Calton Hill research update

Kirsten McKee is researching the history of Calton Hill,  to help inform a future management plan. Her first report is below, and there will be regular updates in the e-newsletter and on her blog at http://calton-hill.blogspot.com/

As a starting point in researching the Calton Hill, it has seemed only natural that the early investigations should focus on its most notorious edifice - the National Monument.

One of the questions that surrounds this structure is why the 19th Century city fathers decided that a national Scottish monument should be built in the Neo-Greek style. Many people are under the misapprehension that the resulting structure was due to the influence of the project's chief architect - C. R. Cockerell - who was well known for his archaeological studies in the Mediterranean and the influence that it had on his own architectural designs.

However, on inspection of the archival material found in the National Library of Scotland, it appears that the great and the good of Edinburgh in the early 19th century had already decided on building a replica of the Parthenon at least three years before Cockerell was ever commissioned!

So then, why did the Scots of this time feel that it was necessary to represent their national grief through an iconic Ancient Greek Temple? Could they have considered this to be a visual comparison of the achievements of the Scottish Enlightenment to those of Ancient Greece? Or is it simply that the likeness of the topography of Calton Hill to The Acropolis made this the perfect place to appreciate a structure thought of as "The purest model of a public building which ever came from the hands of man"?

At present, much more archival research is required to fully answer these questions. However, it is hoped that in the course of this three-year programme many of the unknown and often misunderstood elements of Calton Hill will be uncovered, so that a better understanding can be gleaned of a truly remarkable and important part of Edinburgh's World Heritage Site.