The Deaneries of Aberdeen
From very early times it would appear that what was a large diocese geographically was divided into five deaneries each containing a number of parishes which varied throughout the medieval period. Each deanery can be identified as having had the following:
• Aberdeen Deanery - c.10 parishes
• Buchan Deanery - c.18 parishes
• Boyne Deanery - c.12 parishes
• Garioch Deanery - c.24 parishes
• Mar Deanery - c.37 parishes
Each of the four deaneries had a Dean of Christianty at its head who was responsible to the Bishop through the Archdeacon. It is possible that the Deanery of Aberdeen did not always have a Dean of Christianty and that the function may have been carried out by the Archdeacon himself or one of the 'principals' of the cathedral. This title, Dean of Christianty, is a feature of the medieval church in Scotland - in England the title which tended to be used was Rural Dean.
The five deaneries were of dissimilar sizes both in terms of the number of parishes they each contained and the geographical area which they covered. Largely, of course, this reflected the different population densities across the diocese but they each had strong links with the civil administration areas and some of the boundaries were shared.
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