I could tell by the tour guide's unique accent that she wasn't Scottish and she quickly explained to the group that she was originally from Chicago! It's such a small world! She was educated in Scotland and other areas of the UK which explains the odd combination of the midwestern twang and the Scottish brogue.
The tour began at Saint Gile's Cathedral, which has quickly become one of my favorite spots (I have visited it three times now!) The guide informed us that its original name was the High Kirk of Edinburgh and that the building does not actually qualify as a cathedral, although we call it one today. She also showed us a rather large platform just outside the cathedral. It would have been used during medieval times to make announcements to the city of Edinburgh from the royal family in London. The deliverer of the message would ride on horseback all the way from London to Edinburgh, which would have taken three days. Even today the platform is used to convey messages from London (such as the announcement of Kate and Prince William's royal wedding), and for the sake of tradition the message carrier still waits three days to deliver the message despite the fact that everyone has seen the news on TV and in the newspapers days before. That's dedication.
The tour then moved all around the city where we heard stories like that of the serial killers Burke and Hare who killed over a dozen people to sell their bodies to the University of Edinburgh's anatomists during the 1800s (pretty gruesome stuff). Another really creepy story was about witch-hunting in medieval Edinburgh. There were several physical attributes that could deem a person a witch, one of which was having red hair. One out of six people in Scotland are redheads, so you could imagine that this might have helped the city's overcrowding problem. Witches were tested and tortured in pretty horrible ways, and were almost always eventually burned at the stake. A very old, greying wall has existed along Candlemaker Row in Edinburgh's Old Town for centuries and it is said that the grout for the wall is actually made of the ashes of Edinburgh's witches.
The tour also went through Greyfriars Graveyard, which was definitely my favorite part. On a foggy Scottish afternoon the graveyard looks like it is straight out of a horror movie, although our guide assured us that on nice days people actually picnic and sun themselves on the grounds (apparently the people of Edinburgh don't see the irony in this). We got to see Greyfriars tomb which was pretty cool and is often decorated with offerings of sticks and dog toys for Greyfriars Bobby. There was also a really cool looking cage-like covering on two of the tombs. Apparently grave-robbing was a major problem during the 1800's when the anatomists and surgeons at the university would accept bodies in exchange for cash, so really wealthy people invested in elaborate "mortsafes" and mausoleums. There were some other great ghost stories that surround the graveyard, and I definitely plan on going back. If you're really into scary stories, check out this link. It has all the famous ghost stories that supposedly occurred in the city of Edinburgh, and some of them are said
to be historically accurate.
the entrance to Greyfriars Kirkyard
Another highlight of the tour was the part concerning the writing of Harry Potter. JK Rowling wrote the books at Edinburgh's Elephant House, which is a cafe that overlooks Greyfriars Kirkyard and Herriot's School. Herriot's is a highly esteemed high school that is one of the most selective and the most expensive in the United Kingdom. The architecture of the school is thought to be what inspired Hogwarts and its four houses (the school has four steeples). Also, Greyfriars Kirkyard has a number of tombstones which appear to have inspired the names of Harry Potter characters such as Tom Riddle and Professor McGonagall.
The tour guide ended on a typically Scottish note. After an explanation about the history of Scottish nationalism and Scotland's general disdain for England, she explained that geologists have recently discovered that the landmass that is Scotland is actually moving in the opposite direction of England at about the rate a fingernail grows per year. So millions of years from now Scotland will finally win its everlasting battle for its own national identity and free itself from the English bureaucracy. Hooray! Anyway, the tour was fantastic and I really wish I could remember more of the stories. Edinburgh has so much history and some of the traditions and legends are really important to the identity of the city and its people. I feel like I can truly say that I lived here now that I know the significance and stories behind everything around me.
posing in front of Edinburgh Castle at the end of the walking tour
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