Brechin Cathedral

Brechin Cathedral
Brechin, Angus
Status:	parish church
The Cathedral and Round Tower
	Church of Scotland
	Presbytery of Angus
Location
Location:	56°43’55"N, 2°39’42"W
History
Information
Website:	http://www.brechincathedral.org

Brechin Cathedral is the parish church of Brechin in Angus, within the Church of Scotland. The church dates from the 13th century.

Though it uses the title 'Cathedral' for historic reasons, the kirk only a parish church; it ceased to be a cathedral, which is to say the seat of a bishop with the abolition of that office in the Church of Scotland in 1690.

The cathedral is built in the Pointed style, but suffered maltreatment in 1806 at the hands of restorers, whose work was subsequently removed during the restoration completed in 1902. The western gable with its flamboyant window, Gothic door and massive square tower, parts of the (much truncated) choir, and the nave pillars and clerestory are all that is left of the original edifice. The modern stained glass in the chancel is reckoned amongst the finest in Scotland.

Round Tower

Immediately adjoining the cathedral to the southwest stands the Round Tower, built about 1000 A.D. It is 86 feet high, has at the base a circumference of 50 feet and a diameter of 16 feet, and is capped with a hexagonal spire of 18 feet, added in the 14th century. This type of structure is somewhat common in Ireland, but the only examples in Great Britain are those at Brechin and at Abernethy in Perthshire.

The quality of the masonry is superior to all but a very few of the Irish examples. The narrow single doorway, raised some feet above ground level in a manner common in these buildings, is also exceptionally fine. The door-surround is enriched with two bands of pellets, and the monolithic arch has a well-preserved representation of the Crucifixion. The slightly splayed sides of the doorway (also monolithic) have relief sculptures of ecclesiastics, one of them holding a crosier, the other a Tau-shaped staff.

Two monuments preserved within the cathedral, the so-called 'Brechin hogback', and a cross-slab, 'St. Mary's Stone' are further rare and important examples of Scottish 11th century stone sculpture. The hogback combines Celtic and Scandinavian motifs, and is the most complex known stone sculpture in the 'Ringerike' style in Scotland. The inscribed St Mary's Stone has a circular border round the central motif of the Virgin and Child which echoes that on the Round Tower.

Pictures

• 
  Stained glass: The crucifixion (1902)
• 
  Stained glass window
• 
  Historical view in 1727
• 
  Interior
• 
  The Brechin Hogback
• 
  Doorway
• 
  Exterior
• 
  Historic view

Outside links

• Brechin Cathedral
• Brechin Cathedral Round Tower
• Angus history - Brechin Cathedral
• Brechin Round Tower

References

• Brechin Cathedral and Round Tower, Lumina Technologies, July, 2005