Edinburgh demolition excavations

The remains of a house occupied by one of Edinburgh’s most respected 18th-century judges and the pioneer of evolutionary theory have been uncovered by archaeologists amid the demolition of Old Town vaults.

Experts believe the home - one of many buried for more than a century underneath the Waverley Station car park in New Street - was that of the eccentric Lord Monboddo.

The site, which also includes Victorian vaults covering more than 8,000 square metres, is being cleared to make way for new city council headquarters being built at New Street and East Market Street. . .

Archaeologists have excavated substantial foundations which they believe may form part of the house belonging to Lord Monboddo, whose 1773 book Of the Origin and Progress of Language expressed evolutionary theory almost a century before Charles Darwin.

Posted by David on November 2, 2004 12:48 PM