Museum of Edinburgh & Acheson House
Why is it significant?
Take in the tall front of Huntly House, now the Museum of Edinburgh, with its three gables stepping out over the street and, set into the wall, stone panels carved with Latin mottoes. People nicknamed it the speaking house.
Key Facts
| Place | Museum of Edinburgh & Acheson House |
|---|---|
| Address | 142 Canongate, Edinburgh EH8 8DD, UK |
| Geo Coordinates | 55.95120, -3.17930 |
| Part of Walk | Crowns, Kirks and Sanctuary: Edinburgh's Canongate and the Palace of Holyroodhouse |
| Generated | Generated |
Take in the tall front of Huntly House, now the Museum of Edinburgh, with its three gables stepping out over the street and, set into the wall, stone panels carved with Latin mottoes. People nicknamed it the speaking house. One panel says, in Latin, as you are master of your tongue, so am I master of my ears. It is a building with opinions, and it shares them with passers-by.
Inside, the museum keeps one of the most dangerous documents in Scottish history: an original copy of the National Covenant of 1638. When King Charles I tried to impose a new prayer book on Scotland, thousands of Scots swore to defend their kirk against royal interference, and they signed great parchments like this one. Legend says some signed in their own blood.
That oath led to war. Within a few years Scotland and England were caught up in the conflicts that ended with Charles losing his head in London in 1649. The Canongate, so close to the palace, felt every turn of royal fortune: courtiers arriving, courtiers fleeing, soldiers billeted in its closes, and families who had built their fortunes on the king's favour wondering whose side to be on next.
Now duck into Bakehouse Close, the passage beside the museum, to find Acheson House. It was built in 1633, the very year Charles I came to Edinburgh for his Scottish coronation, for Sir Archibald Acheson, his Secretary of State for Scotland. Above a doorway look for the carved initials of Archibald and his wife Margaret, and the crowing cockerel of the family crest. It is a royal servant's townhouse, built in the brief sunny moment before the storm.
The museum also holds the collar and feeding bowl of Greyfriars Bobby, a small dog with an enormous fan club. Come back out to the Canongate and keep climbing on the same side of the street to the corner of St John Street, where a grand old house pushes a stone balcony out over the pavement.