Historical development of Scottish sheriffdoms

A sheriffdom is a judicial district of Scotland. Originally identical to the Shires of Scotland, from the eighteenth century many counties were grouped to form "sheriffdoms".

By 1975 there were 12 sheriffdoms, with only Lanarkshire not grouped with another county. Following the abolition of the counties and formation of new local government areas in 1975 and 1996 the number of sheriffdoms has been reduced to six.

Shires originated in the twelfth century when the office of sheriff was introduced to Scotland. These shires eventually became the counties of Scotland. Malcolm III appears to have introduced sheriffs as part of a policy of replacing native "Celtic" forms of government with Norman feudal structures. This was continued by his sons Edgar, Alexander I and in particular David I. David completed the division of the country into sheriffdoms by the conversion of existing thanedoms.

At the accession of George II in 1727 twenty-two sheriffs were hereditary, three were appointed for life and only eight held office at the pleasure of the monarch.

The heritable sheriffdoms were:

Those appointed for life were:

Those held at pleasure were:

Following the unsuccessful Jacobite Rising of 1745 the Heritable Jurisdictions Act 1747 revested the government of the shires in the Crown, compensating those office holders who were displaced. The Sheriffs (Scotland) Act 1747 reduced the office of sheriff principal to a largely ceremonial one, with a sheriff depute or sheriff substitute appointed to each "county, shire or stewartry". The sheriff deputes, who were paid a salary by the Crown, were qualified advocates and took charge of sheriff courts. Where a sheriff depute was appointed to more than one county, he was aided by sheriff-substitutes.

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