Bess Rhodes

Darren LayneEmail: egsr@st-andrews.ac.uk

Thesis Title: The Reformation in the Burgh of St Andrews: Property, Piety and Power
Supervisor: Professor Roger Mason

I am currently researching the impact of the Reformation on land-holding in St Andrews. Whilst studying for an M.Litt. in Medieval History I became increasingly interested in the process by which Scotland’s pre-Reformation Church was dismantled. After completing my M.Litt. dissertation on the estates of St Andrews Cathedral Priory between 1400 and 1450, I decided to turn my attention to the fate of ecclesiastical property in the sixteenth century. I am particularly interested in the role that religious institutions played as land-holders in urban areas, and how this affected their relationship with the wider community before, during and after the religious changes of the 1560s.

Conference and Seminar Papers

  • Division and Destruction? The Redistribution of Land in Reformation St Andrews, c.1530-80, Urban History Group Conference, University of Durham (March 2010).
  • Property and Piety: Donations to Holy Trinity Church, St Andrews, c.1500-1559, Reformation Studies Colloquium, University of St Andrews (September 2010).
  • Paper, Parchment and Protestants: Reformers and the Preservation of Catholic Ecclesiastical Documents in the Parish of St Andrews, c.1550-1580, Scottish Society and the Parish Conference, Stirling Tolbooth (November 2010).
  • ‘Tellyt Gold’: Ecclesiastical Money Lenders in the City of St Andrews, 1400-1560, Post-graduate seminar, St Andrews Institute of Mediaeval Studies (March 2011).
  • Property, Piety and Power: Land Tenure in the Burgh of St Andrews, c.1500-1580, Scottish Legal History Group Conference, Parliament House, Edinburgh (October 2011).
  • The Reformation in the Burgh of St Andrews: Property, Piety and Power, Reformation Studies Institute Seminar, University of St Andrews (February 2012).
  • Beyond the Geddy Map: The Sixteenth Century Townscape of St Andrews, 600 Years of Town and Gown: Archaeology and History in St Andrews, Conference organised by St Andrews Archaeological Society, University of St Andrews (February 2012).

Teaching

MO1007 – The Early Modern Western World (Tutor)