#edinburghcastle — Public Fediverse posts

#Edinburgh Castle, viewed from the roof terrace of the National Museum of Scotland

https://www.flickr.com/photos/woolamaloo_gazette/55330745251/in/photostream/lightbox/

#Edimbourg #Castle #Chateau #photography #photographie #architecture #EdinburghCastle #ChateauDEdimbourg #History #Histoire #Ecosse #Scotland

#Edinburgh being gorgeous this afternoon...

.

#Edimbourg #photography #photographie #architecture #church #eglise #castle #chateau #EdinburghCastle

#Edinburgh Castle earlier this evening

#architecture #batiment #Edimbourg #photography #photographie #EdinburghCastle #castle #chateau #PrincesStreetGardens

Cameron Highlanders at Edinburgh Castle, c.1905-10 - Durie Brown Postcard

https://www.ebid.net/uk/for-sale/cameron-highlanders-at-edinburgh-castle-c-1905-10-durie-brown-postcard-224040280.htm

#Edinburgh #EdinburghCastle #CameronHighlanders

#Edinburgh looking especially gorgeous this afternoon.

.

#Edimbourg #architecture #photography #photographie #SaintJohnsChurch #EdinburghCastle #ChateauDedimbourg

#Edinburgh by the Ross Fountain in Princes Street Gardens, and the Castle, looking stunning on this spring day. Half an hour's walk from my flat, little wonder I love living here...

.

#Edimbourg #photography #photographie #architecture #castle #chateau #EdinburghCastle #ChateauDedimbourg #PrincesStreetGardens #RossFountain

Westward view from the roof terrace garden of the National Museum of Scotland, towards Greyfriars kirk and #Edinburgh Castle this afternoon.

#Edimbourg #photography #photographie #Architecture #NationalMuseumOfScotland #Greyfriars #EdinburghCastle #ChateauDedimbourg

West Princes Street Gardens this afternoon. Sunlight, spring flowers,the Castle, and a recuperation walk shared with a dear chum (plus hugs).

I needed that.

#Edinburgh #Edimbourg #photography #photographie #PrincesStreetGardens #EdinburghCastle #chateau #ChateauDEdimbourg #flowers #fleurs #spring #printemps

Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders, Edinburgh Castle, c.1905-10 - GD&DL Postcard

https://www.ebid.net/uk/for-sale/argyll-sutherland-highlanders-edinburgh-castle-c-1905-10-gd-dl-postcard-243041344.htm

#Edinburgh #EdinburghCastle #ArgyllAndSutherlandHighlanders

Ahhh Edinburgh
Built upon the Castle Rock
King Malcolm's high perch

#Haiku #OneHaikuADay #WritersCollective #writingcommunity #BackToHaiku #Seasons #Winter #Holiday #Christmastide #NewYear #Travel #Family #Norway #USA #Scotland #EdinburghCastle #CastleRock #2026 #Photography

January 7, 2026

Church and Castle; #Edinburgh on this freezing but beautiful first day of the year.

#Edimbourg #architecture #photography #photographie #church #eglise #EdinburghCastle #castle #chateau

#Edinburgh Castle at night, viewed from down among the old tombstones of Saint Cuthbert's kirkyard
https://www.flickr.com/photos/woolamaloo_gazette/55014638492/in/photostream/lightbox/

#Edimbourg #Architecture #EdinburghByNight #NightPhotography #photography #photographie #History #Histoire #EdinburghCastle #Chateau #Castle #LongExposure

Taken this day, 2017, #Edinburgh Castle at dusk, viewed from the roof terrace garden of the National Museum of Scotland (great - and free - spot for views across the city)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/woolamaloo_gazette/32021967026/in/photostream/lightbox/

#Edimbourg #Photography #photographie #architecture #Castle #Chateau #EdinburghCastle #dusk #crepuscule

taken this day, 2014, church spire and the Castle at night https://www.flickr.com/photos/woolamaloo_gazette/15936833937/in/photostream/lightbox/

The clock tower of Saint Cuthbert's, with #Edinburgh Castle behind.

#Edimbourg #photography #photographie #EdinburghByNight #NightPhotography #SaintCuthberts #Spire #ClockTower #EdinburghCastle #BlackAndWhitePhotography #architecture

Perched atop Castle Rock in the heart of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Castle dominates the skyline with its imposing medieval architecture and centuries of history. The fortress, a renowned #HistoricSite, offers sweeping #CastleView panoramas over the city and serves as one of Scotland's most visited #TouristAttraction landmarks. Its rugged stone walls and strategic position reflect its origins as a royal residence and military stronghold, embodying classic #MedievalArchitecture. Surrounded by the vibrant cultural life of Edinburgh, the castle remains a symbol of Scottish heritage and pride, drawing visitors year-round. #EdinburghCastle

Taken May 2013

#UKCountryPic #Photography #MastoGPT #EdinburghCastle #HistoricSite #MedievalArchitecture #TouristAttraction #CastleView #FerryRoad #Edinburgh #Scotland #UnitedKingdom

After my film, I cut through the old boneyard of Saint Cuthbert's to have a look & take pics at the festive fair & market in the nearby Princes Street Gardens.

I lasted twenty minutes before it annoyed the smeg out of me. Too loud, far too busy. I think I preferred the old bone orchard! Tombs with a Castle view!

#Edinburgh #Edimbourg #EdinburghByNight #photography #photographie #graveyard #cemetery #BlackAndWhitePhotography #EdinburghCastle

National Gallery and Edinburgh Castle, c.1950s - Postcard

https://www.ebid.net/uk/for-sale/national-gallery-and-edinburgh-castle-c-1950s-postcard-223604209.htm

#Edinburgh #EdinburghCastle

Blue skies and golden, winter sunlight less than an hour ago, on the way to my appointment.

Now murky, grey clouds closing in as I left, and rain starting. There's a reason we talk so much about weather here...

#Edinburgh #Edimbourg #photography #photographie #architecture #Grassmarket #PrincesStreet #ScottMonument #EdinburghCastle #castle #chateau

In #Scotland it's #SaintAndrewsDay ; I took this shot of #Edinburgh Castle, covered in snow & lit up Saltire blue in the winter night, on this day in 2010 https://www.flickr.com/photos/woolamaloo_gazette/5221426019/in/photostream/lightbox/

This was just walking home from my book group that evening. Yes, these are the sorts of things you see when you live in this remarkable city and beautiful country.

#Edimbourg #photography #photographie #EdinburghCastle #Castle #Chateau #snow #neige #SaintAndrewsNight #Scotland #Ecosse #architecture #history #histoire

Changing the Guard, Edinburgh Castle, 1951 - Valentine's Postcard

https://www.ebid.net/uk/for-sale/changing-the-guard-edinburgh-castle-1951-valentine-s-postcard-223452267.htm

#Edinburgh #EdinburghCastle

Usher Hall & a little glimpse of #Edinburgh Castle, from Festival Square

#Edimbourg #architecture #photography #photographie #UsherHall #EdinburghCastle

A Castle view https://www.flickr.com/photos/woolamaloo_gazette/54784880738/in/photostream/lightbox/

#Edinburgh Castle's western flank, glimpsed between a Victorian tenement and the dazzling, white facade of the Lyceum Theatre.

#Edimbourg #photography #photographie #architecture #History #Histoire #Lyceum #RoyalLyceumTheatre #Castle #Chateau #EdinburghCastle

View from Edinburgh Castle, Midlothian, c.1960s - Braemar Films Postcard

https://www.ebid.net/uk/for-sale/view-from-edinburgh-castle-midlothian-c-1960s-braemar-films-postcard-223219929.htm

#Edinburgh #EdinburghCastle

The thread about the Eight Day of Christmas; who were the Maids of the Maiden Castle?

This thread was originally written and published in January 2020.

This part in the Edinburgh and Leith themed Twelve Days of Christmas thread is preceded by a post about Swanston.

On the eight day of Christmas, my true love gave to me; the Maiden(s, a milking). This, perhaps surprisingly, is the first documented name applied to Edinburgh Castle, in a Charter of King David I in 1142; Castellum Puellarum – the Castle of Maidens. It was not until a century later in the time of King Alexander III, 1265, that it is referred to as Castrum de Edynburgh or Castle of Edinburgh. The oldest remaining structure in the castle, St. Margaret’s Chapel, was built in David I’s time in the middle of the 12th century.

No clear explanation exists for the Maiden reference. There are a number of Maiden Castles in England, all except one of which are Iron Age hill forts. This might be a descriptive tame for a “fortification that looks impregnable” or a euphemism implying that it has never been taken in battle. It may also be the evolution of a Brythyonic language term Mai Dun, meaning a “great hill”. Stuart Harris, the man who wrote the book on Edinburgh place names, discounts this theory for Edinburgh; “there is nothing whatsoever to suggests that this was a translation of some[thing] earlier“. He points out that the original references is the Latin – Puellarum – which was translated in the 13th century to its English and French equivalents – Maidens and Pucelles.

Some of the more improbable tales include an early 14th century reference in the Chronicles of Lanercost to a community of nuns who lived here in the 6th century under the Irish Saint Moninne or Modwenna, before being ejected, or to it being a safekeeping place for Pictish princesses. More likely is that it was a romantic term taken from Arthurian legend, one that may have been applied by David I himself. In Arthurian lore, the Land, Island or Castle of Maidens, is a place visited by a man in his dreams where only women live.

In the 12th century, the Welsh chronicler Geoffrey de Monmouth – who was one of the prominent figures in popularising the Cult of Arthur at the time – wrote in his History of the the Kings of Britain of the Castellum Puellarum as “facing Albany” i.e. looking towards the Lands of the Picts and Scots. At this time, these would have been north across the Forth from Edinburgh. He is also credited with the invention of the Duke of Loth – husband to a sister of Arthur – and from where Lothian takes its name. Geoffrey de Monmouth’s chief patron was a nephew of David I and it is probable that David had met him. The sixteenth century Scottish historian and intellectual George Buchanan and the 20th century Arthurian scholar Roger Sherman Loomis both lend credence to this theory.

In Edinburgh lore, the term Maiden also has a much more grisly connotation; it was an early modern device of public execution, a form of guillotine.

The Maiden was introduced to Edinburgh in 1564 to replace the town’s sword, which was worn out and needed replaced. The Provost and Magistrates of Edinburgh ordered its construction by the carpenters Adam and Patrick Schang and George Tod. The whole contraption could be disassembled for storage, only being moved to the point of execution and erected as required. It was returned afterwards, and this is referred to in the town records as “careying of the Maiden ther and hame agin”.

The Scottish machine is made of oak and consists of a sole beam 5 feet in length into which are fixed two upright posts 10 feet in height, 4 inches broad and 12 inches apart from each other, and 3½ inches in thickness, with bevelled corners. These posts are kept steady by a brace at each side which springs from the end of the sole and is fastened to the uprights 4 feet from the bottom. The tops of the posts are fixed into a cross rail 2 feet in length. The block is a transverse bar 3¼ feet from the bottom, 8 inches in breadth and 4½ inches in thickness, and a hollow on the upper edge of this bar is filled with lead…

The axe consists of a plate of iron faced with steel; it measures 13 inches in length and 10½ inches in breadth. On the upper edge of the plate was fixed a mass of lead 75 lbs in weight. This blade works in grooves cut on the inner edges of the uprights, which are lined with copper…

Proceedings of the Society of Antiquities of Scotland, Vol.III, 1886-8

Notable victims of the Maiden include James Douglas, 4th Earl of Morton, one time Regent of Scotland and the man reputed to have introduced its concept to the country, Archibald Campbell, 1st Marquess of Argyll and his son Archibald Campbell, 9th Earl of Argyll. The Maiden was last used in 1716 to execute John Hamilton at the Mercat Cross for the murder of the landlord of a tavern during a brawl. It was again taken down and carried hame agin but was thereafter forgotten about. The original was rediscovered over a century later and is now on display in the National Museum of Scotland.

The Edinburgh and Leith-themed twelve days of Christmas thread continues with a post about Lady Fife, her house, well and “brae”

Note to readers: unfortunately in April 2026, a third-party plug-in more than exceeded its authority and broke many of the image links on this site. No images were lost but I will have to restore them page-by-page, which may take some time. In the meantime please bear with me while I go about rectifying this issue.

If you have found this site useful, informative or amusing then you can help contribute towards its running costs by supporting me on ko-fi. This includes my commitment to keeping it 100% advert and AI free for all time coming, and in helping to find further unusual stories to bring you by acquiring books and paying for research.
Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends and like-minded people, sites like this thrive on being shared.

Explore Threadinburgh by map:

These threads © 2017-2026, Andy Arthur.

NO AI TRAINING: Any use of the contents of this website to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.

The thread about a surprise capture of Edinburgh Castle; when Alexander Leslie was not hoist by his own petard

This thread was originally written and published in March 2020. It has been lightly edited and corrected as applicable for this post.

In March 1639, Lord General Alexander Leslie captured Edinburgh Castle for the Covenanters by having one of his entourage sneakily apply a petard to the castle gates under cover of his appeal to the governor for its surrender. According to the Scottish military historian David Caldwell, this “has to be one of the most remarkable and easy captures of a major fortress in the history of warfare“.

A petard was a bucket or bell-shaped device that was filled with explosives and held against a wall or gate before being exploded, it channelled the explosive force towards the target and as such was a very early form of “shaped charge” weapon. The word Pétard comes from the Middle French péter, to break wind, on the basis of the noise made by the weapon’s detonation. It has entered the popular lexicon from the works of Shakespeare, the phrase “Hoist with his own petard” coming from Hamlet, and means to fall into your own trap or foiled by your own plans, as the petard was often as deadly to those using it as to the intended target.

When war broke out in 1639 between King Charles I and the Covenanting Party in Scotland – The First War of the Bishops – the King had tried to hand the governorship of the castle to Patrick Ruthven, a prominent Royalist soldier. Like many senior Scottish soldiers he had learned his craft in the service of Gustav Adolphus of Sweden during the 30 years war. Ruthven was renowned for his drinking abilities – Gustav Adolphus had used him as a emissary on account of him being able to drink the opposition under the table and still retain his faculties – but sensibly refused the job on account of the poor defensive preparations of the castle. Ruthven also declined Charles’ offer of overall command of the Royalist forces in Scotland as he was not granted absolute authority over them. Instead the castle was held by its long term constable, Archibald Haldane.

Leading the Covenanting Army was Lord General Alexander Leslie, Earl of Leven, an immensely capable and respected general. Ironically he had formerly served under Ruthven in the Swedish Army and had risen to Field Marshall in that service, but now back home found himself on the opposing side.

Leslie arrived at Edinburgh castle with fellow former servants of the army of Sweden; the similarly capable Alexander “Dear Sandy” Hamilton – General of Artillery – and Robert Monro – General Major. They brought with them 1,000 locally-raised hagbutters (musketeers). Ostensibly they were there to either appeal to the garrison to surrender or to overawe them with their force. But they had a third plan in case either of these two failed; the petard.

Edinburgh Castle had been unsuccessfully attacked by the English under Hertford in 1544 when the towns of Edinburgh and Leith were burned. When Hertford, now the Duke of Somerset, returned in 1547 this time he didn’t even bother it. During the Siege of Leith, which lasted from 1548 – 1560, the Castle was held by the Queen Regent, Mary of Guise, and her Scottish Catholic and French supporters and was largely unaffected. War came again to the Castle in 1573 when a combined English and Scottish protestant force besieged it in the “Lang Siege” which brought the turbulence of the “Marian” civil wars to something of a close but also reduced much of the Castle and its defences to rubble.

Gordon of Rothiemay’s remarkable bird’s eye plan of 1647 shows the castle as it would have been in 1639, largely rebuilt since being reduced in 1573. It’s not so recognisable to us after all the Georgian and Victorian additions to the castle, but the obvious features of the royal apartments (a), St. Margaret’s Chapel (b) are there.

Defensively, the “Spur” (magenta) is the first line of defence. Built and financed by the French supporters of Mary of Guise in the 1550s and 1560s, it was a modern artillery fortification on the bastion style and protected the castle gates from direct frontal assault and had been rebuilt. The “Half Moon Battery” (green) was newer – built by Regent Morton after the Lang Siege – but with its rounded form was anachronistic.

The Spur had taken a siege lasting almost 2 years to overcome it; the Covenanters didn’t have anything like that sort of time or besieging resources on their hands, so subterfuge was a much more sensible approach. Leslie, Hamilton and Monro went up to the castle gates “between 4 and 5 in the afternoon” to parley with Haldane. As they withdrew, one of their party attached the petard to the outer gate of the spur and it was fired.

The outer gate demolished, the Covenanters’ forces rushed the spur in the smoke and confusion and quickly set about the 2 inner gates of the castle “with axes, hammers and ramming-leddirs” while others poured over the walls on scaling ladders.

The garrison were caught totally off guard and unprepared and seemingly no attempt at resistance was made. Within an hour, the castle was in Covenanter hands without loss on either side. We can only surmise how the Covenanters managed to fix and fire the petard without any of the defenders trying to stop them. Perhaps the defenders gave those renowned generals outside the gates too much deference and wouldn’t suspect that they might try any such trick. Given this amounted to the physical opening shot of The First Bishop’s War, everything up until this point being political manoeuvring, the defenders could be forgiven for not expecting an assault.

Or perhaps they didn’t even know what a petard was and what to look for. Apparently this was its first use in Scotland for a generation and only the third record of one being used at all. Petards had been banned – on pain of death – by King James VI after their use to blow up the gates of the Lord of Spynie’s house of Kinblethmont in November 1602.

Or perhaps they just didn’t underestimated their foes and didn’t respect the skill, determination and masterful planning that usually marked out Alexander Leslie.

Within a year and the conclusion of the First Bishop’s War (in the favour of the Covenanters), the Castle was back in the possession of the King and this time had to be put under proper siege by the Covenanters under Major Hugh Somerville (Leslie was in England with the main body of the Covenanter army) to take it. Defending it this time was Patrick Ruthven, who had made considerable preparations for such an event and was well supplied and garrisoned; there would be no quick trick to take the Castle this time. Ruthven held out for 3 months before a surrender was finally negotiated, both defenders and besiegers being bloodied by the experience. For his troubles, Ruthven was raised by King Charles to Earl of Forth.

Note to readers: unfortunately in April 2026, a third-party plug-in more than exceeded its authority and broke many of the image links on this site. No images were lost but I will have to restore them page-by-page, which may take some time. In the meantime please bear with me while I go about rectifying this issue.

If you have found this site useful, informative or amusing then you can help contribute towards its running costs by supporting me on ko-fi. This includes my commitment to keeping it 100% advert and AI free for all time coming, and in helping to find further unusual stories to bring you by acquiring books and paying for research.
Or please do just share this post on social media or amongst friends and like-minded people, sites like this thrive on being shared.

Explore Threadinburgh by map:

These threads © 2017-2026, Andy Arthur.

NO AI TRAINING: Any use of the contents of this website to “train” generative artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to generate text is expressly prohibited. The author reserves all rights to license uses of this work for generative AI training and development of machine learning language models.