Publication Account

Date 1981

Event ID 1018051

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1018051

This church, lying to the north and west of the Castle Rock, was the original parish church of Edinburgh (Duncan, 1975, 465). St. Cuthbert's, which probably dates from the eleventh century (RCAM, 1951, 185), was granted by David I to Holyrood Abbey, a grant confirmed by Robert, Bishop of St. Andrews, c.1130 (ESC, 1905, 75). Its strategic position helped in three separate sieges of Edinburgh Castle: in 1573, 1650 and 1689. When the present church came to be built in 1892-4, the foundations of at least six earlier churches were found (Anon, 1960, 16), although nothing visible remains of its medieval fabric (RCAM. 1951, 185).

Information from ‘Historic Edinburgh, Canongate and Leith: The Archaeological Implications of Development’ (1981).