The Vennel Viewpoint Edinburgh Castle

This guide to the Vennel Viewpoint in Edinburgh starts in 1513, when the town council, reeling from the disaster at Flodden, taxed every household to build a defensive wall against an English army that might be coming. It follows the ordinary burgesses, tradesmen and labourers paid by the rood to raise it stone by stone up this hillside, and the surviving Flodden Tower still wedged among the tenements. You'll also hear how these steps picked up a very different, gentler name in 2018.