Time Team
The Broth Plot;
the tale of David Barclay, cannibal and courtier
Day after day for almost 600 years the sea has battered my home, tearing at its very foundations as if it meant to destroy it entirely.
They say evil lies within, but Kairn of Mathers was elegant, strong and grand. I designed the castle myself, majestic at the very cliff edge looking down on a raging sea. It was a house fit for a courtier such as me, a loyal servant of King James and a man of high principle. But it was these very principles that were to lead to my downfall.
Throughout the early years of the 15th century St Cyrus and her surrounding villages had been plagued by a mean-minded and vicious sheriff who knew neither reason nor justice. James Melville was a monstrous specimen despised by every unfortunate who had suffered at his hand. One dark December night, however, the tables began to turn and a sinister plot was hatched.
Every laird in the parish had declared against Melville and his high-handed deeds, so a letter from us all was sent to the King himself to have the sheriff removed. A message soon returned from our King telling us that for all he cared we could make soup of the sheriff and sup him.
We needed no further prompting.
We invited Melville to the pretty gully that lay between our homes for a day's hunting, omitting to tell him that he, in fact, was the prey.
The lairds and I filled a cauldron with water from the stream and brought it to the boil. Our honoured guest was then led to join us by the fire and, before he knew it, hoisted into the boiling water. It was then that we proceeded to do that for which we earned our fame.
One by one we took a sup of the broth, and I can tell you now, without a doubt, that vengeance tastes sweet. Having fulfilled our King's wishes there in the spot forever after known as Sheriff's Kettle, we were distraught to find ourselves betrayed by the very man who had first suggested the means of disposing of our tormentor.
King James denounced our actions, calling us outlaws and denying having played any part in the plot. For me, as the leader, he reserved his greatest anger, swearing an oath that I would get peace to live neither on land nor sea for the rest of my life.
Banished to the inaccessible, sea-ravaged precipice upon which sat my beloved castle, I knew the King would have his way. But as I lived out the rest of my years alone with the winds and waves I had no regrets, for I knew that the lairds and I had supped well.