The Corpus of ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE in Britain & Ireland
Midlothian (now)
Ruined parish church
The ruins of the church centre around a rectangular structure with N and S additions. Dates in the 16thc and 17thc for the primary post-Reformation additions have been suggested, but there is no surviving documentation concerning this work. Major construction on the the church is only first recorded for 1739-40, when certain renovations were carried out. Minor repair and maintenance is documented in succeeding decades, including for replastering in 1776, but no major construction is recorded after 1740. Following much consideration in the early 19thc about the cost of renovating the church, it was decided to rebuild on a completely different site. The new church was begun in 1818.
During the 1993 excavations, earlier activity beneath the church was found, but there was no evidence of a pre-Romanesque church. Foundations of the Romanesque church were discovered with a chamfered plinth beneath the N and S walls and for the original W wall, which was further E than at present. These showed that the first church was about half the length of the present structure.
Within the surviving nave walls of the church are reused stones from the Romanesque church. Other carved stonework, with roll mouldings, survive and are laid out in the E part of the church, now overgrown. There is also a single head of beakhead form built into the E exterior of the S extension.
Ruined parish church
A blocked doorway with tympanum in the N wall, the remains of a stringcourse on the original nave exterior and a section of base stones are the only carved features that survive from the 12th or early-13th century church. A north extension was built off the N side of the nave in the 17th century, but in 1793 a newly constructed church, on a new site, was opened. The old church was abandoned and quickly turned into burial enclosures. As the ruins deteriorated, the W tower became dangerous, so in 1866 work was begun to strengthen it. During the operations, the tower collapsed. Some drawings made before this show the structure as it formerly existed, including the exterior of the doorway on the S side of the nave.
Ruined church
The present parish church (St Mungo’s) dates from 1771 and is built on a new site near the old church. The surviving ruins of the earlier church seem to date from the 17thc. and early 18thc. In 1648, the church minutes record that the church was in need of significant repairs and in a memorandum of 1743, Sir John Clerk states that he had in 1733 built an aisle in the church, as the church had become too small. He also states that he had built the steeple of the church, which is presumed to refer to the surviving west tower. After 1771, the site of the old church was gradually sold off for burial. The only known evidence for a Romanesque church on this site is a multi-scallop capital re-used at ground level on the W nave wall (E ext. of the W tower). The plan of the Romanesque church, itself, is unknown.