Craigievar Castle in Deeside is one of Scotland's best-preserved tower houses.
It belongs to the last generation of Scottish castles, built at a time when
Scotland was entering a period of unprecedented peace and prosperity. The
adult rule of James VI in Scotland saw a marked reduction in feuding, and
his accession
as James I of England led to improved relations between the two countries.
The design of Craigievar, with its obvious emphasis on luxury and display,
and little concern with the need for defence, is testimony to this golden
age.
The castle was the work of William Forbes, who, as a younger son, had to
make his own way in the world. He acquired a fortune through trade, in particular
the lucrative market between Scotland and North Germany, which earned him
the nickname Danzig Willie. Between 1610 and 1626, Willie invested his hard-won
wealth in building Craigievar.
Increasing sophistication
The castle looks very different from the simple massive rectangular blocks
of earlier tower houses, such as Threave. In the intervening centuries, the design
of these buildings had evolved, largely as the result of increasingly sophisticated
domestic needs. Working from the bottom up, tower houses in the 15th and
16th centuries had more elaborate ground-plans than those of earlier times,
often having one or more wings incorporated into their design, to produce
an L- or Z-shape. (Craigievar's ground-plan is an elaborated L-shape.)
Fanciful towers and turrets
Moving upwards, the castle displays more concern with luxury than with
defensibility. As well as an entrance at ground-floor level, large windows
are everywhere in evidence, while loops or ports for cannon are conspicuously
lacking. The biggest difference between early and late period tower houses,
however, is found at the top. Gone are the wall-walks, battlements and
machicolations of the late Middle Ages; in their place are fanciful towers
and turrets. At Craigievar, all of these towers are 'corbelled' (they
protrude out from the walls), an effect which 16th and 17th century architects
and their patrons found particularly pleasing.
An architectural feat
Craigievar was inhabited right down to the end of the 20th century, and
many of its rooms have been much altered and modernised. Several of the
most important rooms on the first floor, however, retain many of the original
internal features from William Forbes's day.
Pride of place goes to the hall, with its original screens, passage and
elaborately carved wood panelling. The real selling point though is the
ceiling, fashioned from ornamental plaster, which depicts (among other
things) the heads of Roman emperors. The castle also has a long gallery
on its top floor; to incorporate such a room in such a tall and slender
building was no mean feat on the part of the architect.
The castle today
Willie's direct descendants continued to own and live in the castle until
the death of Sir William Forbes, Lord Sempill in 1965, when it was bought
by the National Trust for Scotland for £30,000. It remains in the hands
of the NTS today and is open to the public.
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