Banff is a town in the Banff and Buchan area of Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Banff is situated on Banff Bay and faces the town of Macduff across the estuary of the River Banff is a previous royal burgh, as well as is the county town of the historic area of Banffshire. Banff's first castle was constructed to fend off Viking intruders and a charter of 1163 AD reveals that Malcolm IV was living there during that time. Throughout this period the town was a busy trading centre in the "cost-free hanse" of Northern Scottish burghs, in spite of not having its very own harbour till 1775. The very first recorded Sheriff of Banff was Richard de Strathewan in 1264, and also in 1372 Royal Burgh standing was provided by King Robert II. By the 15th century Banff was among 3 principal communities exporting salmon to the continent of Europe, together with Aberdeen as well as Montrose. There was a large amount of lawlessness in seventeenth-century Scotland, and several of the worst offenders were members of the nobility. According to records maintained by chronicler William Cramond, the tolbooth (court house and also jail) of Banff was, in 1628, the website of an altercation in between Lord Banff as well as James Ogilvie, his loved one. Apparently, he struck James Ogilvie upon the head with a baton during a court hearing. Twenty of his pals as well as followers then assaulted Ogilvie with swords prior to chasing him right into the street and completing him off with a handgun shot. Banff and Macduff are divided by the valley of the River Deveron. This uncertain river was ultimately subjugated by the 7 curved bridge finished in 1779 by John Smeaton. An earlier bridge had actually been integrated in 1765, but was swept away in 1768. The old ferry was restored into usage, up until it was shed in a flood in 1773. A public conference was kept in 1800 and passed a resolution for the building of a turnpike roadway between Turiff and Banff as the existing roadway was in an unfortunate state of repair work. Later on 19th century transportation improvements included the structure of two train lines, from Macduff to Turiff in 1860 and also the Banff, Portsoy and also Strathisla Train in 1859 which linked to the major Aberdeen to Inverness line. During the 19th Century the Banff Fishery Area (consisting of the ports from Crovie to Sandend) was important to the herring profession, with manufacturing coming to a head in 1853 at more than sixty-thousand barrels, of which nearly thirty-four thousand were exported, nevertheless by 1912 production had actually declined to just over 8 thousand barrels. Presently, the languages talked in the community and also in its area have a tendency to be the Doric language of Scots, as well as English.