Edinburgh

The city is affectionately nicknamed Auld Reekie,

The city has also been known by several Latin names, such as Edinburgum, while the adjectival forms Edinburgensis and Edinensis are used in educational and scientific contexts.^[33][34]

Edina is a late 18th-century poetical form used by the Scots poets Robert Fergusson and Robert Burns. "Embra" or "Embro" are colloquialisms from the same time,^[35] as in Robert Garioch's Embro to the Ploy.^[36]

Ben Jonson described it as "Britaine's other eye",^[37] and Sir Walter Scott referred to it as "yon Empress of the North".^[38] Robert Louis Stevenson, also a son of the city, wrote that Edinburgh "is what Paris ought to be".^[39]

History

Early history

The earliest known human habitation in the Edinburgh area was at Cramond, where evidence was found of a Mesolithic camp site dated to c. 8500 BC.^[40] Traces of later Bronze Age and Iron Age settlements have been found on Castle Rock, Arthur's Seat, Craiglockhart Hill and the Pentland Hills.^[41]

When the Romans arrived in Lothian at the end of the 1st century AD, they found a Brittonic Celtic tribe whose name they recorded as the Votadini.^[42] The Votadini transitioned into the Gododdin kingdom in the Early Middle Ages, with Eidyn serving as one of the kingdom's districts. During this period, the Castle Rock site, thought to have been the stronghold of Din Eidyn, emerged as the kingdom's major centre.^[43] The medieval poem Y Gododdin describes a war band from across the Brittonic world who gathered in Eidyn before a fateful raid; this may describe a historical event around AD 600.^[44][45][46]

In 638, the Gododdin stronghold was besieged by forces loyal to King Oswald of Northumbria, and around this time control of Lothian passed to the Angles. Their influence continued for the next three centuries until around 950, when, during the reign of Indulf, son of Constantine II, the "burh" (fortress), named in the 10th-century Pictish Chronicle as oppidum Eden,^[47] was abandoned to the Scots. It thenceforth remained, for the most part, under their jurisdiction.^[48]

The royal burgh was founded by King David I in the early 12th century on land belonging to the Crown, though the date of its charter is unknown.^[49] The first documentary evidence of the medieval burgh is a royal charter, c. 1124–1127, by King David I granting a toft in burgo meo de Edenesburg to the Priory of Dunfermline.^[50] The shire of Edinburgh seems to have also been created in the reign of David I, possibly covering all of Lothian at first, but by 1305 the eastern and western parts of Lothian had become Haddingtonshire and Linlithgowshire, leaving Edinburgh as the county town of a shire covering the central part of Lothian, which was called Edinburghshire or Midlothian (the latter name being an informal, but commonly used, alternative until the county's name was legally changed in 1947).^[51][52]

Edinburgh was largely in English hands from 1291 to 1314 and from 1333 to 1341, during the Wars of Scottish Independence. When the English invaded Scotland in 1298, King Edward I chose not to enter the English controlled town of Edinburgh but passed by with his army.^[53]

In the middle of the 14th century, the French chronicler

In 1603, King James VI of Scotland succeeded to the English throne, uniting the crowns of Scotland and England in a personal union known as the Union of the Crowns, though Scotland remained, in all other respects, a separate kingdom.^[61] In 1638, King Charles I's attempt to introduce Anglican church forms in Scotland encountered stiff Presbyterian opposition culminating in the conflicts of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms.^[62] Subsequent Scottish support for Charles Stuart's restoration to the throne of England resulted in Edinburgh's occupation by Oliver Cromwell's Commonwealth of England forces – the New Model Army – in 1650.^[63]

In the 17th century, Edinburgh's boundaries were still defined by the city's defensive town walls. As a result, the city's growing population was accommodated by increasing the height of the houses. Buildings of 11 storeys or more were common,^[64] and have been described as forerunners of the modern-day skyscraper.^[65][66] Most of these old structures were replaced by the predominantly Victorian buildings seen in today's Old Town. In 1611 an act of parliament created the High Constables of Edinburgh to keep order in the city, thought to be the oldest statutory police force in the world.^[67]

18th century

Following the Treaty of Union in 1706, the Parliaments of England and Scotland passed Acts of Union in 1706 and 1707 respectively, uniting the two kingdoms in the Kingdom of Great Britain effective from 1 May 1707.^[68] As a consequence, the Parliament of Scotland merged with the Parliament of England to form the Parliament of Great Britain, which sat at Westminster in London. The Union was opposed by many Scots, resulting in riots in the city.^[69]

By the first half of the 18th century, Edinburgh was described as one of Europe's most densely populated, overcrowded and unsanitary towns.^[70][71] Visitors were struck by the fact that the social classes shared the same urban space, even inhabiting the same tenement buildings; although here a form of social segregation did prevail, whereby shopkeepers and tradesmen tended to occupy the cheaper-to-rent cellars and garrets, while the more well-to-do professional classes occupied the more expensive middle storeys.^[72]

During the

In the second half of the century, the city was at the heart of the Scottish Enlightenment,^[78] when thinkers like David Hume, Adam Smith, James Hutton and Joseph Black were familiar figures in its streets. Edinburgh became a major intellectual centre, earning it the nickname "Athens of the North" because of its many neo-classical buildings and reputation for learning, recalling ancient Athens.^[79] In the 18th-century novel The Expedition of Humphry Clinker by Tobias Smollett one character describes Edinburgh as a "hotbed of genius".^[80] Edinburgh was also a major centre for the Scottish book trade. The highly successful London bookseller Andrew Millar was apprenticed there to James McEuen.^[81]

From the 1770s onwards, the professional and business classes gradually deserted the Old Town in favour of the more elegant "one-family" residences of the New Town, a migration that changed the city's social character. According to the foremost historian of this development, "Unity of social feeling was one of the most valuable heritages of old Edinburgh, and its disappearance was widely and properly lamented."^[82]

19th and 20th centuries

Wikisource has original text related to this article:

Edinburgh (1914) by Robert Louis Stevenson

Despite an enduring myth to the contrary,^[83] Edinburgh became an industrial centre^[84] with its traditional industries of printing, brewing and distilling continuing to grow in the 19th century and joined by new industries such as rubber works, engineering works and others. By 1821, Edinburgh had been overtaken by Glasgow as Scotland's largest city.^[85] The city centre between Princes Street and George Street became a major commercial and shopping district, a development partly stimulated by the arrival of railways in the 1840s. The Old Town became an increasingly dilapidated, overcrowded slum with high mortality rates.^[86] Improvements carried out under Lord Provost William Chambers in the 1860s began the transformation of the area into the predominantly Victorian Old Town seen today.^[87] More improvements followed in the early 20th century as a result of the work of Patrick Geddes,^[88] but relative economic stagnation during the two world wars and beyond saw the Old Town deteriorate further before major slum clearance in the 1960s and 1970s began to reverse the process. University building developments which transformed the George Square and Potterrow areas proved highly controversial.^[89]

Since the 1990s a new "financial district", including the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, has grown mainly on demolished railway property to the west of the castle, stretching into Fountainbridge, a run-down 19th-century industrial suburb which has undergone radical change since the 1980s with the demise of industrial and brewery premises. This ongoing development has enabled Edinburgh to maintain its place as the United Kingdom's second largest financial and administrative centre after London.^[90][91] Financial services now account for a third of all commercial office space in the city.^[92] The development of Edinburgh Park, a new business and technology park covering 38 acres (15 ha), 4 mi (6 km) west of the city centre, has also contributed to the District Council's strategy for the city's major economic regeneration.^[92]

In 1998, the

In 2022, Edinburgh was affected by the 2022 Scotland bin strikes.^[95] In 2023, Edinburgh became the first capital city in Europe to sign the global Plant Based Treaty, which was introduced at COP26 in 2021 in Glasgow.^[96] Green Party councillor Steve Burgess introduced the treaty. The Scottish Countryside Alliance and other farming groups called the treaty "anti-farming."^[97]

Geography

Cityscape

Situated in Scotland's Central Belt, Edinburgh lies on the southern shore of the Firth of Forth. The city centre is 2+1⁄2 mi (4.0 km) southwest of the shoreline of Leith and 26 mi (42 km) inland, as the crow flies, from the east coast of Scotland and the North Sea at Dunbar.^[98] While the early burgh grew up near the prominent Castle Rock, the modern city is often said to be built on seven hills, namely Calton Hill, Corstorphine Hill, Craiglockhart Hill, Braid Hill, Blackford Hill, Arthur's Seat and the Castle Rock,^[99] giving rise to allusions to the seven hills of Rome.^[100]

Occupying a narrow gap between the Firth of Forth to the north and the Pentland Hills and their outrunners to the south, the city sprawls over a landscape which is the product of early volcanic activity and later periods of intensive glaciation.

Other prominent landforms such as Calton Hill and Corstorphine Hill are also products of glacial erosion.[101]^: 64–65 The Braid Hills and Blackford Hill are a series of small summits to the south of the city centre that command expansive views looking northwards over the urban area to the Firth of Forth.^{[101]: 64–65}

Edinburgh is drained by the river named the Water of Leith, which rises at the Colzium Springs in the Pentland Hills and runs for 18 miles (29 km) through the south and west of the city, emptying into the Firth of Forth at Leith.^[104] The nearest the river gets to the city centre is at Dean Village on the north-western edge of the New Town, where a deep gorge is spanned by Thomas Telford's Dean Bridge, built in 1832 for the road to Queensferry. The Water of Leith Walkway is a mixed-use trail that follows the course of the river for 19.6 km (12.2 mi) from Balerno to Leith.^[105]

Panorama of Edinburgh from Edinburgh Castle, with the New Town in the centre and Calton Hill to the right

Excepting the shoreline of the Firth of Forth, Edinburgh is encircled by a

Edinburgh Old Town skyline panorama

Areas

Edinburgh includes former towns and villages that retain much of their original character as settlements in existence before they were absorbed into the expanding city of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.^[107] Many areas, such as Dalry, contain residences that are multi-occupancy buildings known as tenements, although the more southern and western parts of the city have traditionally been less built-up with a greater number of detached and semi-detached villas.^[108]

The historic centre of Edinburgh is divided in two by the broad green swathe of Princes Street Gardens. To the south, the view is dominated by Edinburgh Castle, built high on Castle Rock, and the long sweep of the Old Town descending towards Holyrood Palace. To the north lie Princes Street and the New Town.

The West End includes the financial district, with insurance and banking offices as well as the Edinburgh International Conference Centre.

Edinburgh's Old and New Towns were listed as a UNESCO

The New Town was an 18th-century solution to the problem of an increasingly crowded city which had been confined to the ridge sloping down from the castle. In 1766 a competition to design a "New Town" was won by James Craig, a 27-year-old architect.^[111] The plan was a rigid, ordered grid, which fitted in well with Enlightenment ideas of rationality. The principal street was to be George Street, running along the natural ridge to the north of what became known as the "Old Town". To either side of it are two other main streets: Princes Street and Queen Street. Princes Street has become Edinburgh's main shopping street and now has few of its Georgian buildings in their original state. The three main streets are connected by a series of streets running perpendicular to them. The east and west ends of George Street are terminated by St Andrew Square and Charlotte Square respectively. The latter, designed by Robert Adam, influenced the architectural style of the New Town into the early 19th century.^[112] Bute House, the official residence of the First Minister of Scotland, is on the north side of Charlotte Square.^[113]

The hollow between the Old and New Towns was formerly the Nor Loch, which was created for the town's defence but came to be used by the inhabitants for dumping their sewage. It was drained by the 1820s as part of the city's northward expansion. Craig's original plan included an ornamental canal on the site of the loch,^[76] but this idea was abandoned.^[114] Soil excavated while laying the foundations of buildings in the New Town was dumped on the site of the loch to create the slope connecting the Old and New Towns known as The Mound.

In the middle of the 19th century the

Leith was historically the port of Edinburgh, an arrangement of unknown date that was confirmed by the royal charter Robert the Bruce granted to the city in 1329.^[117] The port developed a separate identity from Edinburgh, which to some extent it still retains, and it was a matter of great resentment when the two burghs merged in 1920 into the City of Edinburgh.^[118] Even today the parliamentary seat is known as "Edinburgh North and Leith". The loss of traditional industries and commerce (the last shipyard closed in 1983) resulted in economic decline.^[119] The Edinburgh Waterfront development has transformed old dockland areas from Leith to Granton into residential areas with shopping and leisure facilities and helped rejuvenate the area. With the redevelopment, Edinburgh has gained the business of cruise liner companies which now provide cruises to Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, and the Netherlands.

The coastal suburb of

The

Given Edinburgh's position between the coast and hills, it is renowned as "the windy city", with the prevailing wind direction coming from the south-west, which is often associated with warm, unstable air from the North Atlantic Current that can give rise to rainfall – although considerably less than cities to the west, such as Glasgow.^[121] Rainfall is distributed fairly evenly throughout the year.^[121] Winds from an easterly direction are usually drier but considerably colder, and may be accompanied by haar, a persistent coastal fog. Vigorous Atlantic depressions, known as European windstorms, can affect the city between October and May.^[121]

Located slightly north of the city centre, the weather station at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE) has been an official weather station for the Met Office since 1956. The Met Office operates its own weather station at Gogarbank on the city's western outskirts, near Edinburgh Airport.^[124] This slightly inland station has a slightly wider temperature span between seasons, is cloudier and somewhat wetter, but differences are minor.

Temperature and rainfall records have been kept at the Royal Observatory since 1764.^[125]

Demography

Current

The most recent official population estimates (2020) are 506,520 for the locality (includes Currie),^[5] 530,990 for the Edinburgh settlement (includes Musselburgh)^[5] and 518,500 for the local authority area.^[6]

Edinburgh has a high proportion of young adults, with 19.5% of the population in their 20s (exceeded only by Aberdeen) and 15.2% in their 30s which is the highest in Scotland. The proportion of Edinburgh's population born in the UK fell from 92% to 84% between 2001 and 2011, while the proportion of White Scottish-born fell from 78% to 70%. Of those Edinburgh residents born in the UK, 335,000 or 83% were born in Scotland, with 58,000 or 14% being born in England.^[130]

Some 13,000 people or 2.7% of the city's population are of

The proportion of people born outside the UK was 15.9% compared with 8% in 2001.

Place of birth	Estimated resident population (2011)[135]
Poland	11,651
India	4,888
Ireland	4,743
Mainland China [A]	4,188
United States	3,700
Germany	3,500
Pakistan	2,472
Australia	2,100
France	2,000
Spain	2,000
South Africa	1,800
Canada	1,800
Hong Kong	1,600

Historical

Historical population

Year	Pop.	±%
1801	82,560	—
1811	102,987	+24.7%
1821	138,235	+34.2%
1831	161,909	+17.1%
1841	166,450	+2.8%
1851	193,929	+16.5%
1901	303,638	+56.6%
1911	320,318	+5.5%
1921	420,264	+31.2%
1931	439,010	+4.5%
1951	466,761	+6.3%
Source: [136]

A census by the Edinburgh presbytery in 1592 recorded a population of 8,003 adults spread equally north and south of the High Street which runs along the spine of the ridge sloping down from the Castle.[137] In the 18th and 19th centuries, the population expanded rapidly, rising from 49,000 in 1751 to 136,000 in 1831, primarily due to migration from rural areas.^[101]: 9 As the population grew, problems of overcrowding in the Old Town, particularly in the cramped tenements that lined the present day Royal Mile and the Cowgate, were exacerbated.^[101]: 9 Poor sanitary arrangements resulted in a high incidence of disease,^[101]: 9 with outbreaks of cholera occurring in 1832, 1848 and 1866.^[138]

The construction of the New Town from 1767 onwards witnessed the migration of the professional and business classes from the difficult living conditions in the Old Town to the lower density, higher quality surroundings taking shape on land to the north. ^[139] Expansion southwards from the Old Town saw more tenements being built in the 19th century, giving rise to Victorian suburbs such as Dalry, Newington, Marchmont and Bruntsfield.^[139]

Early 20th-century population growth coincided with lower-density suburban development. As the city expanded to the south and west, detached and semi-detached villas with large gardens replaced tenements as the predominant building style. Nonetheless, the 2001 census revealed that over 55% of Edinburgh's population were still living in tenements or blocks of flats, a figure in line with other Scottish cities, but much higher than other British cities, and even central London.^[140]

From the early to mid 20th century, the growth in population, together with slum clearance in the Old Town and other areas, such as Dumbiedykes, Leith, and Fountainbridge, led to the creation of new estates such as Stenhouse and Saughton, Craigmillar and Niddrie, Pilton and Muirhouse, Piershill, and Sighthill.^[141]

Religion

In 2018, the Church of Scotland had 20,956 members in 71 congregations in the Presbytery of Edinburgh.^[142] Its most prominent church is St Giles' on the Royal Mile, first dedicated in 1243 but believed to date from before the 12th century.^[143] Saint Giles is historically the patron saint of Edinburgh.^[144] St Cuthbert's, situated at the west end of Princes Street Gardens in the shadow of Edinburgh Castle and St Giles' can lay claim to being the oldest Christian sites in the city,^[145] though the present St Cuthbert's, designed by Hippolyte Blanc, was dedicated in 1894.^[146]

Other Church of Scotland churches include

Muslims have several places of worship across the city. Edinburgh Central Mosque, the largest Islamic place of worship, is located in Potterrow on the city's Southside, near Bristo Square. Construction was largely financed by a gift from King Fahd of Saudi Arabia^[156] and was completed in 1998.^[157] There is also an Ahmadiyya Muslim community.^[158]

The first recorded presence of a Jewish community in Edinburgh dates back to the late 18th century.^[159] Edinburgh's Orthodox synagogue, opened in 1932, is in Salisbury Road and can accommodate a congregation of 2000. A Liberal Jewish congregation also meets in the city.

A

Edinburgh is home to a Baháʼí community,^[166] and a Theosophical Society meets in Great King Street.^[167]

Edinburgh has an Inter-Faith Association.^[168]

Edinburgh has over 39 graveyards and cemeteries, many of which are listed and of historical character, including several former church burial grounds.^[169] Examples include Old Calton Burial Ground, Greyfriars Kirkyard and Dean Cemetery.^{[170][171][172]}

Economy

Edinburgh has the strongest economy of any city in the United Kingdom outside London and the highest percentage of professionals in the UK with 43% of the population holding a degree-level or professional qualification.^[173] According to the Centre for International Competitiveness, it is the most competitive large city in the United Kingdom.^[174] It also has the highest gross value added per employee of any city in the UK outside London, measuring £57,594 in 2010.^[175] It was named European Best Large City of the Future for Foreign Direct Investment and Best Large City for Foreign Direct Investment Strategy in the Financial Times fDi magazine awards 2012/13.

In the 19th century, Edinburgh's economy was known for banking and insurance, publishing and printing, and brewing and distilling. Today, its economy is based mainly on financial services, scientific research, higher education, and tourism.^[176] In March 2010, unemployment in Edinburgh was comparatively low at 3.6%, and it remains consistently below the Scottish average of 4.5%.^[177] Edinburgh is the second most visited city by foreign visitors in the UK after London.

Banking has been a mainstay of the Edinburgh economy for over 300 years, since the

Tourism is also an important element in the city's economy. As a World Heritage Site, tourists visit historical sites such as Edinburgh Castle, the Palace of Holyroodhouse and the Old and New Towns. Their numbers are augmented in August each year during the

The city hosts a series of festivals that run between the end of July and early September each year. The best known of these events are the

The longest established of these festivals is the Edinburgh International Festival, which was first held in 1947[187] and consists mainly of a programme of high-profile theatre productions and classical music performances, featuring international directors, conductors, theatre companies and orchestras.^[188]

This has since been overtaken in size by the Edinburgh Fringe which began as a programme of marginal acts alongside the "official" Festival and has become the world's largest performing arts festival. In 2017, nearly 3400 different shows were staged in 300 venues across the city.^[189][190] Comedy has become one of the mainstays of the Fringe, with numerous well-known comedians getting their first 'break' there, often by being chosen to receive the Edinburgh Comedy Award.^[191] The Edinburgh Military Tattoo, occupies the Castle Esplanade every night for three weeks each August, with massed pipe bands and military bands drawn from around the world. Performances end with a short fireworks display.

As well as the summer festivals,

The summer of 2020 was the first time in its 70-year history that the Edinburgh festival was not run, being cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.^[194] This affected many of the tourist-focused businesses in Edinburgh which depend on the various festivals over summer to return an annual profit.^[195]

Edinburgh's Hogmanay

The annual Edinburgh Hogmanay celebration was originally an informal street party focused on the Tron Kirk in the Old Town's High Street. Since 1993, it has been officially organised with the focus moved to Princes Street. In 1996, over 300,000 people attended, leading to ticketing of the main street party in later years up to a limit of 100,000 tickets.^[196] Hogmanay now covers four days of processions, concerts and fireworks, with the street party beginning on Hogmanay. Alternative tickets are available for entrance into the Princes Street Gardens concert and Cèilidh, where well-known artists perform and ticket holders can participate in traditional Scottish cèilidh dancing. The event attracts thousands of people from all over the world.^[196]

Beltane and other festivals

On the night of 30 April the

Outside the Festival season, Edinburgh supports several theatres and production companies. The Royal Lyceum Theatre has its own company, while the King's Theatre, Edinburgh Festival Theatre and Edinburgh Playhouse stage large touring shows. The Traverse Theatre presents a more contemporary repertoire. Amateur theatre companies productions are staged at the Bedlam Theatre, Church Hill Theatre and King's Theatre among others.^[199]

The

Edinburgh has one repertory cinema,

Edinburgh has a healthy popular music scene. Occasionally large concerts are staged at Murrayfield and Meadowbank, while mid-sized events take place at smaller venues such as 'The Corn Exchange', 'The Liquid Rooms' and 'The Bongo Club'. In 2010, PRS for Music listed Edinburgh among the UK's top ten 'most musical' cities.^[203] Several city pubs are well known for their live performances of folk music. They include 'Sandy Bell's' in Forrest Road, 'Captain's Bar' in South College Street and 'Whistlebinkies' in South Bridge.

Like many other cities in the UK, numerous nightclub venues host Electronic dance music events.^[204]

Edinburgh is home to a flourishing group of contemporary composers such as Nigel Osborne, Peter Nelson, Lyell Cresswell, Hafliði Hallgrímsson, Edward Harper, Robert Crawford, Robert Dow and John McLeod. McLeod's music is heard regularly on BBC Radio 3 and throughout the UK.^[205]

Media

Newspapers

The main local newspaper is the

Radio

The city has two commercial radio stations:

BFBS

Radio broadcasts from studios on the base at Dreghorn Barracks across the city on 98.5FM as part of its UK Bases network. Small scale DAB started October 2022 with numerous community stations onboard

Television

Television, along with most radio services, is broadcast to the city from the Craigkelly transmitting station situated in Fife on the opposite side of the Firth of Forth^[208] and the Black Hill transmitting station in North Lanarkshire to the west.

There are no television stations based in the city. Edinburgh Television existed in the late 1990s to early 2003^[209] and STV Edinburgh existed from 2015 to 2018.^[210][211]

Museums, libraries and galleries

Edinburgh has many museums and libraries. These include the National Museum of Scotland, the National Library of Scotland, National War Museum, the Museum of Edinburgh, Surgeons' Hall Museum, the Writers' Museum, the Museum of Childhood and Dynamic Earth. The Museum on The Mound has exhibits on money and banking.^[212]

Edinburgh Zoo, covering 82 acres (33 ha) on Corstorphine Hill, is the second most visited paid tourist attraction in Scotland,^[213] and home to two giant pandas, Tian Tian and Yang Guang, on loan from the People's Republic of China.

Edinburgh is also home to The Royal Yacht Britannia, decommissioned in 1997 and now a five-star visitor attraction and evening events venue permanently berthed at Ocean Terminal.

Edinburgh contains Scotland's three

Royal Scottish Academy building. Contemporary collections are shown in the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art which occupies a split site at Belford. The Scottish National Portrait Gallery

on Queen Street focuses on portraits and photography.

The council-owned City Art Centre in Market Street mounts regular art exhibitions. Across the road, The Fruitmarket Gallery offers world-class exhibitions of contemporary art, featuring work by British and international artists with both emerging and established international reputations.^[215]

The city hosts several of Scotland's galleries and organisations dedicated to contemporary visual art. Significant strands of this infrastructure include Creative Scotland, Edinburgh College of Art, Talbot Rice Gallery (University of Edinburgh), Collective Gallery (based at the City Observatory) and the Edinburgh Annuale.

There are also many small private shops/galleries that provide space to showcase works from local artists.^[216]

Shopping

The locale around

Boots the Chemist, Edinburgh Woollen Mill, H&M and Jenners.^[217] George Street, north of Princes Street, is the preferred location for some upmarket shops and independent stores.^[217] At the east end of Princes Street, the redeveloped St James Quarter opened its doors in June 2021,^[218] while next to the Balmoral Hotel and Waverley Station is Waverley Market. Multrees Walk, adjacent to the St. James Centre, is a recent addition to the central shopping district, dominated by the presence of Harvey Nichols. Shops here include Louis Vuitton, Mulberry and Calvin Klein.^[217]

Edinburgh also has substantial retail parks outside the city centre. These include

Cameron Toll Shopping Centre, Straiton Retail Park (actually just outside the city, in Midlothian) and Fort Kinnaird in the south and east, and Ocean Terminal in the north on the Leith waterfront.^[219]

Governance

Main article: Politics of Edinburgh

Local government

Main article: City of Edinburgh Council

Following local government reorganisation in 1996, the City of Edinburgh Council constitutes one of the

multi-member electoral wards in the city.^[222]

Following the

Labour Party lost majority control of the council after 23 years to a Liberal Democrat/SNP coalition.^[223]

After the 2017 election, the SNP and Labour formed a coalition administration, which lasted until the next election in 2022.

The 2022 City of Edinburgh Council election resulted in the most politically balanced council in the UK, with 19 SNP, 13 Labour, 12 Liberal Democrat, 10 Green and 9 Conservative councillors. A minority Labour administration was formed, being voted in by Scottish Conservative and Scottish Liberal Democrat councillors. The SNP and Greens presented a coalition agreement, but could not command majority support in the Council. This caused controversy amongst the Scottish Labour Party group for forming an administration supported by Conservatives and led to the suspension of two Labour councillors on the Council for abstaining on the vote to approve the new administration.^[224]

The city's coat of arms was registered by the Lord Lyon King of Arms in 1732.^[225]

Scottish Parliament

Main article: Scottish Parliament

Edinburgh, like all of Scotland, is represented in the

additional MSPs to produce a result based on a form of proportional representation.^[226]

As of the

Scottish Labour Party represents Edinburgh Southern

constituency.

In addition, the city is also represented by seven regional MSPs representing the Lothian electoral region: The Conservatives have three regional MSPs: Jeremy Balfour, Miles Briggs and Sue Webber, Labour have two regional MSPs: Sarah Boyack and Foysol Choudhury; two Scottish Green regional MSPs were elected: Green's Co-Leader Lorna Slater and Alison Johnstone. However, following her election as the Presiding Officer of the 6th Session of the Scottish Parliament on 13 May 2021, Alison Johnstone has abided by the established parliamentary convention for speakers and renounced all affiliation with her former political party for the duration of her term as Presiding Officer. So she presently sits as an independent MSP for the Lothians Region.^{[citation needed]}

UK Parliament

Main article: Parliament of the United Kingdom

Edinburgh is also represented in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom by five Members of Parliament. The city is divided into Edinburgh North and Leith, Edinburgh East, Edinburgh South, Edinburgh South West, and Edinburgh West,^[227] each constituency electing one member by the first past the post system.

Since the

Labour

MP in Edinburgh South (Ian Murray).

Transport

Main article: Transport in Edinburgh

Air

BAA outlined a draft masterplan in 2011 to provide for the expansion of the airfield and the terminal building. In June 2012, Global Infrastructure Partners purchased the airport for £807 million.^[230] The possibility of building a second runway to cope with an increased number of aircraft movements has also been mooted.^[231]

Buses

Travel in Edinburgh is undertaken predominantly by bus.

Edinburgh Bus Station off St Andrew Square and Waterloo Place and are operated mainly by Stagecoach East Scotland, Scottish Citylink, National Express Coaches and Borders Buses

.

Lothian Buses and

night bus service and airport buses are mainly operated by Lothian Buses link.^[232] In 2019, Lothian Buses recorded 124.2 million passenger journeys.^[233]

To tackle

Straiton (in Midlothian). A referendum of Edinburgh residents in February 2005 rejected a proposal to introduce congestion charging

in the city. [234]

Railway

rail services within Scotland operated by ScotRail

.

To the west of the city centre lies

Edinburgh Gateway, South Gyle and Dalmeny, the latter serving South Queensferry by the Forth Bridges, and to Wester Hailes and Curriehill

in the south-west of the city.

Trams

York Place in the city centre's East End. Phase two of the tram project, which sees the existing section of Line 1 (Airport to York Place) tram line extended down Leith Walk to Ocean Terminal and terminate at Newhaven, adding an additional eight new tram stops and connecting Leith and the waterfront to the tram system. As of August 2022 this project is currently nearing completion, and is scheduled to open to passenger use in spring 2023.^[242]

Should the original plan be taken to completion, trams will also run from Haymarket through

Waterfront Edinburgh.^[243] Long-term proposals envisage a line running west from the airport to Ratho and Newbridge and another connecting Granton Square to Newhaven via Lower Granton Road, thus completing the Line 1 (North Edinburgh) loop.^[244]

A further line serving the south of the city has also been suggested.

Lothian Buses and Edinburgh Trams are both owned and operated by Transport for Edinburgh.

Despite its modern transport links, in January of 2021 Edinburgh was named the most congested city in the UK for the fourth year running. ^[245]

Education

There are three universities in Edinburgh: the University of Edinburgh, Heriot-Watt University and Edinburgh Napier University.

Established by royal charter in 1583, the University of Edinburgh is one of Scotland's ancient universities and is the fourth oldest in the country after St Andrews, Glasgow and Aberdeen.^[246] Originally centred on Old College the university expanded to premises on The Mound, the Royal Mile and George Square.^[246] Today, the King's Buildings in the south of the city contain most of the schools within the College of Science and Engineering. In 2002, the medical school moved to purpose built accommodation adjacent to the new Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh at Little France. The university is placed 16th in the QS World University Rankings for 2022.^[247]

Heriot-Watt University is based at the

mechanics' institute, it was granted university status by royal charter in 1966. It has other campuses in the Scottish Borders, Orkney, United Arab Emirates and Putrajaya in Malaysia. It takes the name Heriot-Watt from Scottish inventor James Watt and Scottish philanthropist and goldsmith George Heriot

. Heriot-Watt University has been named International University of the Year by The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2018. In the latest Research Excellence Framework, it was ranked overall in the Top 25% of UK universities and 1st in Scotland for research impact.

Edinburgh Napier University was originally founded as the Napier College, which was renamed Napier Polytechnic in 1986 and gained university status in 1992.[248] Edinburgh Napier University has campuses in the south and west of the city, including the former Merchiston Tower and Craiglockhart Hydropathic.^[248] It is home to the Screen Academy Scotland.

Queen Margaret University was located in Edinburgh before it moved to a new campus just outside the city boundary on the edge of Musselburgh in 2008.^[249]

Until 2012, further education colleges in the city included

Stevenson College, opened in 1970. These have now been amalgamated to form Edinburgh College. Scotland's Rural College also has a campus in south Edinburgh. Other institutions include the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh which were established by royal charter in 1506 and 1681 respectively. The Trustees Drawing Academy of Edinburgh, founded in 1760, became the Edinburgh College of Art in 1907.^[250]

There are 18 nursery, 94 primary and 23 secondary schools administered by the City of Edinburgh Council.^[251] Edinburgh is home to

independent, fee-paying schools including Edinburgh Academy, Fettes College, George Heriot's School, George Watson's College, Merchiston Castle School, Stewart's Melville College and The Mary Erskine School. In 2009, the proportion of pupils attending independent schools was 24.2%, far above the Scottish national average of just over 7% and higher than in any other region of Scotland.^[252] In August 2013, the City of Edinburgh Council opened the city's first stand-alone Gaelic primary school, Bun-sgoil Taobh na Pàirce.^[253]

Healthcare

See also: List of hospitals in Edinburgh

The main

paediatrics

hospital.

There are two private hospitals: Murrayfield Hospital in the west of the city and Shawfair Hospital in the south; both are owned by Spire Healthcare.^[254]

Sport

Football

Men's

Edinburgh has three

F.C. Edinburgh

, founded in 1966.

Heart of Midlothian and Hibernian are known locally as "Hearts" and "Hibs", respectively. Both play in the Scottish Premiership.^[256] They are the oldest city rivals in Scotland and the Edinburgh derby is one of the oldest derby matches in world football. Both clubs have won the Scottish league championship four times. Hearts have won the Scottish Cup eight times and the Scottish League Cup four times. Hibs have won the Scottish Cup and the Scottish League Cup three times each. Edinburgh City were promoted to Scottish League Two in the 2015–16 season, becoming the first club to win promotion to the SPFL via the pyramid system playoffs.

Edinburgh was also home to four other

1896 Scottish Cup Final, the only time the match has been played outside Glasgow.^[257]

The city also plays host to

Spartans, as well as East of Scotland League clubs Craigroyston, Edinburgh United, Heriot-Watt University, Leith Athletic, Lothian Thistle Hutchison Vale, and Tynecastle

.

Women's

In women's football,

Hibs and Spartans play in the SWPL 1.^[258] Hutchison Vale and Boroughmuir Thistle play in the SWPL 2.^[259]

Rugby

The

Watsonians RFC.^[261]

The Edinburgh Academicals ground at Raeburn Place was the location of the world's first international rugby game on 27 March 1871, between Scotland and England.^[262]

Rugby League Conference Scotland Division. Murrayfield Stadium has hosted the Magic Weekend where all Super League

matches are played in the stadium over one weekend.

• 

  Tynecastle Park

• 

  Easter Road Stadium

• 

  Murrayfield Stadium

• 

  Meadowbank Stadium

• 

  Edinburgh Marathon

• 

  Murrayfield Ice Rink

Other sports

The

Scottish cricket team, which represents Scotland internationally, play their home matches at the Grange cricket club.^[263]

The Edinburgh Capitals are the latest of a succession of ice hockey clubs in the Scottish capital. Previously Edinburgh was represented by the Murrayfield Racers (2018), the original Murrayfield Racers (who folded in 1996) and the Edinburgh Racers. The club play their home games at the Murrayfield Ice Rink and have competed in the eleven-team professional Scottish National League (SNL) since the 2018–19 season.^[264]

Next door to Murrayfield Ice Rink is a 7-sheeter dedicated curling facility where curling is played from October to March each season.

Edinburgh Lions all compete in Division 1 of the National League, and Pleasance B.C.

compete in Division 2.

The Edinburgh Diamond Devils is a baseball club which won its first Scottish Championship in 1991 as the "Reivers." 1992 saw the team repeat the achievement, becoming the first team to do so in league history. The same year saw the start of their first youth team, the Blue Jays. The club adopted its present name in 1999.^[265]

Edinburgh has also hosted national and international sports events including the

World Student Games, the 1970 British Commonwealth Games,^[266] the 1986 Commonwealth Games^[266] and the inaugural 2000 Commonwealth Youth Games.^[267] For the 1970 Games the city built Olympic standard venues and facilities including Meadowbank Stadium and the Royal Commonwealth Pool. The Pool underwent refurbishment in 2012 and hosted the Diving competition in the 2014 Commonwealth Games which were held in Glasgow.^[268]

In

World Bowl 96 victory. From 1995 to 1997 they played all their games there, from 1998 to 2000 they split their home matches between Murrayfield and Glasgow's Hampden Park, then moved to Glasgow full-time, with one final Murrayfield appearance in 2002.^[269] The city's most successful non-professional team are the Edinburgh Wolves who play at Meadowbank Stadium.^[270]

The Edinburgh Marathon has been held annually in the city since 2003 with more than 16,000 runners taking part on each occasion.^[271] Its organisers have called it "the fastest marathon in the UK" due to the elevation drop of 40 m (130 ft).^[272] The city also organises a half-marathon, as well as 10 km (6.2 mi) and 5 km (3.1 mi) races, including a 5 km (3 mi) race on 1 January each year.

Edinburgh has a speedway team, the Edinburgh Monarchs, which, since the loss of its stadium in the city, has raced at the Lothian Arena in Armadale, West Lothian. The Monarchs have won the Premier League championship five times in their history, in 2003^[273] and again in 2008,^[274] 2010, 2014 and 2015.

People

Main article: List of people from Edinburgh

See also: List of University of Edinburgh people

Edinburgh has a long literary tradition, which became especially evident during the

UNESCO City of Literature in 2004.^[275][276] Prominent authors who have lived in Edinburgh include the economist Adam Smith, born in Kirkcaldy and author of The Wealth of Nations,^[277] James Boswell, biographer of Samuel Johnson; Sir Walter Scott, creator of the historical novel and author of works such as Rob Roy, Ivanhoe, and Heart of Midlothian; James Hogg, author of The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner; Robert Louis Stevenson,^[278] creator of Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde; Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes; Muriel Spark, author of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie; diarist Janet Harden; Irvine Welsh, author of Trainspotting, whose novels are mostly set in the city and often written in colloquial Scots

;

No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series,^[280] and J. K. Rowling, author of Harry Potter, who wrote much of her first book in Edinburgh coffee shops and now lives in the Cramond area of the city.^[281]

Scotland has a rich history of science and engineering, with Edinburgh producing a number of leading figures.

James Braidwood

, who organised Britain's first municipal fire brigade, was also born in the city and began his career there.

Other names connected with the city include physicist

Maclaurin series,^[284] and Ian Wilmut, the geneticist involved in the cloning of Dolly the sheep just outside Edinburgh, at the Roslin Institute.^[277] The stuffed carcass of Dolly the sheep is now on display in the National Museum of Scotland.^[285] The latest in a long line of science celebrities associated with the city is theoretical physicist, Nobel laureate and professor emeritus at the University of Edinburgh Peter Higgs, born in Newcastle but resident in Edinburgh for most of his academic career, after whom the Higgs boson particle has been named.^[286]

Edinburgh has been the birthplace of actors like Alastair Sim and Sir Sean Connery, known for being the first cinematic James Bond,^[287] the comedian and actor Ronnie Corbett, best known as one of The Two Ronnies,^[288] and the impressionist Rory Bremner. Famous artists from the city include the portrait painters Sir Henry Raeburn, Sir David Wilkie and Allan Ramsay.

The city has produced or been home to some very successful musicians in recent decades, particularly Ian Anderson, front man of the band Jethro Tull, The Incredible String Band, the folk duo The Corries, Wattie Buchan, lead singer and founding member of punk band The Exploited, Shirley Manson, lead singer of the band Garbage, the Bay City Rollers, The Proclaimers, Boards of Canada and Idlewild.

Edinburgh is the birthplace of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair who attended the city's Fettes College.^[289]

Notorious criminals from Edinburgh's past include

Burke and Hare who delivered fresh corpses for dissection to the famous anatomist Robert Knox.^[291]

Another well-known Edinburgh resident was Greyfriars Bobby. The small Skye Terrier reputedly kept vigil over his dead master's grave in Greyfriars Kirkyard for 14 years in the 1860s and 1870s, giving rise to a story of canine devotion which plays a part in attracting visitors to the city.^[292]

International relations

Twin towns and sister cities

See also: List of twin towns and sister cities in Scotland

The City of Edinburgh has entered into 14 international

twinning arrangements since 1954.^[293] Most of the arrangements are styled as Twin Cities but the agreement with Kraków is designated as a Partner City,^[293] and the agreement with Kyoto Prefecture is officially styled as a Friendship Link, reflecting its status as the only region to be twinned with Edinburgh.^[293]

City	Since
Munich, Germany	1954
Nice, France	1958[294][295]
Florence, Italy	1964
Dunedin, New Zealand	1974
Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada	1977[296]
San Diego, California, United States	1977
Xi'an, China	1985
Segovia, Spain	1985[297]
Kyiv, Ukraine	1989
Aalborg, Denmark	1991[298]
Kyoto Prefecture, Japan	1994
Kathmandu, Nepal	1994
Kraków, Poland	1995[299]
Saint Petersburg, Russia	1995[300][301]
Shenzhen, China	2019[302]

For a list of consulates in Edinburgh, see

List of diplomatic missions in Scotland

.

See also

• Outline of Edinburgh
• National Archives of Scotland
• OPENCities
• Tourism in Scotland

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b c} New category created for the 2011 census
2. ^ Category restructured for the 2011 census

1. ^ This figure does not include Hong Kong and Macau.

References

Further reading

• Campbell, Donald (2003). Edinburgh: A Cultural and Literary History. Signal Books.
  ISBN 978-1-902669-73-1
  .
• H Coghill, Edinburgh, The Old Town, John Donald, Edinburgh 1990,
  ISBN 0-85976-289-0
• ISBN 1-84115-275-7
• A Massie, Edinburgh, Sinclair-Stevenson, London 1994,
  ISBN 1-85619-244-X
• S Mullay, The Edinburgh Encyclopedia, Mainstream Publishing, Edinburgh and London 1996,
  ISBN 1-85158-762-4
• S Mullay, The Illustrated History of Edinburgh's Suburbs, Breedon Books, Derby 2008,
  ISBN 978-1-85983-665-1

External links

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article "Edinburgh".

Wikivoyage has a travel guide for Edinburgh.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Edinburgh.

• City of Edinburgh Council website
• Marketing Edinburgh official tourist agency
• Edinburgh at
  Curlie