Edinburgh, Restalrig, Deanery Wall
Village (Medieval), Wall (16th Century)
Site Name Edinburgh, Restalrig, Deanery Wall
Classification Village (Medieval), Wall (16th Century)
Alternative Name(s) Restalrig Priory Wall
Canmore ID 52106
Site Number NT27SE 104
NGR NT 2836 7451
NGR Description NT 2836 7451 to NT 2835 7447
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/52106
- Council Edinburgh, City Of
- Parish Edinburgh (Edinburgh, City Of)
- Former Region Lothian
- Former District City Of Edinburgh
- Former County Midlothian
NT27SE 104 2836 7451 to 2835 7447.
(Centred NT 2835 7447) The ancient village of Restalrig, named after the family of De Lestalric, lies E of the Old Town of Edinburgh and has been engulfed by the modern city. Of the village, only one cottage, dated 1678 on a lintel, survives without material alteration. A fragment of the outer wall of the 16th century Deanery of Restalrig also survives. RCAHMS 1951.
No traces of the village, other than the remains noted above, exist. The 17th century cottage is at NT 2837 7446 and a featureless fragment of Deanery wall is at NT 2836 7451. Area of village approximately defined from OS 6"map, Edinburghshire, 1st ed., 1852.
Visited by OS (J L D) 4 December 1953.
No change to previous field report.
Visited by OS (S F S) 27 December 1975.
NT 2835 7450 Seven trial trenches were excavated within the site of the late medieval Deanery of Restalrig. Any deposits and structures were found to have been removed by construction/ demolition of 19th/20th-century structures and site levelling. One pit containing 19th-century demolition rubble also contained some fragments of human bone, probably derived from the kirkyard of St Margaret's Kirk, which lies directly opposite the site. A detailed survey of the upstanding wall, along Restalrig Road South (reputedly the Deanery boundary wall) was carried out as part of the work.
Sponsor: Mitie Group.
D Henderson 1996
Publication Account (1951)
232. The Village of Restalrig.
This ancient hamlet, which is named after the family of De Lestalric, lies E. of the Old Town of Edinburgh on one of the roads to Leith, and has been engulfed by the modern city. Of the characteristic cottages that formerly bordered the village street only one has survived without material alteration. This is an oblong, rubble-built, harled structure of two storeys, by tradition "the wricht's house," with a gabled projection towards the street to contain the staircase. The entrance, which has a moulded architrave bearing the date 1678 on the lintel, opens at the stair-foot.* Some years ago a wide gateway was forced through the main block; morer ecently a gablet of the staircase has been taken down.
A few yards farther N. is a fragment of the outer wall of the 16th-century Deanery of Restalrig.** The front, which to-day forms the W. boundary of the Scottish Milk Marketing Board's premises, was originally a simpler version of Mar's Wark in Stirling. Coarsely built in rubble, it has two piers projecting on each side of an opening which has probably always been an entrance. The tops of the piers are set out on corbelling. On their N. side can be traced a large built-up window, as well as a high and wide' doorway, with an unusually slender lintel, which has only recently been filled in. There is some reason to believe that the room inside was once vaulted.
The buildings of the Church Hall, which lie S. of the structure first mentioned, have recently been contrived from the remains of a row of old cottages, the lower parts of the front wall being left intact apart from the closing-up of the openings.
RCAHMS 1951, visited c.1941
*One of the stair-landings inside was a re-used gravestone, but this memorial has recently been returned to the churchyard near by.
**In 1630 Captain Ludovic Fowler was served heir to his father, Master William Fowler, "in that great house the Dean's house" together with "the orchards and gardens and the chamber hous called the Priests ' chambers adjacent to the same." This entry in the Register of Service of Heirs, Edinburgh, shows that the prebendaries' manses stood beside the Deanery.
