Canongate Kirk

17th-century parish church on the Royal Mile, the official church of Holyroodhouse, with notable graves

Address 153 Canongate, Edinburgh EH8 8BN

Canongate Kirk was built in 1688 as the parish church for the Canongate, then a separate burgh from Edinburgh. It is now the official church of the Palace of Holyroodhouse, where the royal family worships when in Edinburgh. The kirk itself is a modest, handsome Dutch-influenced building, less grand than St Giles' further up the Royal Mile. The graveyard is the more compelling draw: it contains the graves of Adam Smith, the poet Robert Fergusson (whose gravestone Burns himself paid for), and the economist Dugald Stewart.

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