Listening To Pictures – Art and Music in the Early Renaissance

The name of the village of Athelstaneford is steeped in the most ancient history of Scotland. It is where the original saltire - the white diagonal cross on a sky-blue background – is said to have been first adopted. Legend has it that, on the eve of a battle between Picts and Scots, led by Angus Mac Fergus, High King of Alba, and Angles and Saxons led by Athelstan in 832AD, Saint Andrew, who was crucified on a diagonal cross, came to the Pictish king in a vision and promised him victory. The next morning the Picts saw a white cross formed by clouds in the sky. They won the battle and attributed their victory to Saint Andrew, adopting his form of the cross as their flag, and naming him as their patron saint.  Athelstan was said to have been killed at a nearby river crossing, hence the name Athelstaneford. The identities of the protagonists are disputed but the legend has certainly secured the village’s place in Scotland's history.

The village as we now see it was planned on its high ridge in the 18^th century by Sir David Kinloch of the nearby Gilmerton estate, replacing the ancient settlement on lower ground. The original church of Athelstaneford was built in 1176 by Ada de Warenne, wife of Prince Henry of Scotland, Earl of Huntingdon and son of King David I. This continued to be the parish church until 1780 when the new church was erected.  It has been little altered since then and it has its own memorial to the bloody history of the area in the gravestone on the western wall to Adam Skirving (1719-1803) author of the popular Jacobite song ‘Hey, Johnny Cope’. It commemorates another nearby battle – the defeat of the Hanoverian Army under Sir John Cope by Jacobite forces at Prestonpans on 21 September 1745. Most Scots know the song, with its ironic refrain: Hey! Johnnie Cope are ye waukin’ yet? Or are your drums a-beatin’ yet?