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Edinburgh, 70 High Street, Cant's Close

Tenement (Period Unassigned)

Site Name Edinburgh, 70 High Street, Cant's Close

Classification Tenement (Period Unassigned)

Canmore ID 52335

Site Number NT27SE 309

NGR NT 25998 73649

Datum OSGB36 - NGR

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/52335

Ordnance Survey licence number AC0000807262. All rights reserved.
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Administrative Areas

  • Council Edinburgh, City Of
  • Parish Edinburgh (Edinburgh, City Of)
  • Former Region Lothian
  • Former District City Of Edinburgh
  • Former County Midlothian

Architecture Notes

Depicted on the coloured 1st edition of the O.S. 1:1056 scale map (Edinburgh and its Environs, 1854, sheet 36).

Cant's Close is listed on Edgar 1742. Recorded in RMS (Register of the Great Seal of Scotland Vols I-XI) 1588, its name is from the Cant family, prominent in the town from the days of Adam Cant, bailie in 1403, and probably even earlier. Members of the family had property on both sides of the High Street; but one in the vicinity of this close, next to land owned by Melrose abbey is mentioned in RMS 1492 as owned by Henry Cant junior, who figures along with his father Henry in a list of "gude nychtbouris" or burgesses in Town Council Minutes 1501. (from Stuart Harris, "Place Names of Edinburgh", 1996, page 151)

NMRS REFERENCE:

Edinburgh, 64-78 High Street and Strichen's Close, 66 High Street which were Category B Listed were demolished in 1965/66. Information from Demolitions catalogue.

Activities

Publication Account (1951)

35. 70 High Street.

This narrow tenement extends southwards down Cant's Close, the entry to which passes beneath its E. end. Its present arrangement dates only from a remodelling carried out in the 18th century. To the front is a shop with cellarage at the base, and above are five storeys each with two windows towards the street. The four upper pairs have back-set margins and are unaltered, but the two on the first floor have undergone modification to take late-Georgian curved lights, framed by pilasters and an entablature of wood. Another change was the provision of a separate entrance to the first floor, which was reached from the street by a forestair, whereas in the 17th century access was by the newel-stair that is still extant in the wing. The wing has five storeys and a garret, but has been partly rebuilt from the first floor upwards. At ground level area window and a doorway, both with heavy back-set margins, the latter the original approach to the stair and the upper floors. Internally the building contains nothing of interest.

RCAHMS 1951.

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