Tertowie House

Tertowie House is a 16th century tower house that has been substantially developed over the centuries. The original building is a tall structure of two storeys and attic, built as a crowstepped tower house with a conical-roofed corbelled bartizan. Some vaulted interior passages survive from this period. The exterior is harled with granite dressings and quoin strips, with an ashlar base course (rubble to the south) and an eaves course. A segmental-arched doorway provides the main entrance.

In 1867, Aberdeen architect James Matthews undertook significant reworking of the house. He added a low link section over paired segmental-arched cart entrances, adjoining a single-storey section with raised basement and attic. Stone-pedimented dormerheads with fleur-de-lis and thistle finials, together with stone transoms and mullions, date from this period.

The north-east baronial wing was added by Dr William Kelly in 1905. This wing features a bartizan at its outer left, three fenestrated bays below pedimented dormers at the centre, and a round tower to the outer right.

Classrooms and a gymnasium were added to the west in the 1960s, along with a stair tower on the south elevation. A nuclear bunker was also constructed to the west during this period.

The east elevation comprises three earlier bays to the left with a crowstepped gable at the outer left, featuring a bipartite window at ground floor, a heraldic panel at first floor, and a single window in the gablehead. Set-back bays to the right incorporate a full-width entrance porch in a re-entrant angle, with a segmental-headed doorway containing a deep-set two-leaf panelled timber door at the left and a bipartite window at the right, all under a deep blocking course. Two windows above give way to two pedimented dormer windows, each with carved detail to the tympanum; the left dormer bears the initials 'LC/WRK' and the right bears a thistle in a laurel wreath. A lower set-back link section to the right features a transomed stair window under a crowstepped half gable at the left and paired arches under small bipartites at the right.

The south elevation is regularly fenestrated across three bays, with a crowstepped gable at the left featuring an additional gablehead window. A small dormer window with a rose on its pediment rises from the eaves at the right, and a corbelled bartizan projects at the outer right angle. The three early bays behind the 1960s stair tower at the outer left have regular fenestration, with first-floor windows breaking the eaves into dormerheads incorporating relief-carved detail. These windows are moulded with the initials 'W, R, K, L' between the centre and right bays. A further narrow link bay projects at the outer right with windows to each floor of the return; the first-floor window breaks the eaves into a semicircular-pedimented barrel dormer window. A ball-finialled crowstepped gable crowns the return to the left, with a low 1960s wing projecting at the outer left.

The house has coped harled stacks with some cans, and ashlar-coped skews with skewputts.

A fire in 2011 destroyed the interior entirely. The external elevations survive to wallhead and dormerheads, though the building is now roofless as of 2022.

The south garden elevation overlooks a ha-ha type flat-coped squared rubble terrace wall with ball finials flanking a short flight of stone steps at the right. Buttresses at the centre probably formerly also flanked steps. A single segmental-arched granite road bridge with a voussoired arch and partly stepped ball-finialled flat-coped parapets crosses the formal landscape. A Queen Victoria Memorial stone, dated 1887 and incised with 'VR', stands to the east of the house, though it is broken at the top right.

A pair of tall circular pinnacled ashlar gatepiers marks the entrance to the property.

Tertowie House was the home of the King family, several of whom had distinguished military careers. The family is connected with Archbishop William King of Dublin, and its ancestors came from Barra Castle, which they held since the 13th century. The family coat of arms incorporates a musical note symbol, visible on the principal elevation, in the coloured glass stair window, and on a small crowstepped gablehead to the north elevation. Another symbol appearing on both dormer windowheads and the coloured glass coat of arms resembles an axehead or conjoined leg, similar to the symbol of the Isle of Man. By 1845, the house (then sometimes spelled Tartowie) was in the ownership or rental of Dr Ewing, with a valued rent of £84 13s 4d. The Littlejohn family is also connected with the property; John Bain Littlejohn, son of John Bain Littlejohn and Jane Robinson, was born here on 29 November 1859.

Tertowie House forms part of a historic group within a small estate landscape, listed together with the Walled Garden (Category B), Stable Courtyard (Category C), and Nuclear Bunker (Category B). The small estate has remained a single entity through various changes of ownership, eventually becoming residential and agricultural premises for Aberdeen University in the twentieth century. James Matthews, the architect responsible for the 1867 remodelling, also worked on several important Aberdeen buildings including the Grammar School (1861), St Machar's Cathedral (1867), and Advocates Hall (1869). The property is set within a fine designed landscape that includes the terraced formal garden with ornamental bridge immediately south of the house, a walled garden to the east, and a stable courtyard to the north-east.