The Egyptian Portal to the Land of the Dead

The fascinating story behind Edinburgh's most intriguing gravestone

The Egyptian Portal to the Land of the Dead in Grange Cemetery

It sounds like make believe. Something perhaps from the imagination of a science fiction writer. Maybe the title of a lost novella by HG Wells.

The Egyptian Portal to the Land of the Dead.

It is, however, entirely real. Take a wander through Grange Cemetery and you can find it. The easiest way is to enter by the West Gate, walk past the final resting place of Hugh Miller, the campaigning newspaper editor and ‘father of geology’, and that of the Rev Thomas Chalmers, the great disruptor and founder of the Free Kirk, and there it is in all its glory. Of course, as is so often the case in life, taking the longer route can be much more fun, writes Euan McGrory.

It is as dramatic and intriguing as its name suggests. Stopping to take it all in only adds to the mystery. The intricately carved palm tree, the twin obelisks, the ancient Egyptian heiroglyph (a Sa symbols representing protection) and, most enticing of all, the false door. 

There is an almost over-riding temptation to give the door a hefty kick to see if it opens up. Maybe it leads to a dusty and cobwebbed tunnel, like the ones the intrepid Indiana Jones would leap into in search of buried treasure. 

What is it doing here? How did it come to be created in a genteel suburb of Edinburgh?

The story behind the memorial offers a window into the life of Victorian Edinburgh. It is just as fascinating in its own way, taking in disruptive innovation, global entrepreneurial success, fabulous wealth, artisan craftsmanship and the foibles of 19th century fashion.

The fishing net millionaires

Our story starts in Musselburgh on the banks of the Esk, more than 200 years ago, where the enterprising Colonel James Paterson watched the local fishermen spending long winter days sewing the heavy nets they took out into the Firth of Forth.

Paterson, a cooper, or barrel maker, by trade, knew he could do better. It was a time of great innovation, the Industrial Revolution was gathering steam. In the same year that Elias Howe invented the sewing machine in the United States, 1812, James patented his own invention, the fishing net loom, said to be capable of tying knots at the rate of a dozen manual workers. 

The machine was a success. It would become the basis of a business that would conquer half the world, creating untold riches, but not for Paterson. His net-making business was a success, but would only take off in a spectacular fashion after his death.

Brothers John and William Stuart had followed their father into Edinburgh’s booming wine trade. When Paterson died in 1849, they had the wherewithal and eye for an opportunity to buy the business and patent for his knot-tying machine from his estate.

Within a decade, they had overseen a dramatic expansion, moving into a factory on the banks of the Esk in Musselburgh, which would at its height employ more than 800 people, and turning the company into a global enterprise. JW Stuart had offices or factories in the United States, Canada, Australia and Africa. Their “Scotch weave nets” were known around the globe as a guarantee of quality.

The business, largely driven by William, would go on to enjoy decades of success, only losing its position as a world leader when it failed to adapt quickly enough to new netting materials, such as nylon. It would eventually close 130 years after the Stuart brothers took it on and transformed it.

Eskmills, Musselburgh, the former home of JW Stuart, as it is today. Note the ornate classical style and architectural flourishes of the factory building.

A tomb crafted for a family dynasty

By 1868, when the family were hit by tragedy, William Stuart was a very wealthy man, with international business interests including banking in the US. The family were rich enough to buy a mansion at Braco, in Perthshire, as well as owning property in Edinburgh.

William was a relatively fit and healthy man when his wife Susan died at the age of 57. The couple had seven children, many of whom would go on to make their mark in the professional and business life of the Capital.

The grieving husband and father decided to commission one of the city’s foremost sculptors, Robert Thomson, to create a fitting memorial for his wife, which would also be a family tomb.

He chose a plot in Grange Cemetery. Opened little more than 20 years, it was the largest of the city’s five new garden cemeteries, offering space to create family memorials in a park-style setting, an attractive alternative to the cramped and largely full historic graveyards.

The work of the city’s artisan craftsmen was highly prized by the Victorians. Thomson was among the best known and most accomplished. The lasting allure of the memorial he created is largely down to his magnificent skill. The beautifully rendered palm leaves and tree stumps are a powerful testament to his gifts.

Although he was working from Haymarket Terrace at the time, he would go on to become closely associated with another of Edinburgh’s ‘garden cemeteries, at Dalry. There, he created several memorials for the great and the good of the Capital, and would later ply his trade from a workshop at the cemetery gates. Today, he is largely forgotten as an artist, but lies peacefully in Dalry Cemetery, under a headstone carved by his own hand.

The beautiful intricacy of Robert Thomson’s carving in stone.

Egyptomania

The choice of Thomson to create the family memorial was an obvious one, but why the Egyptian influence, complete with hieroglyphs and palm tree?

The answer lies in the Victorian fascination with the ancient world of the pharaohs.

Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt at the turn of the eighteen and nineteenth century, accompanied by industrial-scale ransacking of historic sites for trophies to bring back to Europe, sparked what has been described as Egyptomania across the continent. The deciphering of the Rosetta Stone vastly accelerated the knowledge of, and interest in, the ancient culture around the Nile.

“With increased travel to the country, resulting in numerous written accounts of its history and geography, the Victorian imagination was ignited by new ideas of the past and fresh, unexplored destinations for the present. The craze for Egyptian objects sparked innovation in design, incorporating elements from the country’s ancient buildings and parchments,” explains Michael Gouck, an author and expert on the art of the Victorian period.

“Writers and artists made their way to Egypt, eager to discover and depict all that Egypt offered in journals, books, and paintings. For the rest of the century, Egyptian history and the stylistic features found in its artifacts influenced many parts of British culture in art, architecture, and literature.”

Arthur Conan Doyle’s Gothic horror short story Lot No. 249, about an Egyptology student and the mummy that comes into his possession, is just one example of its influence on Scottish art. There are several paintings with Egyptian themes from the period, by artists such as Arthur Melville who visited Africa, in the collection of the National Galleries of Scotland.

The Victorian obsession can at times seem bizarre to modern eyes. ‘Mummy unwrapping parties’, held in theatres and at private dinner parties, under a thin veil of scientific interest, have been well documented, as well as the eating of Mummies in the belief they had mystical curative powers. However, much of the interest in the culture of ancient Egypt was regarded as sophisticated and steeped in ancient wisdom.

Catacombs

The Egyptian influence on the Stuart family memorial is not the only fascinating mark left by 19th century tastes on Grange Cemetery.

Its central catacombs, inspired by another European fashion, which included the creation of Paris’s famous burial chambers, are another point of interest for graveyard explorers. The Grange Association’s website includes an excellent account of their history. The research carried out by its members into the notable historic figures buried there, including the Stuart family, are well worth reading ahead of a visit, and helped inform this article.