Rosslyn Chapel, Roslin

Rosslyn Chapel, Roslin

A Gothic church founded in 1446, left unfinished in its cruciform plan. The building consists of a full-height five-bay chancel with projecting lower flanking aisles, connected by flying and salient buttresses between bays topped with pyramidal finials and crockets. A further two-bay buttressed projection extends to the east. To the east stands a lower-level sacristy, and a later vestry of chamfered square plan was added to the west end in 1861–62. The beginnings of the east transept walls remain visible to the west.

The exterior is constructed of cream ashlar sandstone with deeply carved sandstone dressings; the vestry is built of grey ashlar sandstone. Decoration is profuse, with crockets, niches, and gargoyles throughout. A moulded base course runs around the building, with a continuous cill course to the traceried windows at ground level and around the door. The aisle windows have columned mullions. Carved floral hood moulds with mask terminals and further foliate motifs surround the arches. Each buttress displays a richly carved pedestal and canopy, though the statues are now missing. The eaves cornice to the aisles features floreate bosses. A string course at impost level runs continuously around the transept windows as a hood mould with floreate bosses beneath. The margins of the transept windows are evenly disposed with carved motifs. The eaves course displays heraldic shields and gargoyles. The vestry has set-back angle buttresses with stepped pyramidal canopies over figures and smaller canopied figures to the chamfered angles. Hood moulds frame the door and flanking windows. A rose window occupies the west elevation. Above a floreate-bossed cornice runs a thick blocking course with geometric and foliate blind fretwork, topped by trefoil detail to the parapet.

The north (entrance) elevation comprises seven bays, grouped 2–5. A moulded round arch spans the front face of the buttresses at ground level in the entrance bay to the right of centre, with projecting gargoyles in the spandrels. An architraved doorpiece set back to the right contains a boarded door, with a hood-moulded and trefoiled pointed-arched light above. A tall chancel window is set back above. To the left of the entrance bay, two bays contain aisle windows with chancel windows set back above, with buttresses between. Further aisle windows occupy each of the penultimate and outer left bays. The bay to the right of the entrance has an aisle window with a chancel window above. The outer right bay is blank, forming a small enclosure created by the adjoining buttress of the east transept wall, with a chancel window above.

The south elevation mirrors this arrangement, with a round arch spanning the front face of the buttresses at ground level in the entrance bay to the left of centre, flanked by gargoyles in the spandrels. A deep, hood-moulded pointed-arched doorpiece set back contains a boarded door, with a trefoil pointed-arched light above. A tall clerestory window is set back above. To the right of the entrance bay, two bays contain aisle windows with clerestory windows above, with buttresses between. Further aisle windows occupy each of the penultimate and outer right bays. The bay to the left of the entrance has an aisle window with a clerestory window above. The outer left bay is blank, with a small enclosure created by the adjoining buttress of the east transept wall and a clerestory window above.

The west (vestry) elevation is dominated by the chamfered, square-plan vestry added to the centre, flanked by parts of the completed east transept walls. A hood-moulded pointed-arched door at ground level to the west has a deep set opening with a part-glazed door. Hood-moulded lancet windows are set high at ground level in the flanking chamfers. A circular window sits above. Figures occupy the flanking buttresses and chamfers. Pointed-arched windows at ground and upper levels flank pointed-arched windows on the left and right returns, each with a figure to its adjoining buttress.

The east elevation displays a single-storey projecting four-bay block with a window to each bay and buttresses between. Above stands a large bipartite window with a circular light above at the east end of the nave. A further projecting single-bay sacristy block, set at a lower level to the outer left, has a single window to its east elevation and a flat roof. A short coped sloping wall joins it to the main block.

The interior is extremely richly decorated in carved stone relief. A two-storey full-height pointed and ribbed barrel vault runs the length of the building. A five-bay colonnade of heavily moulded pointed arches springs from compound piers with carved foliate capitals, separating the aisles from the nave. The side aisles have low barrel vaults. Pointed-arched windows in the clerestory walls feature hood-moulding, flanked by slim cylindrical columns with carved bosses around the margins. A transverse aisle to the east end behind the altar contains low barrel vaults and four east chapels. Each east chapel has a bipartite window with a light above and extremely decorative stone tracery, mullions, and pointed-arched surrounds. Four-part vaulting ribs and pendants are lavishly decorated throughout. The southeast pier, known as the Prentice Pillar, has four wreathed spiral bands encasing a multi-shafted column, with naive animal carving at the base and a deeply carved foliate capital. A large pointed-arched stained glass window occupies the east end wall above.

The vestry at the west end features an organ loft above. The wall is divided by a carved floral frieze above a squared entrance to the vestry. A decorative wrought-iron pointed-arched screen serves as a doorway. A tall pointed-arched opening spanning the entire west wall above contains an open fretwork screen arch and spandrels with the organ loft behind, and a stained glass light in its uppermost part. A steep stair leads down to a five-bay lower-level sacristy to the southeast, which is ribbed barrel-vaulted with a pointed-arched window at its far southeast end. Round-arched doorways in the north and south walls are flanked by various blank niches.

The windows throughout are of stained glass and leaded design. Bipartite pointed-arched windows with cluster columnar stone mullions and variations on plate tracery appear in the north and south aisles. Pointed-arched windows feature in the north and south clerestory walls. The rose window to the west elevation is quartered by stone mullions with fleur-de-lys foils. An upper half of a pointed-arched window sits above it. A large pointed-arch window with round-arched elements below and a quartered circular window above occupies the east end.

The barrel-vaulted roof has an asphalt covering. The flat-roofed block to the east has crockets to its buttresses.