Planned Villages in South-West Scotland, 1730–1855: Analysing Functional Characteristics

Abstract

Planned villages proliferated in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Scotland. Their development was directly related to the social and economic era often referred to as the Enlightenment. This article examines the functional characteristics of these planned villages. It presents a case study of south-west Scotland, where villages with a diverse range of functions were developed between approximately 1730 and 1855 at coastal and inland sites. These villages were dynamic settlements whose characteristics, functions and position within the local urban and economic hierarchies changed, often over short periods of time. Their functional characteristics were more complex than earlier publications would suggest, highlighting the importance of detailed regional case studies in historical geography.