Publication Account

Date 1981

Event ID 1017995

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1017995

The church of the Blessed Virgin Mary is an ancient church site dating back to the age of the Culdees. The remains are on the cliff overlooking the harbour and are those of cruciform buildings (Cant, 1945, 23). The surviving nave is of twelfth-century date while the remainder is thirteenth. These foundations were discovered in 1860, and show the church to have been nearly 100 feet (30.4m) long (Groome, 1903, iii). As late as 1344, it was still designated 'St. Mary's of the Culdees although it had been raised to the status of a chapel royal in the late thirteenth century (Cowan, 1976, 225).

Information from ‘Historic St Andrews: The Archaeological Implications of Development’ (1981).