Publication Account

Date 1996

Event ID 1018149

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1018149

The medieval N range attached to the demolished choir of Fortrose Cathedral is understood to have been used for burgh purposes from a period soon after the Reformation. The vaulted chapter-house on the ground floor served as the prison, while courts and council meetings were held in the remodelled first-floor room until 1939.

The range is rectangular, measuring 16.1m from E to W by 5.8m, and its roof is gabled as shown in Slezer's late 17th century engraving. The masonry is of red sandstone and is mainly random rubble, although the S wall, which was the internal N wall of the medieval choir, is of coursed rubble. It incorporates a broad-chamfered lancet doorway and appears to be of medieval construction to full height, but the upper parts of the other walls have been extensively rebuilt. The daylight opening of the medieval E window has been enlarged and a large rectangular window has been formed at first-floor level, while in both the Nand S walls there are three windows, of varying sizes, at that level. Most of these openings have chamfered jambs, evidently medieval material in re-use, and there are no dateable features, but a panel above the rectangular first-floor doorway in the W wall records that the building was 'Decorated in the year 1780, General Sir Hector Munro K.B. & M.P.' This doorway is reached by a dog-leg stone forestair, but the only feature of this wall shown in Slezer's view is a rectangular window in the gable. The S part of this wall is corbelled out to contain an original mural stair.

The ground-floor room preserves a six-bay quadripartite ribbed vault with bosses of 13th-century character. In the E part, which was presumably used as the chapter-room, the E bay has an aumbry in the N wall, and the next two bays have mural seats in the Nand S walls. The freestone of the rural recesses, aumbry and E window-jambs bears many graffiti, including several elaborate examples of 1655 and 1659 with decorated frames and the MacKenzie stag's-head crest. The W part of the ground floor, lit only by small lancet-windows in the Nand W walls, has access to the upper floor by the mural stair in the W wall.

The first floor now forms a single room, measuring 14m by 4m, which preserves no early features. There is a plain fireplace towards the E end of the N wall, and a cupboard has been formed in a blocked window-recess in the S wall, while the central window in that wall remains in use. At least part of this room was used for the detention of debtors until the 1830s, and it may have been subdivided, but it now has a uniform high panelled dado of 19th-century type.

HISTORY

In 1661, when Fortrose was chosen in preference to Rosemarkie as the centre of the joint burgh, it was claimed that it had 'a most sure and strong firmance, waird-house, and tolbuith for keeping of prissoners'. Slezer's view of the last quarter of the 17th century, however, shows the chapter-house as roofless, and repeated attempts were made by the impoverished burgh at this period to obtain grants or impose labour-services on the local community for its repair. The repairs carried out in 1700 were evidently of simple character, and a heather roof was replaced by slates in 1721. Until 1716 the burgh school was held in the council-house, which in 1723 was fitted up as a temporary place of worship. The repairs recorded on the inscribed panel of 1780 were financed by Sir Hector Munro of Novar, then member of parliament for the Inverness burghs, of which Fortrose was one. The vaulted undercroft continued to be used as a prison until the middle of the 19th century.

Information from ‘Tolbooths and Town-Houses: Civic Architecture in Scotland to 1833’ (1996).