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According to a family tradition recorded in the 1570s, the progenitor of this noble house was one Andreas, a Hungarian, who had accompanied the exiled Anglo-Saxon prince Edgar the Aetheling and his sister, Margaret to Scotland in 1067. The veracity of this is unclear, probably fanciful and perhaps unknowable. This name itself is of territorial origin, and it seems likely to have been assumed from lands on Borthwick Water in Roxburghshire, first mentioned c. 1200. Borthwick means something like ‘Home Farm’ (the farm that supplied the table of the local lord) or ‘wood farm’. The first person with this surname in the records is Thomas de (of) Borthwick, who was granted lands in Midlothian between 1356 and 1367. It is likely he owned the lands of Borthwick and hence took the name as his designation. Thomas’ grandson, Sir William Borthwick possessed substantial lands in Midlothian and the Borders, and around 1410 obtained a charter that confirmed he held the lands of Borthwick. During the fifteenth century, the Borthwicks acquired immense influence and became Lords of Parliament.