Talk:List of acts of the Parliament of Scotland

Naming of Acts ?

I was going to have a go at a couple of Acts ("Education" ones of the C17th). However, the 1696 act, to pick an example, is redlinked as Education Act (1696) and as Act for the Settling of Schools. The second, so far as I can tell, is the technically correct name. Indeed, every Act of the Scots Parliament pre-1707 that I know the title of starts "Act ..." viz. "Act for the Settling of Schools", "Act anent Peace and War", "Act for the Security of the Kingdom", "Act for the establishment of the 'Company of Scotland' ...", "Act anent the Supremacy" and so on. So, before I start scribbling, I had better ask if anyone has an opinion on naming. Angus McLellan (Talk) 21:01, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Titles such as "Act anent Peace and War" were part of the original Acts. Those which were still in force in 1964 had short titles assigned by the Statute Law Revision (Scotland) Act 1964. For example an Act of 1563 is headed "Anent the creatioun of notaris" and now has the short title The Notaries Act 1563. The 1696 Act on Education was repealed by the Education (Scotland) Act 1872, so never had a short title assigned to it. So references to the Education Act 1696 etc are simply a convenient shorthand, without any formal backing--George Burgess 22:26, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

The original name seems the best option, and indeed the only option for ones excluded from the Statute Law Revision (Scotland) Act 1964. However, for those that were renamed in 1964, the alternative name should also be given in the first sentence in bold. No strong feelings about this, but however we do it we should try to be as consistent as poss, and be explicit and clear about the alt names in each article, linking to the 1964 act. --Mais oui! 22:33, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks to both for the helpful answers ! Angus McLellan (Talk) 22:37, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Act numbering

So, I tripped across a cheap copy (originally £185!) of the Chronological Table of the Statutes yesterday, which has a fifty-page list of all pre-Union Scottish acts tucked in the back. And there's some weirdness going on.

Unlike the English ones, which are annotated as "52 Hen III c.9", nice and simple, these have two numberings. The first is the Record Edition numbering; it goes linearly in chapter number, resetting every now and again... and often twice in a year, so 1424 has the May 26 laws (c.1-27), then it has the March 12 laws (c.1-25), then we go on to 1425 (c.1-23), 1426 (c.1-7) and 1427 (c.1-8 on July 1, c.1-12 on March 1).

We also have a 12mo edition numbering, which has one long list of chapter numbers for the whole of a reign - so it starts in May 1424 with c.1 and rolls right through to c.149 in 1436, breaking this up by "Parl. 1-1424", "Parl. 2-1424", "Parl. 3-1425", ... "Parl. 13-1436"

There's an occasional unnumbered one in each, so the numbers aren't in synch (the Royal Mines Act is either c.12 of James I or c.13 of the May parliament of 1425), and often one will have a chapter number in one system but not the other. And, just to confuse matters further, of course... we're dealing with old-style dates, so the second 1424 Parliament was actually in 1425 (new style).

Thoughts on what this lot means? I'm pretty confused now. Shimgray | talk | 09:33, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Correct name of Act

Was an Act passed in or around 1471 to re-incorporate Orkney and Shetland back into Scotland? If so, what, exactly, was the full and correct title and date of that Act. Any other info you have from bona fide, preferably contemporary, sources would be highly appreciated. Ta. --Mais oui! 15:19, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

There was a "King's marriage" and a "Norway" act in 1467 (January - ie 1468 new style). 1475 has another "Royal marriage" Act, and two on "Crown lands"; a "Wife's ratification" act in March 1481 (1482 NS). These are possibles, but I don't have the text or anything handy - just a list of short titles. It's always possible that there was such an Act, just confusingly named so I can't spot it... or that absorbing O&S in case of default was provided for under the 1467 Act?? Shimgray | talk | 19:33, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Many thanks. Can you confirm that there was not an Act of Parliament passed called "Act of Annexation"? And what is the title, date, publication etc of your source/list of Acts? Ta. --Mais oui! 20:04, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

My source is HMSO's Chronological table of the statutes, 1993. I can tell you there's no act with a formal short title of "Annexation", but formal short titles are all I have listed. I don't know how complete this list is - I believe it's comprehensive, but 1471 is early enough that things are a bit patchy. It won't tell me if "Act of Annexation" is the popular name for, say, s.5 of the Manswearing Act; the modern concept of a single act on a single topic is a bit of a new one, and we tend to retroactively name individual chapters of an old statute as individual acts. But the Scottish ones don't have very descriptive names...

This says we're looking for 1471 c.4, which is given the short title here of "Barratry" - 20th May is the date given, my source says 6th, which looks like a Gregorian/Julian mismatch. But I don't have a copy of the text of the act to confirm or deny this - may be time to find a library. Shimgray | talk | 20:28, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

I'll copy my comment from Talk:Orkney Islands to here:

Annexation is also the phrase used by the 1910 Encyclopedia Britannica see here. A quick Google search seems to show that annexation was the phrase attached to many acts of the time, especially to the appropriation of land previously owned by the church - such the 1587 "act of general annexation" or "general act of annexation".

EB is generally pretty reliable on such matters, but further research would be excellent. A quick extension to my search showed that the other important issue of the Scots Acts of 1471 was the banning of golf [1] - although they had less success with that particular legislation, it seems!

Whether the term is applied to this particular case or not, there is probably scope for an article on the various Acts of Annexation from this period, perhaps based on the fascinating Annals of Dunfermline, although I leave that happy task to someone of a more historical bent. Aquilina 22:27, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Database

The University of St Andrews is producing a database of pre-union Scottish statutes which is due to go online sometime this year at the website http://www.rps.ac.uk/

Hopefully this will enable a more complete list than we currently have. Kurando | ^_^ 10:01, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Moved and renamed "wrongous Imprisonment" Act

I renamed it based on the Records of the Parliaments of Scotland to 1707 site, and moved it to coincide with the date on the Parliamentary Register. The site gives the "Translation" information as:

William II: Translation

1700, 29 October, Edinburgh, Parliament

Parliamentary Register

Friday 31 January 1701

Legislation

Act for preventing wrongful imprisonment and against undue delays in trials

I also added the "c. 6", which is not on the website. Notuncurious (talk) 06:16, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

Linked from Main page today

This article is linked to from Wikipedia's Main Page today (7 December 2008), due to the new Golf in Scotland article appearing as the lead item in the Did you know? column. --Mais oui! (talk) 09:49, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Move

Adding move template because capitalisation is wrong. James500 (talk) 18:41, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Foreign Declarations Act 1585

Can anyone substantiate this act? The editor's other contributions appear to be fictitious, flavoured with some truth. Like those creations, this has only, old written reference(s). Finavon (talk) 19:04, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Middle English?

A number of the titles of Acts of 1424 on this list have been tagged as Middle English. The tags are unreferenced, they are not accompanied by any explanation, and they have only been applied to eleven of the twenty-one Acts listed by their titles for that year. It is not obvious that the titles are not in fact Early Scots. A number of sources say that Scots or "Inglis" was used for Acts of Parliament: Edinburgh Companion to Scots, p 8; Spelling Scots, p 17; "The Spelling of Scots", in Routledge Handbook at p 295. James500 (talk) 16:55, 7 May 2022 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:List of Acts of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 18:18, 26 October 2023 (UTC)