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Field Visit
Date 4 November 1920
Event ID 1114490
Category Recording
Type Field Visit
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1114490
Cramond Old Bridge.
The river Almond, which divides the county of Midlothian from West Lothian, is crossed, rather more than a mile above its mouth, by a fine medieval stone bridge (Fig. 22 [SC 1124586]), which carried the Edinburgh to Stirling highway until a modem bridge was built 130 yards farther up the stream. It is not definitely known when the bridge was first erected, but the detail of the western portion is suggestive of late 15th- or early 16th century work. A portion of the bridge fell some time before 1587 (1), but inscriptions on the parapet record that it was rebuilt by 1619 (2) and repaired in 1687, 1761, 1776, and 1854. There are three pointed segmental arches with salient cut-waters on the intermediate piers. The western arch is the oldest and has four massive soffit ribs; the outer face of this arch is in two orders, both, like the ribs, chamfered. The other arches are without ribs. The north-western cut-water, unlike the other three, which have pyramidal tops, terminates in a sloped tabling. A drip-mould of circa 16th-century date returns horizontally; it breaks and returns over each arch. Throughout, the structure is of light-coloured ashlar, which has weathered well and is in good preservation. Across the parapets the bridge measures 15 feet 11 inches, and the roadway is 13 feet 7 ½ inches wide. The outer arches have nearly the same span, viz. 40 feet, while the centre arch is 36 feet 8 inches wide. The parapet is 22 ¼ feet above the water and 3 feet above the roadway. The south parapet bears inscriptions as under:
(a) In raised lettering within a recessed panel, ‘Anno dom. 1619’; (b) similarly executed, but on the south or outward face of the same stone, the date ‘1619’; (c) incised, ‘Repaired be both sheires 1687’; (d) incised, ‘Repaired by both shires 1761 and again in 1776’; (e) incised, ‘Repaired by both shires 1854’.
RCAHMS 1929, visited 4 November 1920.
(1) Acts Parl. Scot., iii, p. 519; (2) The building of a new bridge was determined upon in 1607. Ibid iv, p. 397.
