City
of Glasgow
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City
of Glasgow
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Although not Scotland's capital, Glasgow is its largest city and in the 19th century was the second city of the British Empire. However, its industrial significance now perhaps overshadows the city's historical role as a place of both religious and scholastic importance. Tradition has it that in the 6th century St. Mungo (also called St. Kentigern) established a church on the north bank of the Clyde on the place where Glasgow Cathedral now stands. In the 12th century work started on the cathedral, which was consecrated in 1197. It seems unlikely that the town itself was of any great importance in those days, however, but in the 15th century the University was founded by Bishop Turnbull, making it the second oldest in Scotland and the fourth in Great Britain. Scotland's great patriot, William Wallace, was born in Elderslie, Renfrewshire, not far from Glasgow. One might not normally associate the city's Stockwell Street with anything macabre, but the story goes that during the Scottish wars of independence Wallace defeated an English force on the north bank of the Clyde. Wishing to dispose of the English corpses, Wallace ordered his men to throw the bodies down the Ratton Well, advising them to "Stock it well!" Ratton Well has long since disappeared, and in its place is Stockwell Street. Wallace's eventual betrayal, incidentally, was plotted in just upriver in Rutherglen by Sir John Menteith and others, and it was Menteith who actually captured Wallace in Robroyston on Glasgow's north-east perimeter in 1305 and took him to London for execution. One might have hoped that Menteith would have met a sticky end, but in 1312 he threw in his lot with Robert Bruce and ended up being one of the signatories to the nation's Declaration of Independence in Arbroath in 1320, eventually dying in his bed. The 16th century and the Reformation proved to be a time of strife for Glasgow. In 1544 the town was plundered by the army of James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran, and in 1560 the Cathedral was ransacked, although not harmed structurally - to this day it remains one of only two complete medieval cathedrals in Scotland (the other is St Magnus Cathedral, Kirkwall, Orkney). At the Battle of Langside (near Queens Park, Glasgow) in 1568 Mary Queen of Scots' 6,000-strong army was defeated in 45 minutes by the troops of her half-brother Lord James Stewart, Regent of Scotland, effectively forcing Mary to flee to England. There was further warfare and a siege of the city in the 1570s. Notwithstanding the ravages of the plague of 1646 and the great city fires of 1652 and 1677, Glasgow's importance as a mercantile centre grew rapidly in the 17th century. Trade in tobacco, sugar and cotton with the colonies of the New World brought substantial growth, and by the 19th century the city was an industrial giant and had far outstripped its rival Edinburgh both in population and commercial importance. Although the 20th century brought industrial decline, Glasgow today is a vibrant, stylish and cultured city which stands on the edge of some of Scotland's most stunning countryside. Glasgow's boundaries have changed several times over the last 100 years and our map of the city shows it as it was between 1975 and 1996, when the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1994 came into effect. Included in the 28 buildings depicted in the kit are some of the city's best known, including Glasgow Cathedral, the University, the City Chambers, the Tron Steeple, the SCWS Building, the Art Gallery & Museum, and Alexander "Greek" Thomson's Caledonia Road Church. Our map of Glasgow measures 14 x 10½ inches (358 x 268 mm) when stitched on the recommended Linda 27-count evenweave, and has 28 buildings, two cranes, place names, city crest, and the Tolbooth as the compass. Thirty shades of stranded cotton are required. Stitch count is 190 x 142.
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