Help decipher 1607 occupation

[GR2]

Tewsday 4 August
George Kincaid caitchpoule keeper A S N Johnne w.
Johnne Mathesoune portioner of B[rou]ghtoun Edward
Kincaid

[pkincaid]

Thanks GR2 for your thoughts.  What keeps throwing me is that it really looks like sp after caitch.  I wonder if poule was for tennis and spule was for badminton.

[pkincaid]

Perhaps to show clearly the person's letter p the following is the word printer from the same page.

[GR2]

On closer inspection, you are right. It is 'caitchspule'. The same game, just another variant in spelling.

Do you know where in Edinburgh your ancestor stayed? There are quite a few records surviving for Edinburgh at this period.

Graham.

[pkincaid]

Thanks GR2!  Mystery solved.  Never would have figured out that occupation.

I've been researching all early Kincaids in Scotland for over 20 years now.  No shortage of records that is for sure.  I only wish I could tie in directly.  However, my Kincaids went to Northern Ireland for a couple of generations.  Different story there in terms of records.  Sigh!

This George is one branch of the Kincaids of Coates (Coittis, etc.).  Coates was an estate just west of the walls of Edinburgh; where St. Mary's Cathedral now stands.  Based on family lore and naming patterns I suspect my line to descend from the Kincaids of Coates.

[Rena]

There's a surname "Catchpole" - which I believe is probably derived from an occupation of some sort of sheriff's deputy -  a sort of debt collector.   Could your ancestor have kept the records?

[Archivos]

Caitchspule keeper - how lovely!  I have to say that's one of the more 'exotic' occupations I've seen - no offence intended, but it does beat 'weaver' and 'ag lab' for sheer interest!

[Roger in Sussex]

Following on from Rena's post, see attached from 1896 dictionary.

As it was the duty of a catchpoll to make arrests, might it have been a catchpoll keeper's job to act as a jailer?

Just a thought.

Roger

[GR2]

Catchpoll is not a word you would find in Edinburgh at this period. If the burgh authorities wanted to arrest anyone the town the sergeants were the officials to do this. This is definitely the keeper of a ball-game court. Such courts and keepers are well attested in Edinburgh in the 16th and 17th centuries.

Graham.