Images

75b - Cowgate

Courtesy of National Library of Scotland | CC BY 4.0

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Date

1781-1820

Description

This sketch depicts part of Edinburgh's Cowgate area, located in the heart of the Old Town section of the city. Although the exact section of the Cowgate represented in this sketch is unknown, it is likely to be somewhere very close to George IV Bridge. The name of the artist is not given, although it is likely that it was Hutton himself and no date has been included on the drawing. Running underneath George IV Bridge and the South Bridge, the Cowgate was the underworld of Edinburgh's Old Town. Located at the eastern end of the Grassmarket, the Cowgate was once the Irish Quarter, populated by the thousands of impoverished Irish immigrants who immigrated to Scotland during the Great Potato Famine of 1846-47. A rabbit warren of dark alleys and passageways, the Cowgate was formerly associated with poverty, crime and vice.
Collective title: Hutton Drawings > [Volume 2] > Midlothian
More details about the album and its contents can be found on the collection website.

Image Licence

CC BY 4.0

Image Credit

Courtesy of National Library of Scotland

Location

Cowgate, Edinburgh, Scotland

Country

Scotland