View of interior showing doorway and ceiling from north. Heather House, Drumlanrig Estate.

Description View of interior showing doorway and ceiling from north. Heather House, Drumlanrig Estate.

Date 23/6/1999

Collection Records of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS), Edinbu

Catalogue Number SC 765052

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of D 46937 CN

Scope and Content Interior, Heather House, Drumlanrig Estate, Dumfries & Galloway, from the north This unusual Victorian summerhouse is octagonally shaped, with roughly-hewn tree trunks supporting a conical roof. The doorway is open to the garden, and the walls are lined with heather and decorated in patterns of Douglas heraldry including a heart surmounted by a crown (right). Bench seating, faced with short lengths of split twigs, is arranged around the walls. The twigs are arranged into geometrical patterns to form heraldic-style shields below the seating. The emblem of a heart surmounted by a crown appear everywhere at Drumlanrig - in stone, lead, iron, wood, leather and carpeting. Its origins are founded in the story of Sir James Douglas, 'The Good' or 'Black' Douglas who was one of the foremost supporters of Robert Bruce, King of Scots in the early 14th century. When Bruce died in 1329 before going on crusade, Sir James was entrusted to carry the king's heart to Jerusalem for burial. Douglas, unfortunately, was killed in Spain before he reached the Holy Land, but before he died is said to have hurled the royal heart, contained in a silver casket, before him with the cry 'Forward, brave heart!'. From that time the Douglas motto became 'Forward' and the family emblem, a heart surmounted by Bruce's crown. Heather House, a mid-19th-century summerhouse, stands in a clearing within the wooded grounds of Drumlanrig Castle. The castle, one of the great Renaissance courtyard houses of Scottish domestic architecture, was built between 1679 and 1690 for William Douglas, 1st Duke of Queensberry. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/765052

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