Dundee Law

Dundee Law
Angus
Summit:	571 feet NO391313 56°28’11"N, 2°59’24"W

Dundee Law is a hill in the centre of Dundee, Angus, surrounded by the townscape and the highest point in the town centre. It is what remains of a volcanic sill.

The hill is just to the north-east of the old town centre of Dundee, and the city has developed all around and over its flanks. With a large war memorial at its summit, the hill is the most prominent feature on the local skyline.

The hill is named from the City, and the common Scots word for a hill, from the Old English hlaw.

Geology

The hill is formed of the remains of a volcanic sill. Lava was forced through fissures in old red sandstone from a volcanic area miles to the west. Actions by subsequent rain, wind and ice movements eroded the sandstone. The glaciers of the ice ages deposited more debris around the base creating a crag and tail. The shallow gradient of the slopes on the north and eastern sides of the law suggest a north easterly movement of ice flows. The hill's summit is at 571 feet above sea level.

Despite the tautology involved, the Law is commonly referred to as the "Law Hill".

Skyline and the Firth of Tay seen from the Dundee Law

History

War Memorial

Archaeological evidence of burials suggest that the law may have been used by settlers 3,500 years ago. During the Iron Age it was the site of a Pictish settlement. Roman pottery has been found on the law, suggesting that the Romans may have used it as a lookout post in the first century, or that the pottery was traded.

On 13 April 1689: Viscount Dundee, known as ‘Bonnie Dundee’, raised the Stuart Royal Standard on the Law, which marked the beginning of the first Jacobite rising.

The Law has a tunnel which runs through it. Closed in the 1980s, it used to be used for the railway to Newtyle. In 2014 a campaign was started to reopen it as a tourist attraction.

A war memorial to the fallen in both World Wars was constructed atop the summit which was first unveiled on 16 May 1925. In the years 1992 to 1994 the facilities on the summit of the Law were upgraded by the local council. The memorial is lit with a large flame at its top on a number of significant days, for example 25 September in memory of the Battle of Loos, in which many members of the local Black Watch regiment lost their lives, and on Armistice Day and Remembrance Sunday.