Edinburgh, Loaning Road, Craigentinny House

231. Craigentinny House, Restalrig.

The mansion of the Craigentinny estate stands in a walled garden about 250 yards N.E. of Restalrig Church (RCAHMS 1951 No. 220), the S. and larger part of the enclosure, which has small garden-houses with square, domical roofs of stone in its S. corners, being divided from the remainder by a lane, "The Loaning," which runs down to the shore. The entrance gateway, which is flanked by Renaissance piers, has been built up.

The house itself, dating from the turn of the 16th and 17th centuries, when the property belonged to James Nisbet, a descendant of the Henry Nisbet who is mentioned on (RCAHMS 1951) p. 242, has been greatly extended and considerably modernized. The original part comprises an oblong main block of four storeys, running E. and W., and a wing on the S. which contains a scale-and-platt stair. This stair rose originally to the second storey and had a chamber above it, but the latter has been done away with to allow the scale-stair to continue upwards, and so replace a turret-stair part of which still exists within the E. re-entrant angle although the steps themselves have been removed. The stair-turret is set out on a conoidal corbelling above the first floor and is divided horizontally by a string-course, the upperpart, capped with a conical roof, containing a gunloop facing E. Beside the turret is a projection for the hall chimney, which is also set out on corbelling as at Duntarvie, West Lothian!, and elsewhere. Two "rounds" or turrets project from the W. gable, while the E. gable has only one. Both stair-turret and "rounds" have been rebuilt in modern times. In all parts of the building themasonry is random rubble with free-stone dressings, rounded at the arris. The majority of the openings are built with relieving arches. The roofs are modern and have modern stone gutters and waterspouts (see Fig. 242).

The entrance, which has had its lintel raised and renewed, is situated in the wing beside the foot of the stair, and is surmounted by an armorial panel, so much defaced by the weather that the charges upon the shield are no longer legible. It may be noted, however, that Nisbet of Craigentinny carried: On a chevron between three boar's heads erased, three cinquefoils. On the basement floor are four unvaulted chambers, all entered from a passage. The easternmost compartment had a large arched fireplace in the E. gable and was evidently the original kitchen; the fireplace was contracted at some late date in the 17th century when a moulded one was inserted in the infilling. Concurrently with this alteration the westernmost compartment may have become the kitchen, since traces of a large kitchen-fireplace are to be seen in the W. gable, while a well is believed to exist in the S.W. corner.

On the first floor are three modernized rooms ensuite, of which the one in the centre represents the hall of the early house. The second floor has four chambers entered off a passage on the S. side. The room to the E. has a mural chamber at the S.E. corner, and above its stone fireplace are two plaster panels each carrying a rhymed inscription in Gothic lettering. These have been partly renewed, with some obvious mistakes, and now read :

(1) REMEMBER HOW I GAVE THE WRACHT

OF FELTHIE ERTH AND DAYE

AND HOW FROME HEILL I HAVE THE BROCHT

QVHST THOW WAS DAMD FOR EY

("Remember how I have thee wrought

Of filthy earth and clay,

And how from hell I have thee brought

When thou wast damned for aye").

(2) THOW HAD ALL THOW MAID

OF REACHIS AND OF GOLD

IF YOW HAVE NOCHT THE LORD IN THOGHT

THAT FOR THY SINS WAS SAVLD

ALL IS IN WAINE I MAKE ZOW PLAIN

AS PAVLL THE TREVTH HAS TAVLD

("Though thou hadst all thou wouldst

Of riches and of gold,

If you have not the Lord in thought

That for thy sins was sold,

All is in vain I make you plain

As Paul the truth has told").

On the third floor are three rooms and a passage, those at each end giving entrance to "studies" in the turrets that project from the gables.

In the garden of Viewforth, Cammo Road, Barnton, is preserved a 17th-century Renaissance door-pediment containing in the tympanum a shield, bordered by strap-work and charged: On a chevron between three boar's heads erased, three cinquefoils, for Nisbet of Craigentinny. Above the shield the initials A N are represented resting on a square and compasses, while the initials G M are cut at the sides. The last two figures of the date, which appears below, have been obliterated.

RCAHMS 1951, visited c.1941

(1) Inventory of Midlothian and West Lothian,No. 281.