This is Queen Mary’s Bath House (in Edinburgh), and has been dated by archaeologists to the year 1565. Despite the name, there is there is no evidence to support the notion that it was ever used as a “Bath House”. The idea of Mary, Queen of Scots, bathing surfaces as early as 1776 in John Pinkertons’s ‘Elegy on Craigmiller Castle:
“That chamber where the queen, whose charms divine
Made wond’ring nations own the power of love,
Oft bathed her snowy limbs in sparkling wine,
Now proves a lonely refuge for the dove.”
We always photograph this quirky little, two storey, building on our Edinburgh Photography Tour. Indeed, there are some suggestions that this structure may be the oldest surviving pavilion in the world. Such are the mysteries of Scottish History!