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Field Visit

Date 21 August 2002

Event ID 613802

Category Recording

Type Field Visit

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/613802

Small parrot/parakeet (?) suspends itself upside down from the handle of a trug; the bird grips the basket's handle with its claws and lays its beak on top. The square stone plinth below has incised dates and leaves around the edges. The stepped base has an incised inscription around the edge of the upper level and a bronze leaf lies on top of each level in the corners.

Zannah Stephen loved the closes off the Royal Mile. The site in James Court was appropriate for two reasons: as a landscape architect, she knew that Patrick Geddes, a great town planner and creator of garden spaces, had lived there; the court is overlooked by the room in the Free Church of Scotland building (to the north) containing an etched portrait of her ancestor Alexander Moncrieff of Culfargie, one of the four brethren of the first major secession in the Church of Scotland in 1733. The room also contains the carved wooden chair in which Moncrieff prayed through the night before the signing of the historical document.

Inspected By : D. King

Inscriptions : 1.) Front of stone plinth (incised numbers): 1960-1997

2.) There is an incised leaf on each side of the plinth (a different one on each side).

3.) Incised letters around top edge of stepped base: SUSANNAH ALICE STEPHEN / KEEP YOUR FACE TOWARDS THE SUN / & THE SHADOWS WILL FALL / BEHIND YOU . IN MEMORY OF

Signatures : None

Design period : 2000

Unveiling details : September 2000

Information from Public Monuments and Sculpture Association (PMSA Work Ref : EDIN1310)

People and Organisations

References