Note 13 — Chapter I · STATE OF SCOTLAND IN THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY.
Reading edition
The use of coal as fuel was very early known in Scotland. By a charter, dated in April 1291, William de Obervill granted liberty to the monks of Dunfermline, to dig coal for their own use in his lands of Pittencrieff, but upon no account to sell any, (Chart. in Statist. Account of Scotland, vol. xiii. p. 469.) By this restriction, it would seem that the proprietor not only set a value on the sale of coal, but also that the monks of those days were in the habit of improving their resources, by trafficking in temporal as well as in spiritual matters.