The Royal Mile, one of the most famous streets in Edinburgh, runs from the castle all the way down to Holyrood Palace. When Edinburgh castle was first established this was the only accessible route, a natural ramp formed thousands of years ago gave access to a castle otherwise impregnable from the east. With the establishment […]
Perhaps my favourite part of Christmas (after opening presents, of course), are the days spent feasting and picking at leftovers until you can’t possibly eat any more. Here’s a compile of traditional Scots Christmas fare, guaranteed to warm your cockles this holiday season. All recipes featured below come from Theodora Fitzgibbon’s book Traditional Scottish Cookery, […]
On a Wednesday evening in Edinburgh, direct your ears upwards while wandering up Victoria Street from the Grassmarket and you might just hear a bit of Gaelic tune floating out onto the street below. Còisir Dhùn Èideann (Edinburgh Gaelic Choir) meet once a week in the Quaker Meeting House, just a few streets away from […]
In August 1561 Mary, Queen of Scots returned to Edinburgh from France as a Catholic queen in a newly reformed Protestant Scotland. Initially greeted with crowds curious to catch a glimpse of their new queen, Mary Stewart was regarded with suspicion and faced a volatile political situation from the fervent Protestant ascendancy. 450 years on, […]
A renowned team of experts at the University of Dundee have revealed a 3D virtual image of Mary, Queen of Scots as she would have looked at the time of her reign. The image was released to coincide with a major new exhibition on the life of the iconic figure that opened at the National […]
A week ago I took advantage of a lovely sunny day in Edinburgh and cycled along the Innocent Railway, then on to Craigmillar Castle. The castle is an amazingly well-preserved 14th Century castle just on the outskirts of the Scottish capital. It was home to the Preston family for over 250 years and was visited […]
Beside a bubbling brook in a remote part of the highlands isn’t usually where you would expect to come across a modern-day monarch. But a new portrait of Queen Elizabeth II has done just that – picturing her against the sprawling backdrop of Balmoral Estate and kitted out in a velvet green mantle and a […]
In 1545 the aptly titled War of Rough Wooing was in full, ruthless swing. In order to gain Scotland’s allegiance to England, King Henry VIII employed the curious tactic of scorching and pillaging Scotland into submission. In retaliation, approximately 2,500 Scottish soldiers were raised by the Chief of Clan Douglas, Archibald Douglas 6th Earl of […]
16th century Scotland was a dangerous place for those in the higher echelons of society. Apart from the likelihood of dying on the battlefield or being murdered as the result of a local feud, it was not uncommon to fall foul of the executioner’s axe. Death by execution was quite a common occurrence and was […]
An interesting angle to the current debate on Scottish independence is what would happen to the British Flag, the Union Jack, should Scotland actually separate from the rest of the United Kingdom. It may seem a trivial point, but the flag and the union are so interwoven that it is worth looking at how it […]
