Skulferatu #101 - Abandoned Railway Bridge, Powderhall, Edinburgh

I like abandoned places.  I especially like finding a gap in a fence so I can go for a wander into an abandoned place that I’ve seen before, but have been unable to get into.  Today, on a walk along the Water of Leith, I found just such a gap in the fencing around a now defunct railway line. Squeezing through, I then took a walk along it.  Though it only went out of service seven or eight years ago it was now quite overgrown, and the wooden sleepers were rotting away.  In the wildflowers growing all around the railway insects buzzed noisily and in the trees above the birds sang their little hearts out.

 

Defunct railway line

 

Dandelion growing by the tracks

 

Old railway line

 

I walked along the railway to a bridge that crossed the Water of Leith.  It had also been fenced off to stop access, though again some kindly soul had removed a couple of the metal bars to allow access.  A slightly tighter squeeze through and I was on the rusting iron bridge.  Beneath me the waters of the river gently ambled by in their shallow, summery way.  Mama duck and her half dozen ducklings paddled by, and small fish darted down and away.  Nature was reclaiming this area for itself. 

 

Abandoned railway bridge

 

Finding a gap in the fence on the other side of the bridge, I scrambled down the riverbank, under the bridge and onto a narrow, trodden path by the river.  It wound through the wild garlic that seemed to cover most of the riverbank, and then up and around areas where the mud of the bank had collapsed into the water below.  Eventually the path became a narrow line at the river’s edge and then crumbled away into nothing.  Not particularly wanting to end up in the river, I made my way back to the bridge and the old railway track.

 

Abandoned railway bridge

 

Bridge and beams

 

Bridge and beams

 

Rivets and graffiti

 

View of Water of Leith from the bridge

 

Machine with knobs

 

The railway track was once part of the Edinburgh, Leith and Granton Line of the North British Railway.  The line was closed in 1968, however part of it was later reopened to serve Powderhall Refuse Depot. 

 

At Powderhall there used to be an incinerator and a large chimney.  Rubbish was burnt in the incinerator and the chimney pumped out poisonous smoke all over the surrounding area of Edinburgh.  The city council eventually decided that this was maybe not such a great idea and the role of the refuse depot then changed.  Instead of burning the refuse, the depot compacted it into containers.  These containers were then loaded on to trains, locally known as ‘Binliners’, and taken away to a landfill site. Over 250,000 tons of refuse from Edinburgh was processed in this way each year. 

 

Powderhall Refuse Depot

 

Powderhall Refuse Depot closed in 2016 and has now been demolished.  A housing estate is being built on the land it once occupied.

 

Wandering around the railway I found an old metal box, connected to some wires that must have once served some useful purpose.  What that purpose was, I have no idea.  I left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me on my walk on a knob on the metal box.

 

Skulferatu #101

 

Skulferatu #101 on a knob on the metal box

 

Skulferatu #101 on a knob on the metal box

 

Map showing location of Skulferatu #101

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are –

 

Latitude 55.96813

Longitude -3.189598

 

what3words: sands.loudly.chase

 

 

Skulferatu #100 - The Lost Village of Gleghornie, North Berwick, East Lothian

I know, from the photographs it looks like nothing more than a grass covered hill and some rocks, but back in the 15^th Century there was a small village nestling here.  A survey of the area in 1962 found some remnants of the village, a few traces of walls and the outlines of a building, but nothing much else. When the village was abandoned, and why, no-one knows. Maybe the inhabitants were wiped out in one of the plagues that swept through the country several hundred years ago, or maybe the village just died a natural death.  People moved out and away, the last of the old inhabitants died and the few remaining houses were abandoned to time and the elements.

 

The land where the village of Gleghornie once stood

 

The land where the village of Gleghornie once stood

 

The remains of a wall

 

Dandelion in a wall

 

The village was once home to the philosopher, theologian, historian and scholar, John Major (also known as John Mair or John Mayr), 1469 – 1550. He was born in the village and spent his childhood and early youth there.

 

Major left the village, and Scotland, during the 1490s to study at Cambridge and then Paris. He later taught at both the Sorbonne and Montaigu College. While in Paris he wrote Historia Majoris Brittaniae, a history of both England and Scotland, which unlike previous histories written about Scotland, cut out much of the myth and magic, and saw the country as being an integral part of Britain. In 1518 he returned to Scotland as Professor of Philosophy and Divinity at Glasgow University. There his pupils included both John Knox (theologian, preacher, and misogynist nutter) and Patrick Hamilton (Protestant reformer burnt at the stake in 1521 for heresy). In 1522, Major moved to the University of St. Andrews, and taught there for a while before briefly returning to Paris. He then returned once more to Scotland and St Andrews, where he was made Provost of St Salvator's College. He remained there until his death in 1550.

 

A contemporary drawing of John Major, taken from his work

In Petri Hyspani Summulas Commentaria, published in 1505

 

Now largely forgotten, much like his namesake, you know the one – the Grey Man of politics, Major was seen as an important figure during his lifetime and beyond. Some of his teachings seem quite enlightened for the time, in that after the Spanish ‘discovery’ of America, Major argued that the native peoples there had political and property rights and that at the very least they should be compensated for any land taken from them.

 

Despite having travelled and lived in some of the fabulous cities of that age, Major never forgot his roots and he styled himself as ‘Glegornesis’ in the titles of several of his works. He was also known to often reminisce about the oatcakes his mother cooked on the gridle over the ashes in the fireplace hearth, of catching lobster and crabs at North Berwick, and of how the Solent Geese nested on the Bass Rock each year.

 

Rocky area near where the village once stood

 

Tree and boundary wall

 

I walked out from North Berwick to Halflandbarns, and then down a dirt farm track to Gleghornie farm. Just past the farm I made my way down another dirt track which led me out to the open and rocky area where the village once stood. There, in a gap in the old stone wall running around the boundary of the land, I left the Skulferatu that had accompanied me on my walk.

 

Skulferatu #100

 

Skulferatu #100 in a gap in the boundary wall

 

Skulferatu #100 in a gap in the boundary wall

 

Map showing the location of Skulferatu #100

 

The coordinates for the location of the Skulferatu are –

 

Latitude 56.036317

Longitude -2.654008

 

what3words: bandstand.passwords.prowess

 

I used the following sources for information on Gleghornie and John Major –

 

Canmore - Gleghornie

Canmore - Gleghornie

 

Pre-reformation Scholars in Scotland in the XVIth Century

by William Forbes-Leith

1915

 

The Catholic Encyclopedia

Catholic Encyclopedia: John Mayor

 

 

John Major of Haddington

E. J. G. Mackay

1892