History of Edinburgh Timeline

Despite wholesale destruction reported by contemporaries at the time of the Hertford Raid in 1544, the town slowly recovered, its merchant burgesses and craftsmen continuing to serve the needs of the royal court and nobility.

The town played a central role in events leading to the establishment of Protestantism in the mid-16th century Scottish Reformation. In 1560, when Scotland's total population was about one million, Edinburgh reached 12,000 people, with another 4,000 in Canongate and Leith.

Image source: Siege of Leith

The Catholic Mary, Queen of Scots returned to Scotland from France in 1561 and suffered from deep discord sown prior to her arrival. Though initially welcomed, the tragic chain of events at Holyrood Palace, including the murders of David Rizzio and Henry Darnley, culminated in her forced abdication in 1567.

Image source: Mary, Queen of Scots

The civil war following Mary's escape, defeat at Langside and flight to England ended with the final surrender of her remaining loyal supporters in the 'Lang Siege' of Edinburgh Castle in 1573.

Image source: Edinburgh Castle

In 1579, Edinburgh's town council revived plans to establish a university, having already sought but not received Mary's approval. Philosophical and religious instruction at the institution which became the University of Edinburgh began in 1583.

Image source: University of Edinburgh

In 1603 King James VI of Scotland succeeded to the English throne, uniting the monarchies of Scotland and England. Despite promising to return every three years, he came back only once, in 1617.

Image source: Union of the Crowns

Stiff Presbyterian opposition to Charles I's attempt to introduce Anglican forms of worship and governance in the Church of Scotland culminated in the Bishops' Wars of 1639 and 1640, the initial conflicts of the civil war period, during which Edinburgh figured prominently.

Image source: Bishops' Wars

In 1650, following Scottish support for the restoration of Charles Stuart to the throne of England, Edinburgh was occupied by the Commonwealth forces of Oliver Cromwell after the Battle of Dunbar.

At the Mercat Cross in 1654, acting on Cromwell's behalf, Monck proclaimed Cromwell Protector of England, Ireland and Scotland and that Scotland was united with the Commonwealth of England.

Image source: George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle

The triumph of Presbyterianism in 1689 determined the settled form of the Church of Scotland, ending decades of internal religious division between Presbyterians and Episcopalians.

Image source: Church of Scotland

Thomas Aikenhead, son of a surgeon in the city, aged 18, was indicted for blasphemy by order of the Privy Council for calling the New Testament 'The History of the Imposter Christ'; he was hanged in 1696, the last person executed for heresy in Britain.

In 1706 and 1707, the Acts of Union were passed by the Parliaments of England and Scotland, uniting the two kingdoms into the Kingdom of Great Britain. This meant the end of the Scottish Parliament, and members of parliament, aristocrats and placemen moved to London.

Image source: Acts of Union 1707

The Faculty of Medicine at the University of Edinburgh, formed in 1726, soon attracted students from across Britain and the American colonies. Its chief sponsor was Archibald Campbell, 1st Earl of Islay, later 3rd Duke of Argyll, Scotland's most influential political leader.

The Edinburgh Musical Society was constituted in 1728 by well-to-do music lovers. They built St Cecilia's Hall in Niddry Street in 1763 as their private concert hall, hired flautist Francesco Barsanti at £50, had close links to the city's Masonic lodges, and dissolved in 1797.

Image source: St Cecilia's Hall

By the first half of the 18th century, rising prosperity was evidenced by the growth of the Bank of Scotland, Royal Bank of Scotland and British Linen Bank, all based in the city.

Image source: Bank of Scotland

During the Jacobite rising of 1745, Edinburgh was briefly occupied by the Jacobite 'Highland Army' before its march into England.

Image source: Jacobite rising of 1745

Although the idea of northwards expansion had been first mooted around 1680 during the Duke of York's residence at Holyrood, the immediate catalyst was a decision by the Convention of Royal Burghs in 1752 to propose improvements to the capital for the benefit of commerce.

Image source: New Town, Edinburgh

First published in three volumes between 1768 and 1771 with 2,659 pages and 160 engravings, it quickly became a standard reference work. The fourth edition (1810) ran to 16,000 pages in 20 volumes, and it continued to be published in Edinburgh until sold to an American publisher in 1898.

Image source: Encyclopædia Britannica

The Royal Society of Edinburgh, founded in 1783, became Scotland's national academy of science and letters. That same era saw Thomas Jefferson write to Dugald Stewart in June 1789 that, as far as science was concerned, 'no place in the world can pretend to a competition with Edinburgh'.

Image source: Royal Society of Edinburgh

Founded in 1802, The Edinburgh Review became one of the most influential intellectual magazines of 19th-century Britain, publishing until 1929. Under editor Francis Jeffrey it promoted Romanticism and Whig politics.

Image source: Edinburgh Review

Observing conditions in the 1770s, an English visitor reported that no people in the world lived in greater hardship than the lower classes there. From 1802 onwards a 'Second New Town' developed north of James Craig's original New Town, and the New Town had been added progressively from the second half of the 18th century onwards.

From around 1820 the city acquired its soubriquets 'Modern Athens' and 'Athens of the North' because of a perceived similarity in topography, neo-classical architecture of its new public buildings and New Town, and its reputation as an intellectual centre.

By 1821, Edinburgh had been overtaken by Glasgow as Scotland's largest city, having been outgrown in the first two decades of the 19th century.

From 1832 to 1844, Chambers's Edinburgh Journal was the most read periodical in Britain, with a circulation over 80,000.

Image source: Chambers's Edinburgh Journal

Following Henry Littlejohn's Report on the Sanitary Conditions of the City of Edinburgh in 1865, major street improvements were carried out in the Old Town under Lord Provost William Chambers through the Edinburgh Improvement Act 1867.

Image source: William Chambers (publisher)

Piecemeal improvements to the Old Town followed in the early 20th century instigated by pioneering town planner Patrick Geddes, who described his work as 'conservative surgery'. Economic stagnation through two world wars saw the fabric deteriorate before major slum clearance in the 1960s and 1970s began reversing the process.

Image source: Patrick Geddes

During the First World War, Edinburgh was bombed on the night of 2–3 April 1916.

The Port of Leith was hit on 22 July 1940 when a 1000 lb bomb fell on the Albert Dock, though it is unclear whether the originally intended target had been the well-defended Rosyth Dockyard. Bombs were dropped on at least 11 other occasions between June 1940 and July 1942 in opportunistic attacks.

Image source: Leith

In the mid-1960s, the working-class area of Dumbiedykes was swept away almost overnight and the George Square area, representing much of the city's original southwards expansion, fell victim to new University building developments.

Image source: Dumbiedykes

Since the 1990s a new financial district, including a new Edinburgh International Conference Centre, has grown mainly on demolished railway property to the west of the castle, stretching into Fountainbridge, which has undergone radical change since the 1980s with the demise of industrial and brewery premises.

Image source: Fountainbridge

In 1998, the Scotland Act, which came into force the following year, established a devolved Scottish Parliament and Scottish Executive (renamed the Scottish Government since September 2007). Following devolution, Scotland's Parliament was re-established in Edinburgh.

Image source: Scotland Act 1998