Scott Monument
The Scott Monument is one of the most dramatic and distinctive Victorian Gothic structures in the world, a soaring 61.1-metre (200-foot) sandstone spire erected in honour of the Scottish novelist Sir Walter Scott, who died in 1832. Standing proudly on East Princes Street Gardens in Edinburgh's New Town, it is the largest monument to a writer anywhere on the planet and a defining feature of the Edinburgh skyline. Scott's literary legacy — the Waverley novels, the Ivanhoe series, and his enormous influence on Romantic literature across Europe — made him one of the most celebrated figures of the nineteenth century, and Edinburgh's citizens raised this extraordinary tribute by public subscription in the years following his death. The monument opened in 1846 and has been a beloved landmark ever since, drawing visitors from around the globe who come to admire its architecture, climb its tight interior staircase, and take in sweeping views over one of Europe's most beautiful cities.
The story of the monument's creation is as compelling as the man it honours. A design competition was held and won by a self-taught architect named George Meikle Kemp, who had become obsessed with Gothic ecclesiastical architecture through years of wandering and sketching cathedrals across Scotland and Europe. Kemp was a carpenter and joiner by trade, a working-class craftsman who entered the competition under a pseudonym and triumphed over professional architects from across Britain. Tragically, he never saw his masterpiece completed: in March 1844, two years before the monument's opening, Kemp drowned in the Union Canal in Edinburgh, his body found some days later. The circumstances of his death remained somewhat mysterious, and he is buried nearby at St Cuthbert's Church. The monument was completed under the supervision of his family and other architects, and his unlikely, poignant story adds an elegiac layer to the structure itself.
The monument is built from Binny sandstone quarried from West Lothian, and its surface is encrusted with an astonishing profusion of Gothic ornament: 64 figures of characters from Scott's novels are carved into niches around the structure, created by various sculptors of the period, each representing a beloved character from Scott's fiction. At the base sits a white marble statue of Scott himself by Sir John Steell, accompanied by his favourite deerhound Maida. The overall effect is of a cathedral spire that has somehow landed in a public garden — brooding, intricate, and slightly otherworldly, its dark stone now stained further by decades of Edinburgh weather, giving it a blackened, almost Gothic-novel quality entirely appropriate to its subject. On rainy days it looms magnificently; on rare Edinburgh sunny afternoons it glows a warm honey-gold.
To visit in person is to engage with the monument physically as well as visually. The interior contains a small museum dedicated to Scott's life and work at its lower level, including a plaster cast of the marble statue and various Scott memorabilia. For those willing to climb, there are 287 steep, narrow, spiral stone steps leading to four viewing platforms at progressively higher levels. The climb is genuinely demanding — the staircase tightens as it rises, and the uppermost galleries require near-crouching — and visitors are advised to wear sensible shoes and be prepared for a confined, vertiginous experience. The rewards are extraordinary: from the topmost gallery, the full panorama of Edinburgh unfolds, from the ramparts of Edinburgh Castle to the east along Princes Street, the volcanic bulk of Arthur's Seat, the Firth of Forth, and on clear days the hills of Fife beyond.
The monument sits within East Princes Street Gardens, which runs along the southern edge of Princes Street and is separated from the Old Town by the ravine of what was once the Nor' Loch, drained in the eighteenth century to create the gardens. The surrounding area is one of Edinburgh's most vibrant: immediately to the east along Princes Street is the National Gallery of Scotland, the Royal Scottish Academy, and the bustling foot of the Mound. The Balmoral Hotel with its famous clock tower stands nearby, the clock famously kept two minutes fast to help travellers catch trains from Waverley Station below. The gardens themselves are a pleasant refuge — filled with flowers, well-maintained paths, and benches — though during the Edinburgh Festival in August they are transformed by the Ross Bandstand events and seasonal attractions. The monument marks an informal division between the east and west sections of the gardens.
Practically speaking, the Scott Monument is easy to reach and well-served by public transport. Waverley Station is immediately adjacent — visitors arriving by train from anywhere in Scotland or England are within a few minutes' walk. Numerous bus routes stop along Princes Street, and the area is accessible on foot from virtually anywhere in central Edinburgh. Entrance to the monument involves a modest admission fee, which includes the climb and the small museum. It is open year-round, though hours vary seasonally and the upper galleries may close in high winds, which in Edinburgh is not a rare occurrence. The best times to visit are on clear days in spring or autumn when the skies open up and the view from the top is at its most spectacular; summer mornings before the crowds gather are also ideal.
Among the monument's less widely known distinctions is the fact that during World War II, the marble statue of Scott was removed from its base and hidden away for safekeeping, lest aerial bombardment destroy it — a measure that speaks to just how highly the city regarded this piece of civic heritage. The monument also featured, perhaps improbably, in the climax of the 1978 John Buchan film adaptation and has appeared in numerous films and television productions set in Edinburgh. Its Guinness World Record status as the largest monument to a writer anywhere on earth is a point of genuine civic pride, and the annual cleaning and maintenance of its intricate carved figures is a painstaking ongoing commitment. The monument remains, above all, a testament to the extraordinary cultural power Scott wielded in the nineteenth century — a power so vast that a carpenter's apprentice devoted his life to imagining this extraordinary stone poem in his honour.