Rosslyn Chapel

Rosslyn Chapel stands in the village of Roslin, Midlothian, its groundbreaking dated to 20 September 1456. It was founded by William Sinclair, 1st Earl of Caithness, and dedicated to Saint Matthew the Evangelist. Though the original plan was cruciform, only the choir was ever completed, and it is this richly worked interior that gives the chapel its reputation as among the finest architecture in Scotland. The vaulted space rests on fourteen pillars forming an arcade of twelve pointed arches, and almost every surface carries carved stone. The best-known feature is the Apprentice Pillar, wound about with foliage and set beside an inscription on the strength of truth. More than a hundred carved Green Men — human faces amid leaves — look down from the walls, alongside botanical detail said to include wheat, strawberries and lilies, and rows of small protruding stone cubes cut with geometric patterns. After the Reformation of 1560 the chapel fell into disuse, but a visit by Queen Victoria in 1842 prompted a restoration completed in 1862. It survived a bomb attack in July 1914, during the campaign for women’s suffrage, and underwent major conservation between 1997 and 2013. Still privately owned and serving as an active Episcopal chapel, it now receives around 145,000 visitors each year.