Nicolas or Nicoll Elphinstone (died 1579) was a Scottish courtier and diplomatic messenger. He was the son of Lawrence Elphinstone of Selmys, 1435–1515. He worked for James Stewart, Regent Moray and was involved in attempts to sell the jewels and pearls of Mary, Queen of Scots in 1567 and 1568.Karen Raber, 'Chains of Pearls: Gender, Property, Identity', in Bella Mirabella ed, Ornamentalism: The Art of Renaissance Accessories (University of Michigan, 2011), pp. 159-180. Moray needed to raise money to govern Scotland and subdue Mary's supporters by force.Calendar State Papers Foreign: Elizabeth, vol. 8, nos. 1658, 1676, 1724: HMC 6th Report: Earl of Moray (London, 1877), p. 643: National Records of Scotland E35/10.
Elphinstone and the Place of Schank Nicolas or Nicholl Elphinstone, described as a servant of Mary of Guise, sought a passport to travel to France in September 1554.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, 1 (London, 1898), p. 195 no. 406. On 1 August 1566 he obtained the lands of Schank from James Sandilands, Preceptor of Torphichen.J.W. Barty, Ancient deeds and other writs in the Mackenzie-Wharncliffe charter-chest (Edinburgh, 1906), p. 72 The Place of Schank was north of the Arniston estate in Midlothian, and an image representing the house was drawn on a 16th-century estate map.Rosemary Gibson, The Scottish Countryside: Its Changing Face, 1700-2000 (Edinburgh, John Donald, 2007), p. 5, the plan NRS, RHP5246/13, RHP82800. The walled garden of a later house on the site of Schank can be seen at Gore Glen Woodland Park, on the higher ground between the South Esk and the Gore Water. The wooded area between these rivers is known as the "Shank Tongue" or "Shank Point".
Elphinstone in London Nicoll Elphinstone, trained in law, was an important servant of James Stewart, Earl of Moray, a half-brother of Mary, Queen of Scots. Moray sent him to Queen Elizabeth's court in the summer of 1565. John Knox said that he went to England in July 1565 to raise £10,000 for Mary's political opponents, at the time of her marriage to Lord Darnley, finance for the rebellion known as the Chaseabout Raid.David Laing, History of the Reformation by John Knox, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1848), p. 496
On 2 August 1565 Moray wrote to the Earl of Bedford, Governor of Berwick, that he had sent a boat armed with cannon to Lindisfarne to pick up Elphinstone. He hoped Bedford could ensure Elphinstone's safe passage on land from Newcastle.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1900), pp. 188-9. The ship, owned by Charles Wilson, was also intended to carry Moray's pregnant wife, Agnes Keith, to the English court in September.Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1900), p. 284: Edward Delmar Morgan, Charles Henry Coote, Early voyages and travels to Russia and Persia, by Anthony Jenkinson and other Englishmen (London, 1886), p. 169-70
Mary Queen of Scots was imprisoned in Lochleven Castle by the Confederate Lords after the battle of Carberry Hill. The Earl of Moray was in London. He sent Nicholas Elphinstone to her in July 1567, but the Lords would not allow him to see the queen.Joseph Stevenson, Selections illustrating the reign of Mary Queen of Scotland (Glasgow, 1837), p. 224. The Confederate Lords considered sending Elphinstone to France to declare their actions to Charles IX.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1900), pp. 354, 356, 371. Moray arrived in Scotland and was made Regent of Scotland on 22 August 1567. He now had control of royal property including a chest of jewels in Edinburgh Castle.Joseph Bain, Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 2 (Edinburgh, 1900), p. 386.
On 20 October 1567 Moray sent Elphinstone to Berwick-upon-Tweed and London with a consignment of the queen's jewels. These pieces were intended for sale and not to be pledged for loans. They were given an estimated value of 9,000 French crowns. The consignment included:Historical Manuscripts Commission 6th Report: Earl of Moray (London, 1877), p. 643. A chain of 91 little rings with two sparks of rubies (except two missing), with 12 square "intermiddis" (entredeux) set with table diamonds, and one round entredeux with a ruby, and two rock rubies. Estimate 3,000 French crowns. Four great table rubies in a gold garnishing (head-dress). Estimate 3,000 French crowns. Four great table diamonds set in the same fashion. Estimate 3,000 French crowns.
Elphinstone went to London in January 1568. At first Elizabeth would not see him because Moray had declined an audience for one of her diplomats.Martin Hume, Calendar State Papers Spain, Simancas, 2 (London: HMSO, 1894), p. 5 no. 5. The details of Elphinstone's negotiations with Elizabeth I in January 1568 are unclear, but he may have tried to discuss the recognition of James VI and his place in the English succession.Conyers Read, Mr. Secretary Cecil And Queen Elizabeth (New York, 1961), p. 389.
Pearls and Queen Elizabeth
Elphinstone sold a large group of pearls to Elizabeth at the end of April 1568.John Duncan Mackie, "Queen Mary's Jewels", Scottish Historical Review, 18:70 (January 1921), pp. 83–98 These pearls have come to be known as the "Medici pearls". Pope Clement VII is said to given them to Catherine de' Medici as a wedding gift. Brantôme wrote that she gave them to Mary and he saw her wearing them.P. Brantôme, Mémoires de Messire Pierre du Bourdeille, seigneur de Brantôme, contenans les vies des dames illustres de France de son temps (Paris 1665), p. 39 Brantôme does not say the pearls were a gift to Catherine from the Pope. Catherine made efforts to buy them back in London.Joseph Robertson, Inventaires de la Royne Descosse (Edinburgh, 1863), pp. 10-11: Teulet, Relations, vol. 2, pp. 352, 367-8: G. Bapst, Histoire des joyaux de la couronne de France (Paris, 1889), pp. 22-3: Labanoff, Lettres de Marie Stuart, vol. 7, pp. 129-30, 132-3: The letters published by Teulet are BNF Français 15971, f.91, 93, 105, 109, 112. The pearls are said to have been given in 1613 to Princess Elizabeth at her marriage, and some are thought to have returned to the British royal family. King James bought pearls and gave them to Princess Elizabeth pearls before her marriage.Nadine Akkerman, Correspondence of Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia: 1603-1631, vol. 1 (Oxford, 2015), pp. 73-4. Anne of Denmark, in 1619, had a "carcanet" of long and round pearls worth £40,000 and said to be the "fairest that are to be found in Christendom."Norman Egbert McClure, Letters of John Chamberlain, vol. 2 (Philadelphia, 1939), p. 251.
The attempted sales in London in 1568 are known from the letters of a French diplomat, Jacques Bochetel de la Forest.Maurice Lee jnr., James Stewart, earl of Moray; a political study of the Reformation in Scotland (New York: Columbia University Press, 1953), p. 219. Bochetel described the great pearls in detail. There were six cordons sashes strung like paternosters, each with twenty five pearls, many large and beautiful, the most part as big as muscady nuts or nutmegs.Dona Dirlam, Elise Misiorowski, Sally Thomas, "Pearl fashion through the ages", Gems & Gemology, 21 (Summer 1985), p. 69.Cassandra Auble, "Royal Jewelry Exchange in Sixteenth Century Anglo-Scottish Politics", Explorations in Renaissance Culture, 46 (Brill, 2020), pp. 76–77. The word for nutmeg has been misunderstood to mean "black pearls".John Duncan Mackie, "Queen Mary's Jewels", Scottish Historical Review, 18 (Glasgow, 1920), p. 94. There were no black pearls.Diana Scarisbrick, Tudor and Jacobean Jewellery (London, 1995), p. 17.Diana Scarisbrick, "Elizabeth's jewellery", Elizabeth: The Exhibition at the National Maritime Museum (Chatto & Windus, 2003), p. 184. They were valued by several merchants for Elizabeth. English merchants offered 10,000 crowns, Italians 12,000, a merchant from Geneva suggested 16,000. Elizabeth, it was thought, paid 12,000. The rest of the jewels on offer were not so valuable, except a well mounted piece of unicorn horn. There were no black pearls.Labanoff, Lettres de Marie Stuart, vol. 7, pp. 132-3. Bochetel's French words for nutmeg "noix muscades" seem to be the origin of an idea that Mary's pearls were black, by confusion with the word "noir". The influential 19th-century biographer Agnes Strickland wrote of "black muscades" and purple Muscatel grapes, Lives of the Queens of Scotland, vol. 6 (New York, 1857), p. 80.
Bochetel de Forrest described how Elpinstone had met the Scottish double-agent Ninian Cockburn, alias "Beaumont", on his journey at Berwick. Nicholas Throckmorton arranged his audience with Elizabeth, and Elphinstone showed her the jewels and pearls in the presence of the Earls of Pembroke and Leicester.Alexandre Labanoff, Lettres de Marie Stuart, vol. 7 (London, 1852), pp. 129-130, the place-name is printed "Varvich". Bochetel wrote that the jewels were carried secretly to London and the pearls sold to Elizabeth for twelve thousand crowns: "ces bagues ... ont este icy envoyees fort secretement, et en fin, comme jay cy devant escript, acheptees par ceste royne pour le somme de douze mil escus."Bibliothèque nationale de France BNF Français 15971, f.109 The concluded sale was not kept secret: when Elphinstone came to Carlisle in June 1568, Mary asked for his arrest as "hyr grevous enemye and seller of hyr juells", and he was threatened by James Cockburn of Skirling.Cassandra Auble, "Royal Jewelry Exchange in Sixteenth Century Anglo-Scottish Politics", Explorations in Renaissance Culture, 46 (Brill, 2020), p. 77: Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 2, p. 422. William Kirkcaldy of Grange noted the sale in his memorandum on the Edinburgh Castle jewel coffer: "Item Mr Nycoll Elphingston sauld the pearll in London for xiij m or xiiij m quhilk the Queen of England hes for hir self & causit by them."National Records of Scotland E35/9/3, Grange’s memorandum of jewels in Edinburgh Castle: Michael Pearce, "The jewels Mary Queen of Scots left behind", 2016, pp. 41, 83.
Regent Moray wrote to Earl of Leicester on 3 May 1568 that Elphinstone would tell him about Mary's escape from Lochleven Castle.W. Stevenson Fitch, A narrative of the principal acts of the regency, during the minority of Mary, Queen of Scotland (Ipswich, 1842), appendix. The jewel sales were halted by Mary's escape from Lochleven and arrival in England on 16 May 1568. Elizabeth now had to appear impartial to causes in Scotland. She bought no more jewels directly from Moray's agents and made efforts to prevent other sales of Mary's goods in England.Calendar State Papers Foreign: Elizabeth, vol. 8, nos 2577, 2585. The "Great H of Scotland" was returned unsold.Alison Rosie, "A Queen's Jewel Box: The 1566 Inventory of Mary Queen of Scots' Jewels", Royal Studies Journal, 12:1 (2025), p. 59 fn. 49 citing National Records of Scotland E35/9/3. Elphinstone sent a letter to William Cecil when he got back to Edinburgh on 21 May 1568, carried by a man who had been at the battle of Langside and would describe the battle to Cecil.Calendar State Papers Scotland, vol. 2, p. 411.
Messenger for Regent Moray