Publication Account
Date 1996
Event ID 1016454
Category Descriptive Accounts
Type Publication Account
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1016454
As it stands today the great church of St Machar, on the curving River Don, represents half of the late medieval cathedral of the Bishops of Aberdeen. Probably the fourth church on this site, most of the fabric dates from the 15th century. The earliest surviving features are the western sandstone piers of the crossing which date from the late 14th century. However, the bulk of the surviving remains, principally the north transept and the militaristic west front, were built in granite by Bishop Henry Lichton between 1422 and 1440. In the early 16th century Bishop William Elphinstone rebuilt the choir and completed the central tower and Bishop Gavin Dunbar added the sandstone spires to the western towers and the transept, as well as commissioning the great ceiling.
Although now reduced to half its length (by the collapse of the central tower in 1688), St Machar's is still a most powerful creation. Severe, unadorned, as the use of granite at this early date dictated, it derives its considerable impact from the massing of the great western towers which rise to battlemented parapets carried on heavy, triple corbels. The tall angle buttresses and narrow ventilation slits add to the sense of strength. The steeples rise to a total height of 34m from cap houses within the parapets. The great, military, bulk of these towers is relieved by the seven slim lancets that fill the west nave gable. Such a 'fortress church' is unique in Britain; east Germany and south-west France provide distant parallels.
The interior is also simple, if not austere, with plain drum columns forming eight bays with clerestorey and aisles. Its most notable feature is the heraldic timber ceiling, designed probably by Alexander Galloway, rector of Kinkell (no. 52) and executed by James Winter of Angus between 1519 and 1521, during the episcopate of Gavin Dunbar. The shields are arranged on the unusual, flat ceiling in three parallel rows with 16 shields in each row;the order of precedence descends from the east. In the southern row are the arms of the premier nobles of Scotland, headed by James V; the central row contains the arms of the Scottish prelates, headed by Pope Leo X, while the northern row has the sovereigns of Europe behind the emperor Charles V.
It is likely that the ceiling was orientated on a statue of the Virgin and Child that stood (until 1640) above the west arch of the crossing, facing west down the nave. An important detail is that the arms of the king of Scots are surmounted by an enclosed crown similar to that of the holy Roman emperor, signifying a monarch with full jurisdiction within his realm. The ceiling may thus be taken as a remarkable late medieval statement of Scotland's role as a distinct but integral part of Catholic Europe. The clerestorey walls would originally have been plastered and painted with coloured decoration (cf Pluscarden, no. 46), thus linking the ceiling to the rest of the building.
Although the great pre-Reformation pulpit is now in King's College (see chapter 1), some other important furnishings remain, such as several fine tombs and a good series of modern stained glass windows, notably the Crombie and Bishops windows in the south ais le (by Douglas Strachan, 1908, 1913) and the fin e, blue east window (by W Wilson, 1953).
The kirkyard is crammed with interesting tombs, from those of Bishop Dunbar (1533-the inspiration for the Tolquhon tomb, no. 43) and Bishop Lichton to that of Major Macpherson who was the Crown's agent for the suppression of human sacrifices in Orissa. 'Trades, Gentlemen, Church and University' are all represented, as well as the Aberdeen artist James Giles (1801-70).
Information from ‘Exploring Scotland’s Heritage: Aberdeen and North-East Scotland’, (1996).
