GLAMIS CASTLE

Walk the fabled hall of King Duncan’s murder in Macbeth, wander the elegant Italian Garden, and uncover the haunting secrets of the Chapel of Lady Glamis.

Glamis Castle

Glamis Castle has had a long, spooky history. By 1372, a castle had been built on the site, around a tower whose walls are 16 feet thick in places, and that year the house was granted by Robert II to his son-in-law Sir John Lyon, Thane of Glamis. The estate has been in the Lyon family ever since, and members of the family were variously ennobled – as Lord Glamis in 1445, as Earls of Kinghorne in 1606, and Earls of Strathmore and Kinghorne in 1677. Mary Queen of Scots visit Glamis in 1562, and in 1606, Patrick Lyon, 1st Earl of Kinghorne began major works at Glamis. When his grandson returned to Glamis in 1670, allowing army occupation of the castle, he found it inhabitable, and over an 18-year period he restored the castle, and built its Baroque garden.

The Lyon family became the Bowes-Lyon family in 1769 when John Lyon, 9th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne married County Durham coal-mining heiress Mary Bowes, with whose money he set about improving Glamis, pulling down the west wing and building new kitchens and a billiard room. In 1900, Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, one of Glamis’ most famous daughters was born. In 1923, she married the Duke of York, and following the abdication of his older brother Edward VIII, in 1937 she became Queen Elizabeth, later Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother after her husband George VI’s death. Her younger daughter Princess Margaret was born at Glamis in 1930.

Glamis is said by some to be Scotland’s most haunted castle. One of the most famous legends connected with the house is that of the Monster of Glamis, a deformed child born into the family, and kept in the castle, the room in which he lived being bricked up after his death. Meanwhile Glamis’ most famous ghost, the Grey Lady, haunts the chapel – in life, she was Janet Douglas, wife of John Lyon, 6th Lord Glamis, who died in 1528. Victimised by James V who falsely accused her of witchcraft and her sons of treason, she was burnt at the stake on Castle Hill in Edinburgh in 1537. Her spirit returned to Glamis.

Today, Glamis is owned by Simon Bowes-Lyon, 19th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne.