Mary Kings' Close private tour

 Edinburgh has two amazing underground places. Read about the vaults elsewhere. 

Mary Kings close came about from a different sort of building project. In the 1800s the council wanted to build a brand new Law courts edifice. They decided on an area encompassing four closes, being the narrow alleyways between buildings, often only one metre wide.

But there were buildings to be demolished. They decided to merely slice the top few storeys off at ground level, and level all the buildings that were going downhill to the North Loch in site. Just build right over them. There was some foundation building, but one close was left pretty much intact - Mary King’s Close. It was named after a women who sold cloth, and clothing and who was a burgess following the death of her husband.

The top stories were just cut off

Our guide was a man who stood 4 foot 10 inches, and he presented himself as a tanner’s apprentice of the 1700s. Best joke of the tour: at the end he confesses he lied to us about being a tanner’s apprentice, and being 400 years old, and some other admissions. Our leader, Lauren, who is herself only 5 foot piped up with “and are you really only that height?”

I enjoyed this tour immensely, again no photos inside but the obligatory photo-opportunity. We are pictured with a plague doctor, Dr Rae, who was the only doctor of Edinburgh to survive the plague. The council then refused to pay him, because they were broke, and he took them to court for 10 years.

Some highlights:

Mary Queen of Scots spent her last night as Queen before her arrest in one of these underground rooms!

Middle class people lived closer to the top, more air, and shorter 45 degree angle paths to negotiate. Their homes had several rooms, often with multiple fireplaces, furniture and wood paneling. You would not know you were virtually underground except there were no windows. You were not actually underground but the closeness of the next building meant that no light could penetrate beyond the few highest stories (and there might be 12 to the north, or 16 to the south).

The last plague was in 1645. Families were blocked in if one had the plague, meaning all died. They did use fire to destroy the belongings of victims which may have helped end that particular plague be used the rats all ran away, taking their fleas with them. They had some graphic models of people suffering the types of plagues.

Guard-de-loo being a corruption French for look out below - yelled out before you dumped your household’s ‘nastiness’ out your front door and down the close. If you heard this you might yell back “hold your hand”, so you could get out of the way. There was an act passed in the 1700s called the ‘Nastiness Act’ which made rules about how you disposed of your daily bucket. 

Some closes were maybe 6 feet wide, Mary King’s Close was one , so there were market stalls along half of that width. All market holders were required by law to provide a lantern/candle between certain hours. Thus providing the first street lighting. Image going up and down those closes in the dark without them. After full dark, you had better be inside.

Below is part of a 1647 map showing the buildings crowding the Main Street of Edinburgh, with Edinburgh Castle at the left.