Dunfermline

Dunfermline

Dunfermline

Top: Town skyline, Top Left: Dunfermline High Street, Bottom Left: Andrew Carnegie House, Right: Dunfermline City Chambers, Bottom: Italian Garden, Pittencrieff Park

Area: 7.07 sq mi (18.3 km)

Population: 49,706 <ref>"Scotland's Census 2011- Dunfermline Locality Area Profile". www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk. 2011</ref>

Density 1,498 /sq mi (578 /km)

OS grid reference NT105875

Council Area: Fife

Lieutenancy area: Fife

Country: Scotland

Sovereign state: United Kingdom

Postcode district: KY11, KY12

Dialling Code: 01383

Police: Scottish

Fire: Scottish

Ambulance: Scottish

EU Parliament: Scotland

UK Parliament: Dunfermline and West Fife

Scottish Parliament: Dunfermline

Dunfermline (Scots: Dunfaurlin, Scottish Gaelic: Dùn Phàrlain) is a town and former Royal Burgh in Fife, Scotland, on high ground 3 miles (4.8 km) from the northern shore of the Firth of Forth. The 2011 census established that Dunfermline has a population of 49,706, making it the second-largest settlement in Fife.<ref>Scotland's Census 2011- Dunfermline Locality Area Profile". www.scotlandscensus.gov.uk. 2011 (accessed 22nd July 2014)</ref>

The area around Dunfermline became home to the first settlers in the Neolithic period, but did not gain recognition until the Bronze Age as a place of importance. The town was first recorded in the 11th century, with the marriage of Malcolm III, King of Scotland, and Saint Margaret at the church in Dunfermline. As his Queen consort, Margaret established a new church dedicated to the Holy Trinity, which evolved into an Abbey under their son, David I in 1128. Following the burial of Alexander I, the abbey graveyard confirmed its status as the mausoleum of Scotland's kings and queens.

The town is a major service centre for west Fife. Dunfermline retains much of its historic significance and provides numerous retail and leisure facilities. Fife College, formally Carnegie College, also have a campus at Halbeath. <ref>Welcome to Fife College". Fife College. (accessed 22nd July 2014)</ref> Employment is focused in the service sector, with the largest employer being BSKYB. Other large employers in the town include Amazon (on-line retailer), HBOS (finance), Taylor Wimpey (housebuilder), Dunfermline Building Society (finance), CR Smith (window manufacturers) and FMC Technologies (subsea technology).

Etymology

There have been various interpretations of the name, "Dunfermline".<ref>Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 3, 4</ref>The first element, "dun" translated from Gaelic, has been accepted as a (fortified) hill, and is assumed to be referring to the rocky outcrop at the site of Malcolm Canmore's tower in Pittencrieff Glen (now Pittencrieff Park).<ref>Taylor and Márkus, The Place–Names of Fife: Volume One, 309–310</ref>The rest of the name is problematic.<ref>Taylor and Márkus, The Place–Names of Fife: Volume One, 309–310</ref>The 'dun' element is found in 23 Fife place names.<ref>Simon Taylor, Place Names of Fife in Donald Omand, The Fife Book, 209</ref>

The second element, "the ferm" may have been an alternative name for the Tower Burn according to a medieval record published in 1455 and that, together with the Lyne Burn to the south, suggest the site of a fortification between these two watercourses.<ref>Taylor and Márkus, The Place–Names of Fife: Volume One, 309–310</ref>

History

The first record of a settlement in the Dunfermline area was in the Neolithic period. This evidence includes finds of a stone axe, some flint arrowheads and a carved stone ball which was found near the town.<ref> Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 9</ref> A cropmark which is understood to have been used as a possible mortuary enclosure has been found at Deanpark House, also near the town. By the time of the Bronze Age, the area was beginning to show some importance. Important finds included a bronze axe in Wellwood and a gold torc from the Parish Churchyard. Cist burials from the Bronze Age have also been discovered at both Crossford and Masterton, the latter of which contains a pair of armlets, a bronze dagger and a set necklace believed to have complemented a double burial.<ref> Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 9</ref>

The first historic record for Dunfermline was made in the 11th century.<ref>Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 15–16</ref>According to the fourteenth-century chronicler, John of Fordun, Malcolm III, King of Scotland (reign 1058–93) married his second bride, the Anglo-Hungarian princess, Saint Margaret, at the church in Dunfermline between 1068 and 1070- the ceremony was performed by Forhad, the last Celtic bishop of St Andrews.<ref>Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 15–16</ref>

Malcolm III established Dunfermline as a new seat for royal power in the mid-11th century and initiated changes that eventually made the township the de facto capital of Scotland for much of the period until the assassination of James I in 1437.<ref>Lamont-Brown, Fife in History and Legend, 178–180</ref>Following her marriage to King Malcolm III, Queen Margaret encouraged her husband to convert the small culdee chapel into a church for Benedictine monks.<ref>Lamont-Brown, Fife in History and Legend, 178–180</ref>The existing culdee church was no longer able to meet the demand for its growing congregation because of a large increase in the population of Dunfermline from the arrival of English nobility coming into Scotland.<ref> Henderson, The Annuals of Dunfermline and Vincity from the earliest authentic period to the present time 1069–1878, 17</ref>The founding of this new church of Dunfermline was inaugurated around 1072, but was not recorded in the town's records.<ref> Henderson, The Annuals of Dunfermline and Vincity from the earliest authentic period to the present time 1069–1878, 17</ref>

King David I of Scotland (reigned 1124–53) would later grant this church, dedicated to the Holy Trinity, to "unam mansuram in burgo meo de Dunfermlyn" which translates into "a house or dwelling place in my burgh of Dunfermline".<ref>Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 15–16</ref> Dunfermline Abbey would play a major role in the general romanisation of religion throughout the kingdom. At the peak of its power the abbey controlled four burghs, three courts of regality and a large portfolio of lands from Moray in the north down into Berwickshire.<ref>Lamont-Brown, Fife in History and Legend, 178–180</ref>Dunfermline had become a burgh between 1124 and 1127, if not before this time.<ref>Lamont-Brown, Fife in History and Legend, pp.178–180</ref>Dunfermline Palace was also connected to the abbey and the first known documentation of the Auld Alliance was signed there on 23 October 1295.

The Union of the Crowns ended the town's royal connections when James VI relocated the Scottish Court to London in 1603.<ref>Durie, Dunfermline: Britain in Old Photographs, 17</ref>The Reformation of 1560 had previously meant a loss of the Dunfermline's ecclesiastical importance. On 25 May 1624, a fire engulfed around three-quarters of the medieval-renaissance burgh.<ref>Durie, Dunfermline: Britain in Old Photographs, 17</ref><ref>Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 35</ref> Some of the surviving buildings of the fire were the palace, the abbey and the Abbot's House.<ref>Lamont-Brown, Fife in History and Legend, 178–180</ref>

The decline in the fortunes of Dunfermline lasted until the introduction of a linen industry in the early 18th century.<ref>Pearson, Around Dunfermline, 10</ref>One reason for which the town became a centre for linen was there was enough water to power the mills and nearby ports along the Fife Coast. These ports also did trade with the Baltic and Low Countries.<ref>Pearson, Around Dunfermline, 10</ref>Another reason was through an act of industrial espionage in 1709 by a weaver known as James Blake who gained access to the workshops of a damask linen factory in Edinburgh by pretending to act like a simpleton in order to find out and memorise the formula.<ref>Pearson, Around Dunfermline, 10</ref>On his return to his home town in 1718, Blake established a damask linen industry in the town.<ref>Pearson, Around Dunfermline, 10</ref> The largest of these factories was St Leonard's Mill which was established by Erskine Beveridge in 1851. A warehouse and office block was later added around 1869. Other linen factories were built on land to both the north and south ends of the burgh.<ref>Lamont-Brown, Fife in History and Legend, 178–180</ref>

During the mid-19th century, powerloom weaving started to replace linen damask. The latter did not survive, going into decline straight after the end of First World War.<ref> Pride, Kingdom of Fife, 8,10</ref>In 1909 the Royal Navy established Scotland's only Royal Naval Dockyard at nearby Rosyth. Post-war housing began in the late 1940s with the construction of temporary prefabs and Swedish timber houses around areas such as Kingseat and Townhill. Additional provisions were made for electricity, water and sewage systems. Council housing was focused towards Abbeyview, on a 240-acre (97 ha) site on Aberdour Road; Touch, to the south of Garvock Hill; Bellyeoman and Baldridgeburn. Private housing became focused to the north of Garvock Hill and on the site of West Pitcorthie Farm.<ref>McEwan Dunfermline: The Post-War Years, 87</ref>

Today, Dunfermline is the main centre for the West Fife area, and is also considered to be a dormitory town for Edinburgh.<ref>Pride, Kingdom of Fife, 8,10</ref><ref>http://www.bbc.co.uk/voices/recordings/group/scotland-dunfermline.shtml</ref>The town has shopping facilities, a major public park, a main college campus at Halbeath and an-out-of-town leisure park with a multiplex cinema and a number of restaurants. The online retailer Amazon.com has opened a major distribution centre in the Duloch Park area of Dunfermline.

Geography

Dunfermline is at 56°04′17″N 3°27′42″W on the coastal fringe of Fife.<ref>Dennison and Stronach, Historic Dunfermline, 3, 4</ref> The medieval town rose from approximately 51 metres (167 ft) above sea level in the south, where Nethertown Broad Street can now be found; 69 metres (226 ft)–67 metres (220 ft) west to east along what is now Priory Lane; to 90 metres (300 ft)–101 metres (331 ft) up the High Street, from west to east; to 92 metres (302 ft)–105 metres (344 ft)&106 metres (348 ft) between Bruce Street and Queen Anne Street from south to north.<ref>Fawcett, Royal Dunfermline, 2</ref>

Demographics

According to the 2001 census, Dunfermline had a total population of 39,229 representing 11.2% of Fife's total population.<ref name="Dunfermline population">Template:Cite web</ref> The 2011 census shows the population has risen considerably to 49,706; an increase of approximately 20% when compared to the 2001 census.<ref name="Scotland's Census 2011">Template:Cite web</ref> There are 21,620 households in Dunfermline, 70.7% of which were owned.<ref name="Dunfermline Profile"/> The demographic make-up of the population is much in line with the rest of Scotland. The age group from 30 to 44 forms the largest portion of the population (23.7%).<ref name="Dunfermline population" />

Recent Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD) figures indicate that the most deprived datazone in Dunfermline is Abbeyview North which is ranked as being one of the 5% most deprived areas in Scotland. The Headwell, Touch and Woodmill areas in Dunfermline fall within the 5–10% banding. Baldridgeburn, Brucefield and Halbeath areas are identified as being within the 10–15%, 15–20% banding of most deprived communities in Scotland.<ref name="SIMD Indicators">Template:Cite web</ref>

Dunfermline compared according to United Kingdom Census 2011<ref name="Dunfermline Profile">Template:Cite web</ref>
	Dunfermline	Fife	Scotland
Total population	49,706	365,198	5,295,403
Percentage Scottish identity only	62.1%	63.8%	62.4%
Over 75 years old	6.2%	7.9%	7.7%
Unemployed	5%	4%	4.8%

References

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