EDINBURGH EXPERT WALKING TOURS - BLOG

Whilst much is often made of the people who were executed - justly or otherwise - in Edinburgh throughout history, there's relatively little attention given to those who bore the responsibility for dispatching those poor souls. 

In order to have an execution, an executioner had to be present to swing the axe, tighten the noose or light the tinder (depending on whether your fate was to be beheaded, hung or burned at the stake). They also carried out corporal punishments, such as public whippings. These people occupied a strange place in the society of their times - no one really wanted to do the job, but everyone agreed on the necessity of justice being meted out as laid down by the laws of the land.

So executioners often existed in a strange half-life among Edinburgh's citizens, by turns feared, respected, despised and admired. Here's my trip through the lives, deaths, and working arrangements of some of Edinburgh's executioners.

THE LOKMAN
In Scots, an executioner was sometimes called a 'lokman', or in popular slang was known as 'the doomster', the man who sent you to your doom....

​The origin of the word 'lokman; is slightly hazy, with some people making the connection between an executioner and a jailer, or one who controlled the locks - although these two roles were never knowingly linked in Scotland.

More likely is the use of 'lok' as a term to describe a quantity of a product - generally about a handful, but also a tuft (of wool or cloth - from which a 'lock' of hair gets its origin). The connection with the executioner is that part of the reward or payment which was given for performing this unpleasant work was taken from a tax levied on every portion of goods which were imported into the city for sale at the market, calculated as a lok or handful of each. Thus the commercial activity of Edinburgh helped to pay for maintaining the law and the administration of justice in the city.

This amounted to a significant quantity of cash - in 1590, the lokman employed to coordinate the execution at the front of Edinburgh Castle of a group of men and women convicted of witchcraft was paid £5 18s 6d, equivalent to over £1,250 in modern currency! 

ALEXANDER COCKBURN
Cockburn was a hangman during the reign of Charles II, and was on duty in the Grassmarket during the execution of around 100 Covenant martyrs, killed for adhering to a statement of religious faith which was at odds with the monarchy during the late seventeenth century.

In accordance with the various traditions of the time, Cockburn wasn't only a hangman, but was also known to have wielded an axe at beheadings of various higher status figures (for whom the faster death than a lingering demise by hanging was considered something of a judicial mercy) and of being involved in the torture of various suspected criminals in order to secure guilty confessions. 

He was known to have conducted himself in his role as executioner with a certain gusto, and cannot have been considered a reluctant administrator of the sentences imposed on criminals. But Cockburn was also notable for having his own life ended at the end of a rope, after he was found guilty of murdering a beggar in the city.

It was alleged that Cockburn had enticed the beggar, called John Adamson, into his home on Fishmarket Close, whereupon he had struck him with a number of violent blows in order to take from him the small amount of cash Adamson had collected that day. He denied causing Adamson's death - denied him even having been in his home - but blood-soaked clothes were found concealed in Cockburn's rooms, and he was arraigned and held in chains to secure a confession. When none was forthcoming, local magistrates pronounced Cockburn guilty of the murder, and sentenced him to be hanged.  

The situation thusly presented authorities with a conundrum - who was to execute the city's executioner?! And so a man named Mackenzie - the executioner in Stirling, who had previously served in Edinburgh - was sent for, and Cockburn might have been darkly amused had he ever known that the man who sent him to his death had been his own predecessor, whom he had replaced!

​Alexander Cockburn was hanged in Edinburgh on (or around) 16 January 1682.

HANG OR BE HANGED
It's fair to say that few people ever set out to become executioners, and the role could be a tricky one to fill anytime it fell vacant. Although the perks and benefits of the job could be substantial, the level of public profile and the gruesome nature of the job description itself made it a hard role to recruit.

One of the last executioners to take the job in Edinburgh was a man named Jock Heich, who was appointed in 1784. His path to employment was a curious one, as he had been arrested on charges of stealing poultry - although he was also a notorious wife beater, and it may have been that the authorities were induced to arrest him for some minor offence as a substitute for crimes they may not have been able to prove in an open court.

His sentence - for what amounted to petty theft - was to be hanged. But the authorities offered him an alternative, and offered him instead the role of hangman, which at that time was carried out by an elderly man who was unlikely to be remaining in post for long. Heich could avoid an unpleasant death for himself by taking on the job of executioner to others.

It's not known how long Heich deliberated over the decision - suffice it to say he served as the city's doomster until his death in 1817. 

MEN OF CONSCIENCE
If Alexander Cockburn had been a violent brute who took rather too much pleasure in the carrying out of his role, other executioners in Edinburgh took a more considered approach to the job.

John Dalgleish was the hangman during the early eighteenth century, and was the figure who saw the smuggler Andrew Wilson to his death ahead of the Porteous Riots in 1736. He was also responsible for administering corporal punishments, including the public whippings of less violent offenders. Asked on one occasion how he judged the force and weight of the blows he administered with the whip, Dalgleish replied, "I lay on the lash according to my conscience". This was perhaps his way of acknowledging a degree of latitude in the degree of trauma involved in the punishments he administered.

A little earlier, in 1700, a similar issue of conscience had led to a curious circumstance in the city. In the aftermath of the Darien Expedition to settle a Scottish colony in South America, there was a great sense of public outrage at the way in which the English government had acted in the affair, which had seen the expedition fail disastrously, with the needless deaths of thousands of would-be resettlers who had risked their lives and livelihoods in the spirit of colonisation.

Such was the strength of public opinion that a riot had been orchestrated in the city of Edinburgh, for which a number of organisers and agitators had been arrested and sentenced to a severe public whipping at the Mercat Cross.

Despite the riot having been a breach of city regulations, many sympathised with the position of the rioters, and agreed with their cause, and the hangman experienced a prick of conscience at punishing men with whose political feeling he strenuously agreed. And so it was that at their punishment, Dalgleish enacted the whipping with a degree of theatricality, and didn't let the whip make contact with the backs of the rioters, avoiding causing them pain or suffering.

The city authorities were outraged by what they saw as a partisan avoidance of judicial instruction, and had the executioner arrested and sentenced to a public whipping for his insubordination!

The council sent to Haddington to secure the services of a hangman to come and administer the punishment, but on arrival the replacement hangman found himself threatened and intimidated by the general public whose feeling had been shared by their conscientious objector.... Accordingly he refused the job and fled the city, forcing some to joke that Edinburgh council would have to secure the services of a third executioner to punish the second who had refused to punish the first...!

Instead, Edinburgh council admitted defeat at the hands of public opinion and dropped the issue.

SHAMED AND ASHAMED
One of the city's executioners had been a young man in a wealthy family from Melrose in the Scottish Borders. Having inherited a significant fortune, he squandered the cash and lost it through a profligate lifestyle, before being declared bankrupt. He left Melrose in shame, and set out to start a new life in Edinburgh, where nobody knew him or his story.

Having changed his name, he found the only job which was open was that of hangman, and with no other option available to him he gratefully accepted the role. 

Having begun to save up some cash, he had aspirations of returning to his former lifestyle, and bought some fine clothes in which he would walk out to Bruntsfield Links, one of the world's oldest golf courses. Here he would socialise with some of the city's elite, playing golf and enjoying something of the former lifestyle he had lost through his own extravagance.

THE LAST PUBLIC HANGING
Edinburgh's last public hanging took place on the High Street in 1864 - and it was precisely because of the events which transpired that day that no further public executions were to take place. 

Because so few executions were occurring at that time, the city had retired the post of executioner and no longer had a resident doomster to call upon for the purpose of administering justice. And so, to execute George Bryce, convicted of murder in June 1864, Edinburgh brought a hangman from York to perform the necessary deed.

It had long been considered that the role of executioner was not just to be trusted to violent thugs (like Alexander Cockburn) but that a degree of skill was required to perform the task in as brisk, efficient and painless way as possible. Sought-after executioners - like Albert Pierrepoint, Britain's last hangman - plied their trade with a methodical rigour that made the process smooth and efficient, and were rewarded highly for their diligent approach to the task at hand.

One primary calculation which was required from hangmen concerned the length of rope from which a prisoner would be hung - adjusting the length as needed to ensure the necessary fall and force of a drop, in order to efficiently break the neck and render death instantaneously, was considered the minimum degree of care to be taken over a prisoner's final moments.

In 1864, the executioner brought to Edinburgh from York - named Thomas Askern - seemed to possess none of these necessary skills and considerations. It may be that he had overstated his experience or qualifications to secure the job, or (according to rumour) he had over-exerted himself at one of Edinburgh's pubs the evening before, and arrived for the execution in a state of hangover. Regardless of the reason, what is known is that Askern took little care in assessing the length of rope needed to hang George Bryce, and when the trap door opened, the prisoner dropped barely two feet and was left to dangle in mid-air in front of the assembled crowd.

Instead of disappearing out of sight beneath the scaffold and dying with a swift break to his neck, as was expected, Bryce slowly suffocated in full view of the men, women and children who had gathered to witness the execution. Reports of the event differ on how long it took Bryce to die. The shortest estimate put it at 12 long minutes of slow, agonising suffocation. One witness recorded it took Bryce nearer forty minutes to finally expire.

Public response to the botched death was heated and angry, and a mob chased the officials and hangman from the scaffold with a barrage of stones. Thomas Askern became immediately so hated he had to be smuggled out of the city on a coach back to York first thing the next morning.

Appalled at the trauma meted out in place of a swift and efficient execution, Edinburgh held no more public executions - although hangings still took place in the privacy of the city's prison until the last execution in Edinburgh, within living memory for some, in June 1954...

Distract yourself from the horrors of the festive season with this fun quiz with 10 seasonal-themed questions to test your knowledge of Scotland's capital city!

Wishing you all the best for a safe, peaceful and relaxing Christmas, and I hope to see you for a tour of Edinburgh in 2021!

Edinburgh is full of historic properties and buildings that have seen their fair share of history. In terms of its heritage status, Edinburgh has more buildings listed for their historical value than any other city in the UK (apart from London).

​This occasional blog series highlights specific buildings and explores their historic associations - previously I've featured Moray House and Prestonfield House, and in this article I'll be looking at Acheson House, located just off Edinburgh's historic Royal Mile.
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Acheson House was built in 1633, as evidenced by the date carved above what was the original main entrance to the building. Today internal renovations have divided up some of the interior space, and this doorway today gives emergency access into the Museum of Edinburgh, housed primarily in an adjacent building.

The building was originally constructed as a home for Archibald Acheson. In 1627 Acheson had been appointed Secretary of State for Scotland in the court of Charles I, and so was a major figure in the royal court as well as in his native Scotland. Acheson's second wife was Margaret Hamilton, and the couple's initials appear on the pediments over the windows on the upper floor.

Scotland and England had only been united under one monarch for barely thirty years at the time when Acheson House was built, and wouldn't be united politically for another seventy years - so it's curious to note the emblem of the thistle and the rose carved into the window pediments. These national emblems of both Scotland and England would suggest the building's owner boasted unionist sympathies.

​However, a fleur-de-lys emblem over a third window may suggest a sense of respect for the 'Auld Alliance', signed between Scotland and France in 1292, making a common enemy of England...

By the eighteenth century the building had fallen in status somewhat. Acheson had died in 1634, barely a year after the house was built, and later the property would come into use as one of the many brothels and houses of ill repute that would have been found all across the Old Town. Prostitution was one of the most common means of earning money for the poorest citizens, and Acheson House had become one venue for soliciting the services of such 'ladies of pleasure'.

Thanks to the emblem above its door, it was known locally as 'the cock and trumpet'....! It is thought that Acheson House may have been a favoured haunt of young Robert Louis Stevenson.

In 1775, an enterprising son of a church minister compiled and published An Impartial List of the Ladies of Pleasure in Edinburgh, detailing some of the women who could be found in the city's brothels, and the particular services (or character) they offered to their paying guests. James Tytler (who is alleged to be the otherwise pseudonymous author of the book) would later help compile the second edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, a decidedly more wholesome publication!

Acheson House was also at one time occupied by Edinburgh's Incorporation of Bakers, and the names of the adjacent lanes - Bakehouse Close and Sugarhouse Close - are a reminder that this area at one time was a relatively industrial part of the city.

As with many of Edinburgh's Old Town buildings in the nineteenth century, Acheson House fell into disrepair, and may have been demolished altogether if it hadn't been for the pioneering vision of the Marquess of Bute, one of the figures who led efforts to restore and preserve many of the city's historic buildings. 

In 1939 the building was acquired by the Canongate Kirk, who installed the minister of the church in the property as his official manse. Rev. Ronald Selby-Wright spent forty years ministering to the community in the Canongate area, and lived at Acheson House during the early years of his tenure.

In his autobiography, Another Home, Selby-Wright describes one evening hearing footsteps crossing the wooden floor of Acheson House, opening the heavy wooden door, and passing out across the courtyard and into Bakehouse Close. When he went to investigate, to see who had been leaving the property, he found the front door firmly bolted closed, and no evidence of anyone having been in the hallway. 

He experienced this same phenomenon several times during his occupation of the building, and a colleague who stayed in the property described a similar experience - footsteps, the door opening and closing, but then discovering the door firmly locked...

From 1951 to the early 1990s Acheson House was a craft centre, hosting a variety of Scottish craftsmen and women, before the building fell into disuse and lay empty for twenty years. Again it seemed as though the building might fall victim to neglect and disuse until a major renovation was funded in 2011.

Acheson House once again had occupants! Today the building remains the offices of Edinburgh World Heritage, the charitable body who work alongside UNESCO to help preserve and protect the city's historic structures. 

Still occupied after nearly 400 years, Acheson House has survived some of the most disruptive, damaging and difficult periods of Edinburgh's history, and today stands as a monument to the value of preserving the city's built heritage. 

As we crawl ever closer to Christmas, check out my virtual Edinburgh advent calendar - each day I will 'open' another doorway that can be found around the city, and share some of the secrets of the Old and New Towns!

You can view the interactive map - with links to the FB posts for each of the daily doors - below...

And of course you can join me on an actual tour of the city to explore some of these doorways in much more detail! 

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

As the world's first UNESCO City of Literature, Edinburgh is renowned for its literary influences and connections. Chief among the figures frequently celebrated is Robert Louis Stevenson, who was born in the city on 13 November 1850. 

Stevenson is still widely read with works such as Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and one story that has a particular connection to Edinburgh itself, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. 

To mark 170 years of Stevenson's influence and legacy in Edinburgh, here are eight locations in the city associated with this literary giant.

17 Heriot Row
The Stevensons moved to this grand address in Edinburgh's New Town when Robert Louis Stevenson was six years old, and he spent the bulk of his childhood at this address.

As a child he was prone to illness, especially problems with his lungs and his breathing, and so was rarely allowed to go out into the damp Scottish climate to play with the other children of the neighbourhood.

Directly across the road from the house is Queen Street Gardens, a private garden space, where Stevenson would watch the other children playing, from the safety of the drawing room on the first floor of the house. 

In these gardens is a pond, with a small island in the centre of it. Literary historians have speculated that it was from watching the children playing around this pond and its island that Stevenson came up with the ideas of what became Treasure Island. 

Swanston Village
During the summers of the late 1870s, Stevenson spent much of his time in this picturesque village on the side of the Pentland Hills, to the south of Edinburgh.

His father had rented one of the properties, and Stevenson used the village as the inspiration for his unfinished novel St Ives, which he wrote in parallel with The Weir of Hermiston, which he did manage to complete.

Today the village of Swanston is still a rural retreat from the city of Edinburgh itself, with access to the hills, and remains popular with dog walkers and ramblers. 

Corstorphine Hill
Another local setting which Stevenson borrowed for his writing was one of the many hills which make up Edinburgh's landscape. Corstorphine is to the west of the city, towards Edinburgh airport, and features in Kidnapped, Stevenson's adventure story set in the aftermath of the 1745 Jacobite Uprising. 

The book ends with the two main characters form the story - David Balfour and Alan Breck Stewart - going their separate ways on Corstorphine Hill. Today a statue of the figures by the artist Alexander Stoddart can be found on Corstorphine Road, near the location where the scene from the book is set.

Princes Street Gardens
Stevenson spent the latter years of his life on an island in Samoa, in the Pacific Ocean. He integrated into the community there, who named him 'Tusitala', meaning 'Teller of tales', and on his death in 1894 he was buried in a spot overlooking the ocean, a reminder of his time as a traveller, journeying in the way many of his characters did in their respective stories.

So he has no formal grave in Edinburgh, his hometown. Instead, in Princes Street Gardens, surrounded by a glade of birch trees, is a simple commemorative headstone bearing his initials, RLS.

The Writers' Museum
One place where Stevenson is celebrated fully is in Edinburgh's Writers' Museum, a small building celebrating the life and work of three of Scotland's greatest literary figures - Sir Walter Scott, Robert Burns, along with Robert Louis Stevenson.

The museum can be found on Lady Stair's Close, off the Lawnmarket on the Royal Mile. It's a free entry museum and is worth exploring for anyone interested in the lives of the writers featured.

The Hispaniola
Stevenson was known for living the lifestyle of a nineteenth-century writer, which meant (broadly) significant amounts of drink, drugs, and a fondness for prostitutes... One of the bars in which he drank still survives, and is today an Italian restaurant in the Old Town.

The Hispaniola was a bar popular with writers, poets and figures associated with the University of Edinburgh, and Stevenson is known to have spent time here with figures like William Henley, a writer and poet who had a large red beard and only one leg, the other having been amputated after a childhood illness...

The Hispaniola bar helped give Stevenson the name for the ship in Treasure Island, and surely a one-legged bearded man must have inspired that story's notorious pirate, Long John Silver?

Colinton Village
Another suburb of the city where Stevenson spent time was Colinton, a small village near to Swanston where he spent time during his childhood. Stevenson's grandfather was minister of the church in Colinton, and the area provided young Robert with plenty of space to roam and explore and develop his interest in the natural world.

Today Colinton remains a peaceful residential suburb of Edinburgh, with the Water of Leith running through the area, and visitors can find a small statue of a boy playing with his dog, near to a heritage and nature trail. The boy in the statue is Robert Louis Stevenson, and his dog is Coolin, Stevenson's own childhood pet.

Chessel's Court
My final Edinburgh location which has a Stevenson connection is Chessel's Court in the Old Town, just off the Canongate section of the Royal Mile.

It was here in 1787 that a robbery took place, masterminded by Deacon William Brodie, the man whose life would help to inspire Stevenson's most enduring (and influential) character study - that of the duality of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde... 

On 8 November 1736, Scotland's first theatre formally opened, on Carrubber's Close in Edinburgh's Old Town. It had been established by the poet and librarian Allan Ramsay, at what he described as "great expense", for the purpose of staging entertainments and performances for a local audience.

The life of the theatre was shortlived, as by the following year the venue on Carrubber's Close had closed, forced out of business as a result of campaigning and opposition from religious leaders in the city.

​For a long time, the performing arts were closely linked with issues of vice and depravity, had sinful associations with excess and debauchery, and attracted a dubious clientele. Many influential figures decried the harmful, degenerate influence that theatres had on their communities, and it's no surprise that Ramsay's venture was forced out of business so speedily.

Of course, the closure of the theatre on Carrubber's Close wasn't the end of the performing arts in Edinburgh, and today the city boasts the world's largest arts festival every summer - and at a time when many arts venues and artists are experiencing the devastating effects of the pandemic lockdown, here's my celebration of some of Edinburgh other important theatres, past and present.

In the 1750s, this was the venue for a famous production by John Home called Douglas, a romantic tragedy set in the Scottish Highlands. At its first performance it was received with such enthusiasm and positivity, a cry of "Whaur's yer Wullie Shakespeare noo?" was heard in the crowd at the curtain call.

Home was a church minister at the time, and the outcry at his association with the dreaded performing arts forced his resignation from the church. 

Douglas was restaged in London in 1757, where it was well received by a non-domestic audience, and was followed with several other classical-themed plays. Home later became an MP for Edinburgh, and died in 1808.

The theatre on Playhouse Close closed in 1769.

THEATRE ROYAL
Another long-gone theatre in Edinburgh was the Theatre Royal, which stood on a square named Shakespeare Square, between 1769 and 1859. Shakespeare Square was at the east end of Princes Street in the New Town, near the junction with North Bridge, where the former General Post Office building stands today.

The foundation stone for the theatre was laid by Prince Albert, Queen Victoria's prince consort in 1863, on the same day he laid the foundation stone for what is today the National Museum of Scotland, on Chambers Street.

When the venue closed after 90 years, the title of Theatre Royal was then passed to a second building, previously known as the Queen's Theatre and Operetta House, on nearby Broughton Street.

This theatre was immediately adjacent to St Mary's Cathedral, where the John Lewis department store stands today, and seemed curiously vulnerable to fire - it was destroyed by fire and rebuilt no fewer than three times, before being demolished after catching fire for the last time in 1946. 

ROYAL LYCEUM THEATRE
One of the most popular local theatres in the city is the Royal Lyceum, which opened in 1883.

​A classic proscenium arch theatre, the auditorium here is one of the most beautiful of all the theatres across Scotland. 

The theatre has a permanent creative company dedicated to producing live theatre created in Edinburgh, attracting actors, designers and directors from all around the world.

Casts here have included performers like Sam Heughan (Outlander), David Tennant (Doctor Who) and Brian Cox (the original Hannibal Lektor in Manhunter), and designers including Olivier and Tony-award winning Bunny Christie.
 
The Lyceum is especially renowned for its work attracting younger audiences, including an annual Christmas show and its year-round Youth Theatre program.

KING'S THEATRE
Another classic proscenium arch theatre, the foundation of the red sandstone building of the King's Theatre was laid in 1906 by Andrew Carnegie, at one time the richest man in America. 

The King's was part of the traditional music hall circuit of the early- to mid-twentieth century. This was a key part of the theatre tradition in the UK, where comedians, singers, dancers and novelty acts would travel the country performing at venues. Scottish comedians like Rikki Fulton, Stanley Baxter, and Jimmy Logan all starred at the King's theatre in their careers. 

More recently, the King's has become one of the city's receiving houses, hosting touring productions for a week at a time throughout the year. A major renovation in 2013 saw improved access to what had become a challenging building for audiences to get into, and further development is planned for the near future. 

A beautiful mural on the decorative ceiling rose was painted by the artist and playwright John Byrne. 

In 1911 the Empire Theatre was the site of a devastating stage fire which broke out during a performance by a magician named the Great Lafayette, during which 11 people were killed - including the magician himself, his illusion body double, and a lion featured in his act.

TRAVERSE THEATRE
The Traverse is one of the city's most important creative spaces, being dedicated to new writing. Originally established in 1963 by a group of people including John Calder - who was Samuel Beckett's publisher in the UK - and Richard Demarco, who remains an important and active artist and writer in Edinburgh.

The original theatre space was located on a lane off the Lawnmarket before moving to a more formal location in the Grassmarket, until it moved to the modern development from which it still operates today in 1992.
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The Traverse become a major hub during the annual Edinburgh Festival Fringe, and is well regarded as a venue that nurtures and develops the work of new Scottish writers.

EDINBURGH PLAYHOUSE
The Edinburgh Playhouse is the largest theatre venue in the UK by number of seats, with room for just over 3,000 audience members at every performance. 

The building opened in 1929 as a cinema, and today operates as a receiving house for large scale touring productions of West End musicals, international opera and ballet companies, and stand-up comedy.

Explore more of Edinburgh's theatres and arts venues with my private city walking tours!

Robert Stodart Lorimer was born in Edinburgh on 4 November 1864.

His name isn't as well known as some of the architects like Robert Adam or William Playfair, but Lorimer was active across the UK and further afield during the early twentieth century, and found a reliable supply of work after the First World War as a designer of graves, monuments and war memorials. He also worked extensively in domestic settings, creating not the grand public buildings of better known architects, but contributing to his clients' domestic experience instead.

He was a notoriously frugal figure who never had more than four people working in his architecture practice, and resented having to buy coal to heat the offices during the winter months. He could also be a difficult man to work with, and lost several commissions because of his lack of tact or his  insistence on features and elements that his clients didn't like.

One of his chief draughtsmen once commented that Lorimer was "terrible with clients", and remembered that during one argument with a client was heard to say, "'This house will be remembered because I designed it, not because you paid for it"...!

But some of Lorimer's greatest works were public buildings and features in Edinburgh. Here are some highlights. 

This octagonal feature on the south-east corner of the building is filled with incredibly ornate decoration, with every surface covered in carved wooden panels with the crests of major Scottish figures around the space. It is in the Thistle Chapel that the Queen awards the chivalric title of Order of the Thistle, a historic royal honour dating back to the seventeenth century.

It's a small space, and not always open to the public (which is why I don't have photos of it!) but is worth visiting if you can get access during a visit - it is in the Thistle Chapel that you'll find the famous carving of an angel playing bagpipes! See if you can spot it amongst all the other decorations and carvings.

Lorimer utilised a part of an existing barracks block on the site at the top of Edinburgh Castle for his plans, which today are a quiet and peaceful place of reverence and respect.

​Rolls of the names of the dead are kept in books for visitors to trace family and loved ones, and even in the middle of the summer when the castle is at its busiest, the Scottish National War Memorial remains a place of remembrance.

Lorimer died in 1929, so it's likely that the bulk of the zoology building from 1928 was designed and overseen by Matthew, but it's an intriguing structure that always catches my eye on my frequent trips past it to do my weekly supermarket shop...