Cairns Castle

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Cairns Castle on the banks of Harperrig Reservoir

Cairns Castle is the ruins of a donjon from the 15th century, about 10 km southwest of Balerno , a suburb of the Scottish capital Edinburgh in the administrative unit West Lothian . The ruin lies at the southwest end of the Harperrig Reservoir .

It could be that this donjon was also called Easter Cairns Castle , but one is not sure if it was not referring to another castle in the area.

history

The castle originally belonged to the Crichton clan ; George Crichton , Earl of Caithness , had it built. Then it fell to the Tennants , who owned it from 1542 to 1708.

architecture

In addition to the donjon, the castle had an attached wing. It had a vaulted cellar, a kitchen on the ground floor and a knight's hall on the floor above. All floors could be reached with a spiral staircase in the inside corner between the main block and the attached wing. There were at least 3 floors. The open fireplace in the kitchen has been converted into an entrance. The entrance tower in the eastern part of the facility no longer exists.

Cairns Castle has been a Scheduled Monument since November 30, 1981 . Historic Scotland listed Cairns Castle as a Category B Historic Building until it was withdrawn in 2015.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Martin Coventry: The Castles of Scotland . Goblinshead, 1997. ISBN 1 899874 10 0 . P. 97.
  2. ^ Cairns Castle . In: British Listed Buildings . Retrieved March 30, 2017.
  3. ^ Cairns Castle . Royal Commission for Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. Retrieved March 30, 2017.
  4. Scheduled Monument - Entry . In: Historic Scotland .

Web links

Commons : Cairns Castle  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 55 ° 49'45.1 "  N , 3 ° 27'13.3"  W.