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New Romantics: fans are flocking to Culross, where 'Outlander' was filmed
If you stumbled across Culross on a summer’s day, you could be forgiven for thinking you’d wandered into a Dutch master’s painting. And you wouldn’t be entirely wrong. The charismatic, curiously foreign-looking Fife village could be the lost cousin of some far-away burgh; I was eight when I first visited, and can still remember my dad crouching to explain how the roofs of the buildings there, with their jagged edges and orange tiles, came to look so different.
The former port, one of the most complete examples of a 17th-century village in Britain, has a long history of trade with the Low Countries, Scandinavia, and the Baltics. But that summer my dad kept it simple — he pointed at the seashore and told me how, in the olden days, boats left there for France and Belgium loaded with Scottish coal and salt, and on their return brought back building materials, including those distinctive orange tiles that are still ubiquitous in Culross today. Later I’d hunt down the architectural terms to describe those Flemish influences: pantiles, crowsteps, gablets.
Culross suffered a very gradual loss of purpose. The harbour was filled in late in the 19th century, replaced by a rusted railway line and later a Pay and Display car park. In 1900, the village was described as “a decayed royal burgh containing many old houses”, and by the Eighties, when my dad first took me there, the place had been ghostly for decades — the water was quiet, the buildings were flaking and sad, nothing much moved but net curtains and chimney smoke. There was little life and definitely no chance of an ice cream.
Yet this small town boasted an illustrious history: it was one of Britain’s very first industrial villages. It owed its fine reputation to Sir George Bruce of Carnock (1550-1625), the engineer, merchant, MP and Privy Councillor who brought great wealth in the 16th and 17th centuries through exports of local coal and salt. Bruce earned the hamlet the title of “royal burgh” from King James VI in 1588, and went on to build the mustard-colour Culross Palace — his great lodging — which remains Culross’ most popular tourist attraction. By the time of his death, he employed 175 miners and owned 44 salt pans in the local area.
By far his greatest achievement was the Moat Pit — a coal mine under the sea. This wildly ambitious mining operation showcased Bruce’s skills as an engineer, 150 years before the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. The Moat Pit shaft, a watertight tower of stone projecting up off the seabed, was built 450m from the shore and allowed Bruce access to the otherwise unreachable coal reserves under Culross Bay. Extracted coal could be loaded from the artificial island of the tower onto waiting boats which then headed straight for England and the Continent.
The shaft was a phenomenal achievement, unprecedented in Britain, and it drew admirers from throughout the country. One visitor, the English poet John Taylor, wrote: “Neither in any travels that I have beene in, nor any history that I have read, or any discourse that I have heard, did neither see, read, or heare of any worke of men that might parallel or equivalent with this unfellowed and unmatchable worke.” Even Ben Johnson, the most famous writer in the country at the time, visited during his peregrination on foot across Britain between 1618-19.
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SubscribeWhy no mention of Culross Abbey surely the most impressive building in the place. Founded in 1217 it is still, remarkably, in use even in its semi ruined state, which is unusual given the savagery of the Reformation in Scotland.
I known Culross (prunounced cuh-ros) well, as it is not far from where I live, and I can say that it has been like that at least for 10 years, well before Outlander. I was there just recently and it doesn’t seem to have changed post Outlander.
Thank you.
I must admit that the bit of Fife West of the M90 is unexplored territory to me, although we once took a “cruise” from Rosyth (the truck ferry to Zeebrugge).
It’s a jewel on the coast, well restored and maintained and we’ve visited a numer of times as NTS members. The terraced garden behind the palace is worth a visit on its own and gives even better views of the Forth estuary. The abbey up the hill is fine too although not focused on tourism. Another Outlander filming location only 40 minutes north east in Fife is Falkland and Falkland Palace is just as worthy of a visit, again with lovely gardens and an ancient enclosed tennis court and run by the NTS.
I am perhaps rare amongst Unherd readers, in that my middle name is Culross. My father, a Scot raised in Edinburgh, gave me this name to honour our ancestor, John Blaw, who made girdling irons (for cooking Scotch pancakes and similar) in Culross. He is, from memory, mentioned in one of the rooms of the ‘castle’. At least thats what I remember from visiting when I was 8.
Culross is lovely and only a short bus ride from other historical sites in Dunfermline.