George Heriot, 400th Anniversary
12th February 2024 marks the 400th anniversary of the death of George Heriot. His name is well known in Edinburgh for the extraordinary legacy he left to the city and its people after his death, whereby so many orphans and children have benefited from his kindness. Remembered in buildings and streets names of Edinburgh, his […]
10 Scotland Street
by Leslie Hills (Edinburgh: Scotland Street Press, 2023) Book review by Edward Duvall I found reviewing this book a great treat. Leslie Hills has lived in the main-door flat at 10 Scotland Street in Edinburgh for 50 years and this is the fruit of her research in various archives into the residents during the preceding […]
Bodysnatcher
We were approached by Ringwood Publishing in Glasgow asking if we would review a new novel by Carol Margaret Davison, Bodysnatcher. We took up this kind offer, as it was based on the Burke and Hare murders and may appeal to our members. Here’s what Jo Chapman, one of our Council Members, made of it: […]
Summer visit to Mansfield Traquair
On 9 June, 10 members of the OEC enjoyed a spectacular visit to the converted church that is the Mansfield Traquair Centre at 15 Mansfield Place, Edinburgh. It is quite breath-taking inside with the magnificent murals painted by Phoebe Traquair (self portrait pictured left), who eventually finished them in 1901, and her story is worth […]
Making historical research more accessible
We are pleased to announce the completion of a project to digitise nearly 70 articles first published between 1991 and 2008. These authoritative articles appeared in the Book of the Old Edinburgh Club, the Club’s journal which was launched in 1908. There is an eclectic mix of topics featuring Edinburgh people, places, culture and society. […]
Who runs Edinburgh?
Why ask who runs any city these days? The conventional wisdom is that cities have been hollowed out by global economic forces, that they are nowadays only interesting because of that process. If cities were once places of considerable power, they are no longer. Yet all is not what it seems. Studies of local power […]
Auld Greekie
Around the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, and particularly in the years between about 1810 and 1840, Edinburgh – long and affectionately known as ‘Auld Reekie’ – came to think of itself and to be widely regarded as something else. The city became ‘Modern Athens’, an epithet later turned into ‘the Athens of the North’. […]