Crail, Shoregate. View from north east looking towards harbour.

Description Crail, Shoregate. View from north east looking towards harbour.

Date c. 1885

Collection Papers of Erskine Beveridge, antiquarian, Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland

Catalogue Number SC 739233

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of F 1911

Scope and Content Shoregate, Crail, Fife, from the rear (east) Crail, a picturesque fishing town with a small tidal harbour, sits on the eastern tip of the Fife peninsula overlooking the North Sea. The port, with pantile-roofed houses hugging the steep descent to the harbour, was photographed c.1885 by the Scottish photographer, Erskine Beveridge, providing some of the oldest known photographic records of the town. Shoregate, the main street running up from the harbour into the town, is lined with 17th- and 18th-century houses which, from the rear, form a terrace overlooking the sea. The houses are roofed with pantiles, roof-tiles curved to form an S-shaped section and fitted to overlap, which are typical of East coast fishing villages. The walls are harled over rough rubble, or left unharled, and two of the houses have the traditional Scottish architectural feature of a central chimney gablet rising from the front wall-head. Crail became prosperous in the 16th and early 17th centuries as a fishing and fish-curing station. It was a major port for trade with Holland, especially in the export of 'Crail capons' which were haddocks, split and dried, and one of the specialities of the burgh. The town shows a strong Dutch influence in many of its buildings and most of the 17th- and 18th-century houses are roofed with pantiles, originally brought back from the Netherlands as ballast. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

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