There is a carving in Melrose Abbey of someone playing a small three-
course lute. This (if the carving is anywhere near as old as the
abbey itself) is by far the oldest documentation of any stringed
instrument in Scotland.
The type of lute was one I couldn't think of another parallel for,
though; its shape was between an ud and a rebec, maybe rebec-sized
(i.e. nearest to a mandolin among modern instruments, which should
please Nigel).
But today I spotted a picture of an instrument that looks just the
same, in the New Grove's section on folk music of the USSR. It's the
local lute type in Kirgizia; I forget the exact name, something like
"kobuz" or "kobuk". It has a wacky tuning with the middle course
the highest.
Maybe the Kirghiz got it from Persia, but I can't see how any chain
of influence could have transmitted an instrument design from Persia
to Scotland in the Middle Ages either.
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