West Close, Newhaven

Category

Library Item

Item no

5424

Title

West Close, Newhaven

Description

A fisherman stands near a woman holding on to a large basket in West Close, Edinburgh. Another woman sits on the pavement at the bottom of a stairway, a child is on the stairs. Barrels and baskets are beside the houses in the close and washing is dying on a line suspended between two buildings.

Artist / maker

Heron, James

Date

1876

Size

11.9 x 16.2 cm

Type

Watercolour

Location

Edinburgh and Scottish Collection

Newhaven was founded by James IV in 1504 as a royal dockyard. It became an important fishing village, famous initially for oysters and later herring. An indoor fish market was built there in 1896. Newhaven fishwives, with their distinctive striped clothes, sold their goods around Edinburgh. David Octavius Hill and Robert Adamson famously photographed these fishwives and other Newhaven residents in the 1840's. The area now has a population of roughly five thousand.

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Related subjects

Architecture > Architectural features > Stairways

Homes > Residential buildings > Houses

People > Agriculture and fisheries > Fishermen

Places > Edinburgh areas > Leith

Places > Edinburgh areas > Newhaven

Places > Scotland > Edinburgh