Recording Your Heritage Online
Event ID 563932
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Recording Your Heritage Online
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/563932
Tolquhon, late 14th century; 1584-9, Thomas Leper. AL THIS WARKE EXCEP THE AULD TOWR WAS BEGUN BE WILLIAM FORBES 15 APRIL 1584 AND ENDIT BE HIM 20 OCTOBER 1589 proclaims the datestone of one of the most characteristic
châteaux of the Scots Renaissance. Very similar in sequence and plan to that other grand Forbes work, Pitsligo (see 'Banff & Buchan' in this series), it began with the Preston Tower, a dour rectangle with walls 71/2ft thick, now reduced largely to its vaulted ground floor. This functional block was enfolded within the courtyard plan of the new building created for the Renaissance man, Sir William Forbes.
Entry to this new wark was by an arched pend surmounted by a rich frontispiece set between two central semicircular towers. These are distinctly unmilitary in the thinness of their walls and the decorative Leper triple shot-holes and stringcourses. Harled, with its gilded frontispiece, the effect would have been stunning. Quality living was at the first-floor level: the gatehouse and west wing consisted of galleries, the latter a formidable 57ft by 14ft, starting from a bold
flanking round tower, incorporating the main stair and ending at the south range. This, two storeys and attic, with commodious hall and private rooms, is enlivened by a central circular stair-tower corbelled to the square above. By Thomas Leper, the similarity to nearby Schivas is clear. A small south-east tower creates a hollow Z-plan encompassed
by enclosures; these enclosures, in the manner of Pitsligo, include a large hexagonal outer forecourt with 12 bee-boles in its wall, a walled garden to the north and a pleasaunce around the main mansion.
Taken from "Aberdeenshire: Donside and Strathbogie - An Illustrated Architectural Guide", by Ian Shepherd, 2006. Published by the Rutland Press http://www.rias.org.uk
