Dalmeny Church

Romanesque architecture extended over Europe as a truly cosmopolitan style, with a remarkable variety of local variants. Dalmeny Church in Edinburgh is Scotland's best-preserved Romanesque parish church. It features the round-apse layout characteristic of many parish churches from the early to mid-12th centuries, but its elaborate sculpture indicates that it is part of a separate local group that includes the abbey at nearby Dunfermline. It was erected for the local landowner, Earl Gospatric, from of sandstone blocks, which has contributed to its endurance. It was finished in 1140.

Although its western tower was restored from 1922 to 1927 by architect P. MacGregor Chalmers and rebuilt to Alfred Greig's designs in 1937, the rest of the building is very much as Gospatric would have known it, with its hefty construction and vaulted chancel and apse giving its interior a highly memorable sense of enclosure. Dalmeny's crowning splendor is its ornate south gateway.

The stones around the arch are filled with a dazzling array of images, many of which are taken from the medieval bestiary. There are centaurs, lustful lovers, and the tree of life, all of which have symbolic meanings. Building churches was a means of trying to ensure God’s approval, and, with a keen eye to the afterlife, Gospatric commissioned a decorated sarcophagus, which was moved from the church to the graveyard during the Reformation and now stands as a timely reminder of mortality.

Location: Main Street, Dalmeny EH30 9TT, Scotland