Publication Account

Date 1981

Event ID 1018298

Category Descriptive Accounts

Type Publication Account

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1018298

The church of Linlithgow, dedicated to St.Michael, was first mentioned in an 1138 charter granting it to the bishop of St.Andrews (Lawrie, 1905, 90). The nave of the church was burned in 1424 and repair and enlargement of the fabric continued through the fifteenth century. The church was completed about 1540, just in time to be 'cleansed' by the Lords of the Congregation in June 1559 (Powell, 1974, 13). The church underwent repair in 1831 and was extensively overhauled in 1894-96. At this time a valiant attempt was made to repair as much as possible the damage that had been done in 1831 when the choir arch was removed and a screen wall erected one bay to the east. The galleries which had disfigured the east .end of the church were taken down and the choir arch was restored (MacDonald, 1932, 74). On plan the church consists of an aisled nave and choir, the latter being apsidal ended with north and south transeptal aisles. A late fifteenth-century western tower originally with a crown steeple guards the entrance to the church.

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