A mile south of the village of Roslin in Midlothian, the ground falls sharply into the gorge of the North Esk river, and in the cliff face above the water a castle clings to the rock — not built on top of it, but carved partly from it, its foundations indistinguishable from the geology of the gorge itself. Rosslyn Castle is one of the most dramatically situated tower houses in Lowland Scotland, and it sits in the shadow — literally and culturally — of Rosslyn Chapel, the extraordinary collegiate church begun by the Sinclair earls of Orkney in 1446 and made famous to a new generation by Dan Brown's novel The Da Vinci Code. The castle predates the chapel by several decades and has a history quite as remarkable as its more celebrated neighbour. The Sinclair clan who built both structures are one of the most fascinating families in Scottish heritage — Norman knights who became earls of Orkney, hereditary Grand Masters of Scottish Freemasonry, and custodians of one of the most elaborately decorated small churches in Europe.
What is Rosslyn Castle and where is it?
Rosslyn Castle is a ruined fourteenth and fifteenth-century castle in Roslin, Midlothian, Scotland, about 7 miles (11 km) south of Edinburgh. It sits on a rocky promontory in the gorge of the North Esk river, with steep drops to the water on three sides. The castle is managed by the Landmark Trust, who rent out the surviving habitable portion — a seventeenth-century residential block within the original castle fabric — as a self-catering holiday property. The castle ruins, chapel, and gorge walks are accessible to the public. Rosslyn Chapel, a separate institution, is independently managed and operated as a visitor attraction about 300 metres from the castle.
Which clan built Rosslyn Castle?
Clan Sinclair — one of the great Norman-descended families of Scotland — built and held Rosslyn Castle from the twelfth century onward. The Sinclairs arrived in Scotland from Saint-Clair-sur-Epte in Normandy and were granted the barony of Rosslyn in the early twelfth century. They rose through royal service to become one of the most powerful families in Scotland, and at their peak in the fifteenth century the St Clair (Sinclair) earls of Orkney held the earldom of Orkney, the earldom of Caithness, and the barony of Rosslyn simultaneously — a territorial extent that made them among the most powerful nobles in the kingdom. The third earl, William St Clair, surrendered the earldom of Orkney to the Scottish crown in 1470 and concentrated his ambitions on Rosslyn — it was he who built the chapel that bears the family's greatest cultural legacy.
How old is Rosslyn Castle?
The site has been associated with the Sinclair family since the early twelfth century, but the surviving castle fabric dates from the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. The main tower was built around 1302–1307, and the castle was extended significantly in the fifteenth century. The residential block that the Landmark Trust manages dates from around 1622 — a seventeenth-century addition that provided comfortable accommodation within the older castle walls. The gorge setting and the integration of the castle into the living rock give Rosslyn a geological antiquity that adds to its atmosphere beyond the strictly architectural.
The Sinclair earls of Orkney — Scotland's most extraordinary noble family
The Sinclair earls of Orkney deserve a word of their own. Henry Sinclair, first earl, is the subject of one of the most extraordinary claims in Scottish genealogical mythology: that he led an expedition to North America in 1398 — nearly a century before Columbus — reaching what is now Nova Scotia and possibly Massachusetts. The claim is based on a fifteenth-century document known as the Zeno Narrative and on circumstantial evidence including the Westford Knight carving in Massachusetts. Whether or not the expedition actually took place, the myth reflects the Sinclair family's genuine connection to the North Atlantic world through their Orkney earldom, and it has made them a focus of enormous popular interest in Scotland and North America alike.
Rosslyn Chapel and the Da Vinci Code
Rosslyn Chapel — properly the Collegiate Church of St Matthew — was begun by William St Clair, third Earl of Orkney, in 1446. It was intended as the first part of a much larger collegiate church, but only the choir was completed before William's death in 1484. The chapel is famous for its extraordinary density of carved stone decoration — hundreds of carvings covering every surface, including the Apprentice Pillar (a column of exceptional quality around which legend has constructed an elaborate story of a murdered apprentice and his master), the green men, the corn cobs (sometimes cited as evidence of pre-Columbian American contact), and dozens of other motifs. Dan Brown's 2003 novel The Da Vinci Code brought the chapel to global attention by making it the location of the Holy Grail — a fictional conceit that drove a massive increase in visitor numbers that has never entirely subsided. The historical chapel is remarkable enough without the fiction.
The Landmark Trust at Rosslyn Castle
The Landmark Trust — a charity that rescues historic buildings by offering them as holiday lets — manages the habitable portion of Rosslyn Castle as a self-catering property available to rent for stays of a week or more. Guests sleep and live within the seventeenth-century residential block of the castle, in rooms that look out over the North Esk gorge on one side and toward the chapel on the other. The combination of the castle's geological drama, the gorge walks, and the proximity of Rosslyn Chapel makes this one of the most distinctive heritage holiday experiences available in Scotland.
The Battle of Roslin — 1303
The area around Rosslyn Castle was the site of one of the more remarkable Scottish victories of the Wars of Independence. At the Battle of Roslin in February 1303, a Scottish force under Simon Fraser and John Comyn defeated three successive divisions of an English army in a single day — an engagement that temporarily halted the English advance in Lothian and demonstrated that Scottish resistance remained viable even in the darkest period of the independence wars. Our article on the Battle of Roslin 1303 covers this episode in full.
Visiting Rosslyn Castle today
The castle exterior and gorge walks are freely accessible. The Landmark Trust cottage within the castle can be booked for self-catering stays. Rosslyn Chapel is separately managed and charges admission — it is open year-round. For those exploring Midlothian's heritage, our Borthwick Castle guide and Crichton Castle guide cover two other remarkable Midlothian castles within easy reach. Our legendary Scottish clan sites roundup situates all three within the broader sweep of Scottish heritage.
Why Rosslyn endures
Rosslyn endures because the Sinclair family built two extraordinary things here — a castle carved from a gorge and a chapel of inexhaustible decorative richness — and because the combination of the two, in their wooded valley south of Edinburgh, creates one of the most atmospheric heritage landscapes in Lowland Scotland. For anyone with Sinclair ancestry — one of the most widespread Scottish clan names in the diaspora — Rosslyn is the most emotionally concentrated encounter with that family's remarkable history. Find your clan name at Celtic Ancestry Gifts — mugs, woven blankets, apparel, ornaments, and garden flags for hundreds of Scottish and Irish heritage names including Sinclair.
