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The first references to Scotland's central city of Edinburgh appear in A.D. 160, in the notes of Ptolemy, but the area had already been inhabited for at least 6,000 years. The first residents were hunters and fishermen, followed by Celtic tribes who had been forced out of Europe. In A.D. 80, Roman legions marched in, hung out for a while and then headed home. The Romans were followed by the English, who may also be heading home.

3 for $45

The first site in the area to be colonized was probably a hill called Arthur's Seat, just outside of modern Edinburgh. Precisely which Arthur actually sat there isn't clear. Romantics suggest the legendary King Arthur of the Round Table, though no evidence supports that view.

The top of one of Edinburgh's hills is home to the town's oldest building. It is known as "The Castle," and it dates back to the 12th century. In 1313, the Scots burned it to the ground so the English couldn't secure a stronghold in Scotland. Everything went except tiny St. Margaret's Chapel. The Scottish military still hold weddings and christenings in it, partly because of its historic significance but also because it can only hold 16 people, which makes for a very inexpensive wedding.

The youngest building on the hill went up in 1923 with rock from a chapel called St. Mary's. St. Mary's had been a Catholic chapel, demolished during the turbulence of the Reformation. But, being Scottish, they kept all the original stonework until they had something else to build. Following World War I, the stones were used to erect a memorial to the Scots who died in battle. Every Scot who died in a 20th-century conflict is listed by name. People come from all over the world to find the name of a grandfather or uncle or friend who died for Scotland.

Old Town

The castle originally served as a military fortress. People built houses in its shadow for protection, and eventually these structures formed the earliest homes in the Old Town. It became a walled city, concentrated on a rocky ridge with a huge population and no room to expand. As a result, it grew up -- with buildings as high as 16 stories. Many of these are still in use.

The Edinburgh author Robert Louis Stevenson, who wrote "Treasure Island," described what Old Town was like during the 1800s:

"It grew under the law that regulates the growth of walled cities, not out, but up. Public buildings were forced, whenever there was room for them, into the midst of thoroughfares; thoroughfares were diminished into lanes; houses sprang up, story after story, neighbor mounting upon neighbor's shoulders, until the population slept fourteen to fifteen deep, in a vertical direction."

One of the things I like about the Old Town was that all economic levels of the society lived in the same house. The rich and famous lived in the middle, and the poor and unknown lived at the top and the bottom; they were in regular contact with each other. They met in the hallways, on the staircases, in the courtyards, and they knew all about each other's lives. A dishonest businessman or an unpopular magistrate would be confronted upon arriving home. Often the confrontation took the form of a flying bucket of garbage: a most appropriate exercise of public expression. As I see our public officials leaving their elegant homes in chauffeur-driven limousines, I wonder if we should have a law requiring all government officials to go to work by public transportation -- just to keep them in touch.

Next page | The inspiration for "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde": A Scot!