General view

Description General view

Date c. 1885

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

Catalogue Number SC 740624

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of F 2018

Scope and Content Windmill, Kingsbarns, Fife (now demolished) Kingsbarns, a weaving and agricultural village, lies on the coastal road between Crail and St Andrews. The Scottish photographer, Erskine Beveridge, photographed the village c.1890, providing the only known photographic record of the 'Kingsbarns windmill', now demolished, that was once used for threshing or grinding grain. This picturesque pantiled steading probably dates from the 18th century. The windmill has wooden-framed sails with hinged wooden shutters, rather like those of a Venetian blind, and would have been attached to a wooden or brick base (out of sight behind the steading) containing gears for turning the sails, and machinery for grinding or threshing grain. Windmills, devices for trapping the energy of the wind by means of sails mounted on a rotating shaft, were a common feature of the Fife landscape from the medieval period onwards, and were chiefly used for grinding or threshing grain, or pumping water. Improvements in machinery standards, however, demanded by insurance companies in the late 19th century, caused many landowners to abandon mill sites or convert them to other purposes. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/740624

File Format (TIF) Tagged Image File Format bitmap