Skulferatu #84 - St Baldred's Cave, Auldhame, North Berwick

 

A few miles from North Berwick there is a turn off down a single track road that leads down to Seacliff Beach.  Past the toll barrier and down the narrow, bumpy road a red sandstone cliff towers over one of the car parking areas.  In the cliff, and usually obscured by a parked car or van, there is a rather non-descript looking cave with a large boulder standing in front of it.  This is St Baldred’s Cave, which used to be known as Seacliff Cave.

 

St Baldred’s Cave from the path leading to Seacliff Beach

 

St Baldred’s Cave from the path leading to Seacliff Beach

 

St Baldred’s Cave

 

Saint Baldred was a Northumbrian monk who is believed to have lived around the mid to late Eighth Century.  He is said to have founded an abbey at Tyninghame, though mainly lived in a small hermitage on the Bass Rock and sometimes, when he fancied a wee change, in the cave by Seacliff beach. 

 

Saint Baldred led a simple and frugal life of prayer and contemplation, which is probably just as well as the cave does not look like the most comfortable place to live.  It is damp and cold with little shelter from the wind and elements.  It is also full of stinging nettles.  However, as a good old fashioned Christian saint, Baldred would have no doubt made a bed from these and slept naked on them as it snowed outside.  Maybe I’m being a bit harsh on old Baldred, as though the cave is known by his name, he most likely had nothing to do with it and never stayed there.   The cave’s supposed association with him in fact hides a dark and sinister past, as it would appear that back in the mists of time, probably around the Iron Age, the cave was a place of pagan worship and human sacrifice. 

 

In 1831, George Sligo, who owned the land around Seacliff, had work carried out to create a pathway down to the beach.  To do this a large hill of sand that rose up against the cliff had to be removed, and during its removal the cave was discovered. Sligo, who was a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, then set about examining and noting everything within the cave.  He described how a stone standing at the front of the cave appeared to be an altar and that there was an eight shaped pavement of stones within the cave.  There were also lots of charred bones and piles of ash inside the cave.  The bones were found to be human as well as those of animals such as pigs, sheep, horses, and dogs.  On the altar stone itself, Sligo found charcoal and bones that were firmly adhered to it, which he concluded had probably ‘been caused by the sprinkling of the blood of the victim by the priest during sacrifice.’  Within the cave he also found the fragments of several earthenware pots and a carved tusk that appeared to be the handle for a knife.

 

The finding of the cave caused a bit of a stir in the local community and many people came out to see it.  Due to this, Sligo became slightly worried about the altar stone, as its foundation was a bit weak, and he feared that it may topple over if someone tried to climb it.  So, he had one of the foundation stones removed to put a larger and sturdier one in its place.  On doing this some of the clay that had been used to bind the stones together fell away revealing the skeleton of a very young child.  On examining the opposite side of the altar Sligo found the skeleton of another child there.  The children, both appeared to have been the sacrificial victims of whatever cult had worshipped at the cave.

 

Drawing of the cave from Notes on an Ancient Cave by George Sligo

 

St Baldred’s Cave looking out past the altar stone

 

Inside the cave

 

St Baldred’s Cave from Seacliff Beach

Today, as I walked into the cave, I could see no evidence of its dark past.  Near to the entrance lay the charcoal and foil remnants of several disposable barbecues, so in a way I suppose offerings of burnt meat are still made here.  The floor of the cave was hidden under vegetation, sand, soil, and plastic dog poo bags full of shit.  While the back of the cave had been utilised as a toilet by beach goers who had been caught short, and it was scattered with poo and toilet paper.  In short, there was nothing left there of its dark past...well, except for that altar stone sitting right outside the entrance.  And at this point I should give a word of warning to all you out of towners thinking of taking a trip to Seacliff.  That is, if you notice any of the locals staring at you be very, very wary.  You may think human sacrifice is something from the past, but I’ve watched ‘The Wicker Man’ and ‘Midsommar’, so I know just what these rural folk really get up to!

 

Skulferatu #84

 

Skulferatu #84 on a ledge in St Baldred’s Cave

 

Map showing the location of Skulferatu #84

 

I left a small earthenware Skulferatu on a rock ledge in the cave, as my offering to the ancient gods.  Hopefully, they’ll appreciate that a bit more than the poo and garbage left by most visitors.

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are –

 

Latitude 56.05149

Longitude -2.636708

 

what3words: snooty.occupations.cave

 

I used the following sources for information on St Baldred’s Cave –

 

Canmore

Canmore - St Baldred's Cave

 

Notes on an Ancient Cave, & c,. discovered at Aldham, now called Seacliff, in East Lothian, in 1831.

By George Sligo

1832

 

Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland - Eighth Report with Inventory of Monuments and Constructions in the County of East Lothian.

1924

 

Evidence of Human Sacrifice in Seacliff Cave, Scotland

Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia, Volume 7, Issue 3

1934

 

Skulferatu #83 - Acheson House, Bakehouse Close, Edinburgh

 

On a warm and muggy day during the Edinburgh Festival, I made my way up to the old town.  There I found the streets crowded, not so much with tourists and festival goers, but rather with piles of rubbish.  Some were almost six feet high and beginning to stink in the heat.  Bins were overflowing and cups and containers from takeaways were strewn across the pavements and the road.  In the slight, gentle breeze napkins, tissue paper and plastic bags floated up, swirled around and then dropped back to the ground.  The bin men had been on strike for only a few days and in those few days Edinburgh had started to resemble one of those cities in zombie movies.  There was abandoned junk everywhere, zonked out people stumbling from show to show and bewildered looking tourists staring glass eyed at their phones as they tried to work out where the hell they were and how they could get to where they were going.

 

I made my way past them all and the piles of rubbish, as I was in search of one of the many little streets, or closes as they are called up here in Edinburgh, that you can walk down and feel you’ve almost stepped back in time.  One of the most perfect examples of these being Bakehouse Close which sits just off the Canongate and seems to belong to an era from maybe two or three hundred years ago.  Well, that is as long as you face the Canongate entrance and ignore all the parked cars down at the bottom of the close.   

 

Entrance to Bakehouse Close from the Canongate

 

Bakehouse Close

 

Entrance from Bakehouse Close out to the Canongate

 

Just inside Bakehouse Close sits Acheson House, a fine example of an old town mansion built at a time when the wealthy all wanted to be close to Holyrood Palace and the King or Queen of the day.

 

Entrance to courtyard of Acheson House

 

Acheson House was built in 1633 for Sir Archibald Acheson, who was the Secretary of State for Scotland under King Charles I.  It was originally built as a three storey mansion with the main entrance being accessed through a courtyard that led out onto Bakehouse Close.  Above one of the two doorways into the house was carved the date 1633, a monogram of the initials of Acheson and his wife Margaret Hamilton, and also Acheson’s family crest, a cockerel and trumpet. Acheson died the year after the house was completed and it is unlikely that he ever actually lived there.  

 

Doorway into Acheson House

 

The Cock and Trumpet

 

Graffiti on the stone doorframe

 

The house was inherited by Acheson’s son, who quickly sold it on to Patrick Wood, a wealthy Edinburgh merchant.  Over the next two hundred years the house was sold on numerous times.  In the early nineteenth century, as the old town of Edinburgh became more and more run down and overcrowded, the house was split up and became a tenement housing various families and businesses.

 

One of the businesses that occupied the house was a tavern, which also operated as a brothel.  It was commonly known as the Cock and Trumpet, as clients entered through the door with the Acheson family crest above it.  Of the many Victorian gentlemen who frequented the brothel, there was one who would go on to be a world famous and much respected author.  This was the young Robert Louis Stevenson, who often ventured from the stifling Presbyterian atmosphere of his parents’ home in the new town, to drink in sleazy dives and explore the dark delights of the old town.

 

Of the women who worked in the Cock and Trumpet we know very little.  There is though a photograph from 1856 by Dr Keith Thomas showing a woman standing in the doorway there.  Whether she is one of the women from the brothel or is a tenant of one of the tenements around it, we do not know as the photograph is simply entitled ‘Doorway Acheson House’.

 

Doorway to Acheson House, taken by Dr Keith Thomas in 1856

 

In 1924 Acheson house was bought by the city council, who were buying up and demolishing the slum housing in the area.  It lay empty for several years and then, luckily, before it was knocked down, the building came to the attention of the Marquis of Bute, who bought it from the council and had it restored.  It was then occupied by several businesses before becoming the home of the Scottish Craft Centre in 1952.  In 1991 the Craft Centre closed, and the building again lay empty.  This time for nearly two decades.  As it began to crumble into dereliction there was much huffing and puffing about what should become of it, before plans were eventually drawn up and part of the building was incorporated into the Edinburgh Museum, with the main house becoming the headquarters for the Edinburgh World Heritage Trust.

 

The area outside the little courtyard leading to the house now attracts many visitors, mainly Outlander fans attracted to Bakehouse Close, as scenes from the series were filmed there.  On a warm summer’s day try to walk down the close without someone stopping you, handing you a phone or a camera and asking you to take a photo of them there – I dare you.

 

I left the Skulferatu that accompanied me on my walk around Bakehouse Close, sitting on the curve of an old drainpipe running down the wall of Acheson House.

 

Skulferatu #83

 

Skulferatu #83 on the curve of an old drainpipe

Skulferatu #83 on the curve of an old drainpipe

 

Map showing the location of Skulferatu #83

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are –

 

Latitude 55.951205

Longitude -3.179022

 

what3words: pages.spoon.lamp

 

I used the following sources for information on Acheson House and Bakehouse Close –

 

Information plaques at site

 

Edinburgh World Heritage

Edinburgh World Heritage - Acheson House

 

Wikipedia

Wikipedia - Acheson House

 

Collins Encyclopaedia of Scotland

By John Keay & Julia Keay

1994

 

Royal Scottish Academy – Keith Thomas

Royal Scottish Academy: Keith Thomas - Edinburgh Photographs