OS1/34/55/34

List of names as written Various modes of spelling Authorities for spelling Situation Description remarks
Remains of HOSPITAL [continued] 005 [Continued from page 33]
The chief object of interest in an antiquarian point of view is the Preceptory or chief seat of the Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. It would appear from the date of the original charter 1153 that the preceptory was founded in that year as it was the first property held by the Knights in Scotland and continued to be their chief seat. Its site was well chosen for both strength and beauty at the base of the picturesque range of the Torphichen hills on the edge of a piece of marshy ground which furnished water to filled a moat twenty feet wide by which the building itself and about a scotch acre of land were surrounded of which moat the course may still be distinctly traced. The upper part of the building commanded an extensive prospect towards the Firth of Forth in the direction of Falkirk and Stirling as also the upper range of Ochils and the summit of the Grampians It appears to have been built as most religious structures were in the form of a cross of which nothing but the transept or cross-beam necessarily the smaller division of that figure with a tower at one angle containing a spiral Staircase are now remaining. The walls of the nave or main part of the fabric have long disappeared entirely but its foundation may Still be traced so as to give Some idea of its original dimensions. The transept or as it is commonly called the choir still remains almost entire. It is about 72 feet long by 26 broad (inside 66 by 20 the walls being above 3 feet thick) the nave was about 112 feet long. The interior is composed of three lofty arched domes supported by massive yet handsome Gothic columns 20 feet high before the spring of the arch of [Continued on page 35]

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[page] 34

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Moira L- Moderator, Jeanette

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