Your Guild segment is very well done, I enjoyed viewing all the photographs and reading the captions. In 1992 history was made as daughters of existing burgesses were admitted to the Guild for the first time, numbering 274 out of a total of 808. Information on the commissioners representing the burghs in the Scottish Parliament is given in 'The Parliaments of Scotland: Burgh and shire commissioners', edited by Margaret Young (Edinburgh, 1992)

Other sources of information on burghs are: Scottish parliament records (PA), privy council records (PC), exchequer records (E) and private papers (GD). A small series of miscellaneous material relating to burghs is in NRS reference RH9/11. For information on new towns built after the war of 1939-45, look at the records of the Scottish Office Industry Department (NRS reference SEP). The building is situated at the rear of Shakespeare's birthplace giving a good view into the rear of the birthplace. The land is part of a parcel of land that is thought to have belonged to Shakespeare himself. This area was known as Guild Pits and was used as a rubbish tip prior to any buildings being erected, what is under this plot of the Bards can only be imagined! Guild Court was originally built as a school for sewing at the end of the last century and in living memory some Stratfordians can remember the building being a home for gentlewomen. The Dean of Guild Court in many burghs became the first effective form of building control and continued to regulate building standards until 1975. Dean of Guild court records for most burghs passed to local authorities in 1975 but some are held by the NRS: The medieval burgh court had both administrative and judicial functions. Eventually administrative acts were kept separately in the council minutes. The books include burgh statutes and ordinances, admission of burgesses, small debt, removal of tenants, assault, breach of the peace, inquests recognising someone as heir to a deceased person and offences against trade such as forestalling. The burgh also dealt with the moral and social good behaviour of their inhabitants. Cases were passed from the kirk sessions to the burgh courts - for example adultery, fornication, irregular marriage, witchcraft.Burgh registers were instituted by an act of 1681. Only royal burghs had the registers and the register related to lands within the original burgh boundaries. The Burgh Registers (Scotland) Act of 1926 arranged for their gradual demise. An amended Building Regulations Act was introduced in Glasgow in 1900 with further by-laws in 1909, but these do not appear to have altered the building process to any great extent. Though the 1862 and 1892 Acts did apply to all parts of Scotland, a unified code of building regulations for the whole of Scotland was not introduced until 1963. 16 The Measurer

The Burgh Police (Scotland) Act of 1892 extended the existing regulations on planning and construction of new buildings; repairs and ruinous buildings; street layout; and ventilation, drainage and water, requiring the introduction of indoor WCs to all residential properties for the first time (section 256). In many locations, planning and building matters were enforced by Police Commissioners. In Glasgow, the Dean of Guild Court had retained these powers. 13 To be a Burgess entitled you to trade in the town. Outsiders couldn't trade. The entitlement of the Burgesses was established in a Royal Charter. The first one known being in 1179 from Henry II. The full programme contains a very impressive range of events and activities including every aspect of modern Preston: business, schools, music, theatre, dancing, art and craft, story telling, literature, history, military etc.Supervision of police, street cleaning and lighting and water supplies, 1833-1890. Police Commissioners were often also town councillors. In the second half of the 19th century, the construction of new buildings or alterations to existing buildings in Scotland came under the control of increasingly comprehensive and stringent regulations set out in a series of Parliamentary Police Acts. In burghs, such as Glasgow, the planning and building process was overseen by the Dean of Guild Court; in rural areas planning committees were not established until after 1897. 1 A Guild Court was held to admit people to the Guild. Once they were in the Guild, burgesses could reap important benefits and these could be passed on to sons and grandsons without question.

Police burghs: the Burghs and Police (Scotland) Act 1833 allowed inhabitants of royal burghs and burghs of barony to set up police commissioners. This was extended to parliamentary burghs in 1847. In 1862, a new Police Act for Scotland was passed by Parliament. It was more comprehensive than its predecessors, and was innovative in its provisions in relation to the planning, construction and occupation of buildings and in giving statutory support to all of the activities of the Dean of Guild Courts, including Glasgow's. 10A staffed reception is available to greet clients and a generous off loading parking area is available at the front of the building with further secure parking available if required. Coach and bus stops are either available in Guild St itself or in nearby Bridge St (200m). The train station (which has direct trains to London) is about 500m via main roads from where a regular taxi service is available, the nearest taxi rank to Guild Court is a comfortable walking distance of approximately 150m. I did return to Preston for a month to celebrate the Guild Week with family and friends and had a wonderful time while in Preston. In 1846 all the exclusive rights and privileges of trading that had been granted to the Craft were swept away by the Recissory Act, but the Craft members decided not to wind-up the Craft and distribute the funds to the members. Instead the members decided to channel the energy and enterprise of the Craft into the work of benevolence. Over the years since 1846 the Craft has still continued to attract men who are associated in some way with the trade of which its members once had a monopoly, but the old spirit of exclusion has long since gone. Today the Craft's benevolence continues and considerable funds are still distributed each year to the Craft's grantees.