Edinburgh - Grassmarket c1544

Edinburgh - Grassmarket c1544

Intangible Heritage

Our depiction of Edinburgh and the Canongate was inspired by a drawing in the British Library made by the English military engineer Richard Lee, who accompanied Hertford’s forces in 1544. Lee’s drawing is the earliest moderately realistic picture of Edinburgh and would influence how the English portrayed the Scottish capital into the seventeenth century (a variant of Lee’s illustration is included in John Speed’s atlas, The Theatre of the Empire of Great Britain, published c.1611). It is possible that Lee’s plan was created to explain the outcome of the Edinburgh expedition to Henry VIII of England. On 19 May 1544 the Earl of Hertford informed Henry that he was sending him ‘Master Lee, who I assure your Majesty hath served in the journey both honestly and willingly, [and] doth bring unto your Highness a plat of Leith and Edinburgh so as your Majesty shall perceive the situations of the same, which is undoubtedly set forth as well as is possible.’

reconstructions

2017

image/png

Reconstruction

190

In Copyright (InC)

current,55.9475,-3.196111;

https://www.openvirtualworlds.org/grassmarket-1544/

https://player.vimeo.com/video/224289826

Smart History

TEXT

https://canmore.org.uk/site/111846

Firstly, a digital landscape was created using survey data and height maps. Following extensive historical research and collaboration with specialists, 3D models are created and imported into UNREAL Engine (a cross-platform game engine for creating virtual worlds). Models are textured, scaled, oriented and assembled. Scenes are created and populated with appropriate objects, including furniture and artefacts. Landscapes populated with flora and fauna. Weather settings and atmospheric lighting. Clothing and characters researched, created, imported and animated.

The Grassmarket area probably developed in the fourteenth century. It seems to have originally been outside the town walls, and in 1477, James III ordered that beasts, cows and oxen should be sold here, rather than bringing live animals into the burgh itself. In the early sixteenth century, Edinburgh’s defences were extended by the construction of the Flodden Wall, and the Grassmarket area became properly integrated into the town. In 1543, repairs were made to the ‘calsay’ (or stone road surface) in the Grassmarket, indicating that the street was already paved at this date. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the Grassmarket was the scene of numerous public executions. It was referred to as ‘the street called Newbygging under the castle’. By the 1470s, the area was known as ‘Westirmart’, and seems to have been associated with the sale of timber, hats, and shoes. At the far end of the Grassmarket stood the gateway known as the West Port, which was in existence by at least 1509, and formed the western boundary of the burgh.

Bess Rhodes, Richard Fawcett (University of St Andrews), John Lawson (CECAS),

Sarah Kennedy, Iain Oliver, Bess Rhodes, Catherine Anne Cassidy, Adeola Fabola, Alan Miller

1544