| Built | 16th Century |
| Built by | Cuninghame |
| Materials | Stone |
The old Barony and castle, fortalice, or tower house of Hill of Beith lay in the feudal Regality of Kilwinning, within the Baillerie of Cunninghame, and the Sherrifdom of Ayr, now the Parish of Beith, North Ayrshire, Scotland.
The Tironensian monks of Kilwinning Abbey held a Grange or farmland at Beith, given to the abbey by Sir William de Cunninghame in the early 14th century. This ownership involved the monks in extensive agricultural activities and details of the rents from their farms show a considerable annual production of cheese in particular, 268 recorded for one year alone.
The Barony of Beith had been given to the Kilwinning monks by Richard de Morville's wife towards the end of the 12th century and the monks as ecclesiastical barons, with the feudal right of 'pit and gallows', had a court hill where they delivered local justice. This artificial earth mound is still in existence, standing close to Boghall House. The abbey's farm or Grange was most likely at Grangehill, a small estate nearby.
The abbot may have stayed at the Hill of Beith castle when in the locality as this tower may have been the main residential building of the monks' grange, becoming secularised upon the dissolution of the monastery and passing into the hands of the aristocracy. The site is prominent, commanding a fine view of the surrounding countryside and being well defended by the natural slopes, overlooking the old Loch Brand site that protected its north-westerly boundary.
The Abbot of Kilwinning feued out the 'Lands of Hill of Beith' to a cadet branch of the Cuninghames of Kilmaurs, Earls of Glencairn, in the person of John Cuninghame, son of Sir William Cuninghame of Caddel, near Giffordland outside Dalry.
At the Reformation, James Hamilton, son of Gavin Hamilton the last Abbot of Kilwinning, obtained the twenty-four shilling land of old extent with the teinds of the same of Overhill (Easter) Hill of Beith and then in around 1579 he sold them to Lord Robert Boyd. The Cunninghames however once again held the castle and lands in the early 1600s at the time of Timothy Pont's famous survey of Cunninghame.
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Wikipedia