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Edinburgh (pronounced ED-in-burra (SAMPA: ["Ed@n%b@r@])), Dùn Éideann in Scottish Gaelic, is a major and historic city on the east coast of Scotland on the south shore of the Firth of Forth, and in the unitary local authority of City of Edinburgh. It has been the capital of Scotland since 1492 and is the site of the Scottish Parliament, which was re-established in 1999. The Old and New Towns of Edinburgh were listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1995. In the census of 2001 Edinburgh had a total resident population of 448,624.
Edinburgh is well known for the Edinburgh Festival, a collection of several arts festivals, and for the Hogmanay celebrations which are becoming one of the largest in the world.
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The origin of the city's name is understood to come from the Brythonic Din Eidyn (Fort of Eidyn) from the time when it was a Gododdin hillfort, perhaps, as David Nash Ford (http://www.earlybritishkingdoms.com/articles/nenniuscities.htm) suggests, when it was the home of the mid-6th century King Clinog Eitin whose epithet records the placename.
After it was besieged by the Bernician Angles the name changed to Edin-burh, which some have argued derives from the Anglo-Saxon for Edwin's fort, possibly derived from the 7th century Northumbrian king Edwin. However, since the name apparently predates King Edwin, this is highly unlikely.
The city is affectionately nicknamed "Auld Reekie" (Old Smokey). Some have called it the "Athens of the North" in reference to its neoclassical Georgian architecture (including the National Monument; see below) and its 18th century intellectual life, sometimes referred to as the Scottish Enlightenment and among which shone beacons like David Hume and Adam Smith. One writer facetiously said that the "Reykjavik of the South" would be more appropriate!
Edinburgh has also been known as "Dunedin", deriving from the Scottish Gaelic, Dùn Éideann. Dunedin, New Zealand, was originally called "New Edinburgh", and is still nicknamed "The Edinburgh of the South".
The Scots poet Robert Fergusson sometimes referred to the city as "Edina" in his work.
Some Scots refer to the city affectionally and informally as "Embra".
The historic centre of Edinburgh is divided into two by the broad green swath of the Princes Street Gardens. To the south the view is dominated by Edinburgh Castle, perched atop an extinct volcanic crag, and the long sweep of Old Town trailing after it along the ridge. To the north lies Princes Street and the New Town. The gardens were begun in 1816 on marsh land which had once been a loch, the Nor'Loch.
Some 70 million years ago several volcanic vents in the area cooled and solidified to form tough basalt volcanic plugs, then later a glacier swept from west to east, exposing rocky crags to the west and leaving a tail of material swept to the east. At the castle rock this tail formed a narrow steep sided ridge, declining in height over a mile till it meets general ground level at Holyrood. At the same time, the glacier gouged out ground to each side, leaving the ravine of the Grassmarket and Cowgate to the south, and the swampy valley of the Nor'Loch to the north.
This formed a natural fortress, and recent excavations at the castle (described in Excavations within Edinburgh Castle by Stephen T. Driscoll & Peter Yeoman, Society of Antiquaries Scotland Monograph Series 12 1997) found material dating back to the Late Bronze Age, as long ago as 850 BC.
In the 1st century the Romans recorded the Votadini as a British tribe in the area, and about 600 the poem Y Gododdin using the Brythonic form of that name describes warriors feasting in Eidin's great hall.
The map coordinates of the centre of Edinburgh are approximately 55°57' N, 3°11' W.
The Old Town has preserved its medieval plan and many reformation-era buildings. One end is closed by the castle and the main street (the Royal Mile) leads away from it; minor streets (called closes or wynds) bud off the main spine in a herringbone pattern. Large squares mark the location of markets, or surround major public buildings such as St Giles Cathedral. This layout, typical of the old quarters of many northern European cities, is made especially picturesque in Edinburgh, where the castle perches on top of a small mountain and the main street runs down the crest of a ridge from it.
The old city is also home to some of the earliest "high rise" residential buildings. During the 1700s the Old Town had a population of about 80,000 residents, however in modern times it has reduced dramatically to just 4,000 residents. The population was for a long time reluctant to build outside the defensive wall, so as the need for housing grew the buildings became higher and higher. However many of these buildings were destroyed in the Great Fire of 1824. They were then rebuilt on the original foundations. This led to changes in the ground level and the creation of many passages and vaults under Old Town.
On December 7, 2002, another major fire in the Old Town engulfed part of the Cowgate. It destroyed the famous comedy club The Gilded Balloon and much of the Informatics department of the University of Edinburgh, including the comprehensive AI library.
The New Town north of the gardens and Princes Street, was begun in the latter 18th century; it has grown greatly since then, but to this day it remains a very fine example of Georgian town-planning and architecture.
Leith is the port of Edinburgh. It still retains a separate identity to Edinburgh, and it was a matter of great resentment when Leith was merged into Edinburgh. Even today the parliamentary seat is known as 'Edinburgh North and Leith'.
The varied topography of the city includes several summits which command sweeping views over Edinburgh.
To the southeast of central Edinburgh stands the eminence known as Arthur's Seat, overlooking Holyrood House and the Old Town beside it. The crag is a collection of side vents of the main volcano on which Edinburgh is built. The volcano slipped and tipped sideways, leaving these vents the highest points for miles around. Arthur's Seat is now part of Holyrood Park, originally owned by the monarch and part of the grounds of the Palace of Holyroodhouse. It contains Britain's largest concentration of geological SSSIs, as well as providing the people of Edinburgh with spectacular views of and from Arthur's Seat and somewhere to relax after a long day in the city.
To the northeast, overlooking the New Town, is Calton Hill. It is topped by an assortment of buildings and monuments: two observatories, a tower dedicated to Admiral Horatio Nelson, the old Royal High School (once almost the home of a devolved Parliament), and an unfinished national monument modeled on the Parthenon from the Athenian Acropolis, which is nicknamed Edinburgh's Disgrace. It was commissioned by the city of Edinburgh independently on behalf of the nation to commemorate Admiral Nelson's victory at Trafalgar. When Edinburgh ran out of money substantially before completion, the city of Glasgow offered to fund the remainder of construction; Edinburgh refused to take the money and the building remains not much more than a frontage to this day.
With the redevelopment of Leith – Edinburgh's sea port, once a town in its own right – Edinburgh has gained the business of a number of cruise liner companies who now provide cruises to Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands from Leith. Leith also boasts the Royal Yacht Britannia, berthed behind the new Ocean Terminal.
Edinburgh has two football clubs; Hibernian and Heart of Midlothian. Both play in the Scottish Premier League.
Rugby internationals and some football and American football games are played at Murrayfield stadium, owned by the Scottish Rugby Union.
Edinburgh Dialect (http://www.scots-online.org/grammar/edinburgh.htm)
Edinburgh is twinned to several cities across Europe and throughout the rest of the world. These include:
The name Edinburgh has also been given to places elsewhere in the world, mainly by Scottish settlers:
The Scots Gaelic name Dùn Éideann has also been given to other cities, including:
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