Mons Meg

On the highest esplanade of the Castle of Edinburgh, three hundred and eighty-three feet above the sea, stands the celebrated old cannon "Mons Meg," made at Mons in Brittany in 1486. It figured in so many battles and other historic events, that the Scottish people have placed it there as a national relic. In one of the rooms of the old castle are kept the ancient crown, sceptre, and sword of state of Scotland. Edinburgh was named Edwin's Burgh for Edwin, King of Northumbria, who lived there in the seventh century. It is now often called the "Athens of the North."