National War Memorial

The memorial planned after World War I was to be a national shrine, built at the apex of Edinburgh’s Castle Rock. It was to contain a record of all the fallen of all the Scottish services: land, sea and air.

The Scottish National War Memorial was designed by Sir Robert Lorimer (1864-1929), an architect with a love of traditional detail, and he encouraged sculptors to work with him. The Memorial is a major feature within the grounds of Edinburgh Castle, created to honour over 100,000 Scots killed in the war. It had been an 18th-century barracks, and Lorimer transformed the interior into a vaulted Hall of Honour with a casket holding the names of the dead as the focal point. On the bare basalt of Castle Rock is an altar of Ailsa Craig granite. At its corners, bronze angels kneel in prayer around the casket.

Roof bosses were carved by Pilkington Jackson, heraldic stained glass was designed by Douglas Strachan, and bronze reliefs of the various armed services tell some of their own astonishing stories. 

Opened by the Prince of Wales in 1927, it remains a shrine of great resonance today.

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