Tulliallan - Old Castle

Old Castle

The first fortification at Tulliallan was built some time before 1304, when it was ordered to be strengthened by Edward I of England. The position was strategic, near the main ferry over the Forth, and in 1304 Edward I gave orders for the walls of "Tolyalwyn" to be strengthened. Presumably this would have included strengthening the D-shaped moat and the outer rampart, making the position strong against attack across the marshy land, which would not be drained until the 18th century. There would have been buildings within the enclosure, but the old castle was probably built later, by the Douglasses.

The Douglas castle was initially an L-shaped two-storey building of ashlar masonry, with a tower at the southwest corner holding the main entrance, which was reached by a drawbridge. Most of the ground floor had small, square windows, while there were large slits above. The interior was unusual in that there were important rooms on the ground floor. The ceilings of these rooms included ribbed vaults springing from octagonal piers. The house was extended in the fifteenth century, and a major reconstruction seems to have been undertaken in the late sixteenth century.

The castle was surrounded by a moat, which would have been filled by water from the Firth of Forth, which in the old days extended further inland. An 1853 account of the then-ruined building said "two narrow posterns open from each end of the southern front, of which that on the east opens into an apartment which has been termed the great hall, where three compartments are curiously formed by elegant groined arches, which rest upon a central octagonal column, the whole being in a state of remarkable preservation. In 1885 the old castle, although ruined, was still described as an imposing-looking edifice.