Desk Based Assessment

Date July 2002 - August 2002

Event ID 1189984

Category Recording

Type Desk Based Assessment

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/1189984

(NT 257 736) A baseline archaeological assessment was carried out between July and August 2002 on the area generally referred to as Mary King's Close, beneath Edinburgh's City Chambers. The programme of work consisted of detailed site inspection, photographic survey and desk-based research. The site is on several levels, due originally to the use of the steep natural slope on the N side of the High Street. Occupation and subsequent building phases saw exploitation of the slope in the form of terracing, cutting or projecting the natural bedrock profile.

Despite the small scale of the programme, a record of the principal archaeological features was completed, and sufficient evidence gathered to define the archaeological sequence:

1. The gradual infill of medieval burgage plots behind the High Street frontages.

2. The sudden imposition of a large complex public building after 1754 on the residual streetscape.

3. The total abandonment of parts of the site after c 1900.

4. Occasional public access.

As the site itself is a combination of residual medieval occupation with 18th- and 19th-century cellars superimposed, its overall archaeological significance centres on how the elaborate streetscape of late medieval Edinburgh was developed as part of a radical new architectural vision for the capital in the later 18th century. The site combines structural evidence of 17th-, 18th- and 19th-century occupation which reflects the evolution of the medieval High Street - the focus for prestige building for centuries.

Archive to be deposited in the NMRS.

Sponsor: PastForward.

G Ewart, D Gallagher and A Hollinrake (Kirkdale Archaeology) 2002