St. Giles Cathedral

St. Giles Cathedral was founded in 1124 by King Alexandre I or by King David I. Giles himself was a 7th century Greek hermit who lived in the forests near Nimes in the south of France with a tame deer. One day the King of Visigoths was out hunting and shot the deer with an arrow. The King went looking for the deer and found it held protectively in the arms of Giles, who had been wounded in the hand by the arrow, the King was so impressed he convinced Giles to become the abbot of the monastery which he founded for him. From the 12th century to the 16th century St. Giles Cathedral grew in physical size. The population of Edinburgh was growing rapidly and in 1584 the town council decided to divide the cathedral into four parishes, each with its own church. The largest of the churches occupied the chancel of St. Giles, which was then called the East Kirk, the High Kirk or the New Kirk. The crossing and part of the nave became the Auld Kirk (Old Church) or Great Kirk. The south west end became the Tolbooth Kirk or the West Kirk, and the north west end was the Haddo's Hole Kirk. The division of the churches would last until William Chambers started his great restoration project in the 1870s and 1880s.