Hammermen

The Hammermen Craft was the the trade guild which regulated all who wielded the hammer. These included gold, silver and blacksmiths as well as clock makers, addlers, lorimers and pewterers. Their motto was

 ‘By hammer in hand, all arts do stand

Between 1599 and 1620 when the town was small it registered four pewterers, a greater number than existed in any royal burgh except Edinburgh. The Incorporation’s earliest minute book is dated 24 January 1596 when one Robert Robertson, deacon of the Hammermen and pewterers, gave a statement of accounts. It is, however, clear that the Stirling Incorporation dates from an earlier period. In 1604 it was recorded that Robert Bruce, a saddler, had delivered to the new Deacon

‘in keeping for the wekfare of the craft, thrie pieces of evidance, with an copies in peper, togidder with two buiks with two pensalls, with ane sucthe.’

A later minute stated that the ‘evidence’ comprised parchment charters and these may well have been the original Seals of Cause granted to the Hammermen, about which today nothing is known. The’two buiks’ presumably contained the earlier minutes while the ‘pensalls’ would have been the flags of the Hammermen – again, long lost like the ‘ane boxe with twa keyis’ that held the craft funds.   Incorporation of Hammermen Stirling Archives hold – Minutes, 1596-1737 (and extracts 1565-1618); Court book, 1741-1797 and undated; Account book, 1740-1908; Titles, rules and regulations, papers, lists of members, vouchers, 1806-1916.

The following publications written in the 1920’s gives an overview of the Incorporation.

The Incorporation of Hammermen of Stirling by David B Morris

The Oldest Minute Book