Edinburgh Castle

 Tom the backroads traveller hosts this weekly meme.

January 2024 

John is watching the Scottish series Crime that is set in Edinburgh and keeps remarking on the views of Edinburgh Castle. I looked and discovered I had never blogged about our visit there!

This was our view of the castle from our rented house!

From the street.

Edinburgh Castle is one of the oldest fortified places in Europe. With a long rich history as a royal residence, military garrison, prison and fortress, it is alive with many exciting tales.

Set upon its mighty rock, Edinburgh Castle’s strategic advantage is clear. Seeing the site’s military potential, Iron Age people built a hill fort on the rock. Early medieval poetry tells of a war band that feasted here for a year before riding to their deaths in battle.

As well as guarding great moments in history, the castle has suffered many sieges. During the Wars of Independence it changed hands many times. In 1314, the Scots retook the castle from the English in a daring night raid led by Thomas Randolph, nephew of Robert the Bruce.

The castle defences have evolved over hundreds of years. Mons Meg, one of the greatest medieval cannons ever made, was given to King James II in 1457. The Half Moon Battery, built in the aftermath of the Lang Siege of 1573, was armed for 200 years by bronze guns known as the Seven Sisters. Six more guns defend the Argyle Battery, with its open outlook to the north.

Ships in the Firth of Forth once set their maritime clocks by the One o’Clock Gun. The firing of the gun dates back to 1861, when businessman John Hewat brought the idea to Edinburgh from Paris.

The gun is still fired every day at 1pm, except on Sundays, Good Friday and Christmas Day. Crowds gather to enjoy the spectacle – and the sound often surprises people on Princes Street below.

The original gun was a 64-pounder. Since 2001, a 105mm field gun has instead been fired from the Mills Mount Battery.

John, being photographer!

Pirates and prisoners of war were once held in the vaults below Crown Square. In the 1700s and 1800s hundreds of prisoners of war were held in these dark, cramped spaces. Today, a recreation of the vaults as they would have looked around 1800 offers a glimpse into the grim way of life.

The first prisoners were French privateers caught in 1758, soon after the Seven Years’ War began. The youngest held was a five-year-old drummer boy captured at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805.

Prisoners of war came from France, America, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland, Italy, Denmark and Poland. Most were sailors, many of them Americans fighting in the War of Independence. An early depiction of the ‘Stars and Stripes’ flag is scratched into a door. Many tried to escape. In 1811, 49 prisoners escaped through a hole in the defences that is still visible today. All but one made it safely down Castle Rock, but were recaptured.

Caribbean pirates were held in the vaults before they became a prison of war. In 1720, 21 members of Black Bart’s crew were captured off Argyll. They had come to Scotland to retire. Instead, most were hanged.