Smailholm Tower
Smailholm Tower stands on a rocky outcrop in the farmland of the Scottish Borders near Kelso, a perfectly preserved sixteenth-century peel tower that rises stark and solitary against the wide Border sky with a clarity of form that has made it one of the most recognisable and most painted buildings in the region. The tower is maintained by Historic Environment Scotland and contains a small exhibition of figures and tapestries relating to the Border ballads and the literary associations that have made Smailholm one of the most celebrated minor historic buildings in Scotland.
The literary connections are considerable. Sir Walter Scott spent holidays as a child at nearby Sandyknowe Farm and developed his lifelong fascination with Border history, legend and landscape in sight of Smailholm Tower. The tower appears in his poetry, including Marmion, and the romantic attachment Scott formed to Border balladry and the fortified architecture of the region in large part originated in his early experiences at Sandyknowe. That connection with one of the most influential writers of the nineteenth century has given Smailholm a cultural significance well beyond its modest scale.
The tower itself is a good example of the peel tower form developed across the Border counties in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as a response to the chronic raiding and small-scale violence that characterised life in this politically unstable zone between England and Scotland. Peel towers were not major fortifications but rather secure refuges: strong enough to resist a raiding party, tall enough to provide warning of approaching horsemen and substantial enough to protect household valuables and cattle during the brief but intense episodes of violent theft known as reiving. The Borders landscape is dotted with such towers, but Smailholm's isolation and preservation make it the most atmospheric of them all.
The views from the tower top across the rolling farmland and distant hills of the Borders are exceptional, with Kelso, the Eildon Hills and the distant Cheviots all visible on a clear day.