Craigmillar Castle

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Craigmillar Castle from the east

Craigmillar Castle is a ruined medieval castle in the Scottish capital of Edinburgh . It is located 3 miles southeast of the city center on a low hill south of the modern suburb of Craigmillar . The Prestons of Craigmillar , the local feudal barons, started building the castle at the end of the 14th century; the construction work dragged on from the 15th century to the 16th century. In 1660 Sir John Gilmour , Lord President of the Court of Session , bought the castle and had further renovations carried out. The Gilmours left Craigmillar Castle in the 18th century and it fell into disrepair. Today the ruin is managed by Historic Environment Scotland .

Craigmillar Castle is best known for its association with Mary Queen of Scots . After her illness after the birth of her son, the future king James VI. , Mary Queen of Scots arrived at Craigmillar Castle on November 20, 1566 to recover. Before she set out again on December 7, 1566, with or without her knowledge, a treaty was signed to get rid of her husband, Henry , called Craigmillar Bond .

View of the site from above

Craigmillar Castle is one of the best preserved medieval castles in Scotland. A residential tower or donjon in the middle is surrounded by a courtyard wall from the 15th century with "particularly beautiful" defensive facilities. There are further lines of buildings in it and the whole is surrounded by an outer courtyard wall, which also contains a chapel and a dovecote .

history

Origins

King David I loaned the Craigmillar lands to the monks of Dunfermline Abbey in the 12th century . The Preston family first received land in the area from King David II and owned two-thirds of the estate in 1342. In 1374 King Robert II gave the rest of the Craigmillar lands to Sir Simon de Preston , Sheriff of Midlothian . Simon de Preston's son, Simon Preston , or his grandson, Sir George Preston , started work on the residential tower that now forms the core of the castle. This was already finished in 1425 when a charter from Sir John Preston was sealed at Craigmillar Castle. The castle courtyard wall was probably built by Sir William Preston († 1453), who traveled to France and relied on inspiration from the mainland for the new work. He also brought the arm of St. Aegidius , which he donated to the High Kerk of Edinburgh , where the Preston Aisle was named after him. In the late 1470s, John Stewart, Earl of Mar , became the brother of King James III. , held at Craigmillar Castle and charged with witchcraft against the king. He later died under suspicious circumstances.

16th Century

In 1511 Craigmillar was raised to barony and the outer courtyard was built around this time, probably on behalf of another Simon Preston († 1520), 1487 Member of Parliament for Edinburgh, who had taken over the property in 1478. In September 1517, when the plague broke out in Edinburgh, the youthful King James V moved to Craigmillar Castle for safety reasons. His French guard, De la Bastie , had new locks made for the door of his bedroom and two iron gates, and a separate stable was built for the king's mule . A family chapel in the outer courtyard was documented in 1523. In 1544 the English wanted with the Rough Wooing of their King Henry VIII with military means a marriage alliance between Edward VI. and force the young Maria Stuart. Craigmillar Castle were burned down by English forces under the Earl of Hertford . The baron, Sir Simon Preston († 1569), had the castle repaired again, with the residential wing in the courtyard being rebuilt. Sir Simon Preston held the office of Lord Provost of Edinburgh for several years and was a loyal supporter of Maria Stuart, who appointed him to her Privy Council .

Mary Queen of Scots and her husband, Lord Darnley, whose murder was sealed at Craigmillar Castle.

Mary Queen of Scots stayed at Craigmillar Castle twice, once in September 1563 and the second time from November 20 to December 7, 1566. It is said that she slept in the small, earlier kitchen in the tower block, but it is more likely that she had a larger one Bedroom in the relatively new east wing. On her second visit, Maria Stuart was still in poor health after a serious illness in October. Several of her nobles went with her and suggested that her unpopular husband Henry be eliminated, either through divorce or other means. An agreement, the Craigmillar Bond , was signed by Maria Stuart's Secretary of State, William Maitland , and a number of nobles, including the Earls of Bothwell , Argyll, and Huntly . The treaty is no longer preserved today, but it shows the conspirators' will to eliminate Lord Darnley . Although Mary Queen of Scots made it clear that she was not happy with Lord Darnley, she did not participate in the conspiracy and probably had no idea that her husband was being killed. It was originally planned that Lord Darnley should also stay at Craigmillar Castle when he returned to Edinburgh, but he wanted to stay at Kirk o 'Field in the city, where he was assassinated on February 10, 1567. In 1572, after Maria Stuart's flight to England, the Regent Mar used Craigmillar Castle as a base during his siege of Edinburgh Castle , which was held by supporters of the exiled Queen. King James VI visited Craigmillar Castle himself in 1589 when he was a guest of Sir David Preston .

The Gilmours

Sir John Gilmour bought Craigmillar Castle in 1660

Following the death of Sir Robert Preston in 1639, Craigmillar Castle fell to a distant cousin, David Preston of Whitehill . His son sold the castle in 1660 to Sir John Gilmour († 1671), who at the same time bought the adjacent property The Inch . The royalist Gilmour was rewarded by King Charles II of England after the Stuart Restoration : he became Lord President of the Court of Session in 1661 . In the 1660s he had the west wing rebuilt to provide more modern living space, but in the early 18th century the Gilmours left Craigmillar Castle and moved to the adjacent Inch House to the west . Two of the laird's daughters are said to have continued to live in the castle after the rest of the family had already left them. After that, Craigmillar Castle was just a romantic folly in Inch Hosue Park . In 1775, when the poet and antiquarian John Pinkerton wrote his work Craigmillar Castle: to Elegy , the castle was already in ruins. From the end of the 18th century, the castle ruins were a popular tourist attraction and were painted by many artists. In 1842 the proposal to renovate the castle ruins for Queen Victoria was put forward, but was never carried out. King Victoria himself visited Craigmillar Castle in 1886 and the then owner, Walter James Little Gilmour († 1887), commissioned extensive restoration work.

Craigmillar Castle has been in the care of the state since 1946 and is now owned by Historic Environment Scotland. The castle ruin was listed as a Category A historical building and is a Scheduled Monument . The castle estate has been included in the Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes .

description

Plan of the first floor of Craigmillar Castle.
Legend: A = kitchen, B = dining room, C = bedroom, D = entrance to the tower, E = basement of the tower, F = basement of the east wing

The core of Craigmillar Castle is a residential tower with an L-shaped floor plan from the 14th century, which was built on a ledge. It is surrounded by the inner courtyard wall from the 15th century with extensions in the southeast, east and west. Below this wall there is a lower, outer wall that encloses a wide, outer courtyard. This contained the gardens and the chapel. More gardens are to the south, where you can see the bank of a fish pond.

The residential tower

The four-storey residential tower forms the keep of the castle, even if it originally stood alone. It covers an area of ​​15.8 × 11.6 meters and has a protruding extension of 8.5 × 3.5 meters in the south. The walls are up to 3.3 meters thick and the second and fourth floors have vaulted ceilings . The tower was built on the edge of a ledge; the original entrance was protected by the natural crevice. This was probably spanned by a wooden bridge until it was filled in during the construction of the curtain wall. On the ground floor there are basements, which were originally built over with a large, wooden loft . The partition wall and the doors on both sides are later additions.

Upper part of the residential tower

On the first floor there is the knight's hall and the kitchen in the reveal, as well as the later corridors to connect the east and west wings. The knight's hall has a large, hewn open fireplace that was built around 1500 and once had a wooden ceiling, probably painted. The kitchen in the residential tower was replaced by a larger one in the east wing in the 16th century and converted into a bedroom. A smaller open fireplace was placed in the large kitchen stove and larger windows were built in. The second floor, which can be reached via a spiral staircase, contained a windowless room in the vault above the ceiling of the great hall. Above the kitchen was the lord's bedroom, the only private bedroom in the building. The spiral staircase leads to the parapets of the stone roof. Another floor with a single bedroom was added in the 16th century. On the outside of the residential tower, there used to be two wooden balconies or viewing platforms, one in the direction of the gardens to the south and one to the east over the landscape of Lothian.

The inner courtyard

Looking up through the machiculis of the curtain wall

The curtain wall from the middle of the 15th century, together with the residential tower, encloses an approximately 10 meter wide courtyard and is approximately 1.8 meters thick. The external dimensions of the square are around 40 × 27 meters. There are round towers at every corner; at the foot of the south-east tower there is a side gate . The towers have keyhole-shaped loopholes that were used for both decoration and defense. The arched gate is in the north wall. Above it is the coat of arms of the Preston family with the coat of arms of Scotland above it. The walls have maschikulis for defense, i.e. openings through which things could be thrown down at the attackers. Crenellations provide access to the wall along its entire length. On the inside of the wall, traces of windows suggest that there was once a southern building line in the courtyard. There is no well in the courtyard, but there is a stone gutter that leads through the curtain wall, through which water could get into the castle.

The east wing

The east wing fills the southeast side and the east side of the inner courtyard. The original east wing, which was built at the same time as the curtain wall, was rebuilt in the 16th century and connected to the residential tower by a new, wide spiral staircase. The building in the south-east connects directly to the residential tower and contains two bedrooms on the first floor. In the basement below was a bakery and possibly a prison . A corridor connects the residential tower with the large kitchens with vaulted ceilings in the east wing, which can also be reached via a straight staircase from the courtyard. Another image of the Preston coat of arms, held by lions, appears above the door of the east wing. Under the kitchens there are vaulted cellars in which there is a walled out gate through the courtyard wall. On the second floor there was a large gallery, today only the lower parts of the walls have been preserved.

The west wing

The west wing was completely rebuilt on behalf of the Gilmours in the 1660s. A large suite of modern living quarters was housed there, matching Sir John Gilmour's position as chief judge. On the first floor there was a large central drawing room and dining room with large windows and an open stone fireplace. Stucco ceilings and other decorative elements were also placed in this room. In the north was a kitchen and in the south a bedroom with a wine cellar underneath. There were four bedrooms on the first floor. Another new staircase was built connecting the residential tower with the west wing. The door to this tower had a classic decorative gable. Above it is a plaque from the 20th century, which a descendant of the Gilmours had placed there, and which shows the coat of arms of Sir John Gilmour and his wife. The west wing has now been stripped of its roof, the false ceilings no longer exist and the large windows have been bricked up.

The outer courtyard with the gate on the left and the main part of the castle in the middle and on the right

The outer courtyard and gardens

The outer walls, which date from the mid-16th century, are smaller and less well built than the inner walls, but they enclose a much larger area. A round tower on the northeast corner has loopholes and a pigeon house on the upper floor. The family chapel was built around 1520 and is dedicated to Thomas Becket . Today it has no roof either, but it still serves as a burial place for the Gilmour family. Gardens covered the east and west sides of the courtyard; over the west terrace were the large windows of the west wing. The barn in the northwest corner of the courtyard was converted into a Presbyterian church for the town of Liberton in 1687 . To the south of the castle were informal gardens and orchards; the foundations of the observation towers from the 16th century continue to form the corners of this dry stone enclosure. The former fish pond, which was shaped like the letter P (for Preston), is a nationally significant archaeological garden detail because it is so rare. In the 1820s a plan was drawn up for picturesque landscaped gardens between Inch House and the castle, which also included the "Queen Mary's Tree", a sycamore maple that Mary Queen of Scots is said to have planted. Much of the open forest on the castle property dates from the beginning or the middle of the 19th century.

Individual evidence

Craigmillar Castle, engraving from 1836 by William Miller after William Turner .
  1. ^ Maurice Lindsay: The Castles of Scotland . Constable & Co., 1986. ISBN 0-09-473430-5 . Pp. 162-164.
  2. ↑ Chris Tabraham: Scotland's Castles . BT Batsford & Historic Scotland, 1997. ISBN 0-7134-7965-5 . P. 93.
  3. ↑ a b c Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 4.
  4. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Mike Salter: The Castles of Lothian and Borders . Folly Publications, 1994. ISBN 1-871731-20-8 . Pp. 34-35.
  5. ↑ Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 5.
  6. ↑ a b c d e f g h Garden and Designed Landscape - entry . In: Historic Scotland .
  7. ^ Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland . Volume 5. P. 130, 148: Additional locks purchased in 1517.
  8. ↑ Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 6.
  9. ↑ a b Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 7.
  10. ↑ a b c Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 8.
  11. ↑ a b c Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 18.
  12. ^ A b Antonia Fraser: Mary Queen of Scots . Panther, 1970. ISBN 978-0-586-03379-1 . Pp. 334-335.
  13. ↑ Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 9.
  14. ↑ a b Listed Building - Entry . In: Historic Scotland .
  15. ↑ Scheduled Monument - Entry . In: Historic Scotland .
  16. ↑ a b Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 16.
  17. ↑ Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 17.
  18. ^ Charles McKean: The Scottish Chateau . Sutton, 2001. ISBN 0-7509-3527-8 . P. 73.
  19. ↑ Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 14.
  20. ↑ a b Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 15.
  21. ↑ a b Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 20.
  22. ↑ Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 22.
  23. ↑ Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 21.
  24. ↑ a b Denys Pringle: Craigmillar Castle . Historic Scotland, 1996. ISBN 1-900168-10-3 . P. 24.

Web links

Commons : Craigmillar Castle  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 55 ° 55 ′ 33.2 "  N , 3 ° 8 ′ 26.2"  W.