Excavation

Date 8 December 1998 - 28 January 1999

Event ID 1029953

Category Recording

Type Excavation

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1029953

During December 1998 and January 1999 Kirkdale Archaeology were asked to undertake a programme of graphic recording and small-scale excavation within the NE room of the Queen Anne Building (at Edinburgh Castle. This formed part of a rolling programme of work, so far involving excavation within the S and W wings of the building, as well as a trench located at the S end of the central courtyard.

The Queen Anne Building is a barracks block built between 1708-10, the earliest purpose-built barracks in the castle. It is a rectangular structure, orientated N-S, located on the W edge of Crown Square, overlying a sequence of medieval vaults, whose origins probably lie in the 15th century. These vaults allowed the building up of the present-day Crown Square as a level platform to the S of the main summit of the Castle rock, a process which must have been substantially complete by the early years of the 16th century, by which date the Great Hall had been constructed on top of them, adjoining the S end of the Queen Anne Building. The recent relinquishing of the role of Scottish United Services Museum for the Queen Anne Building led to the current programme of work.

A series of masonry walls were revealed, some of which pre-dated the construction of the building, while the majority post-dated this period, some corresponding to cross-walls depicted on the 1877 Ordnance Survey of the structure.

Sponsor : Historic Scotland

D Murray 1999

Kirkdale Archaeology