Old Photograph Roman Bridge Musselburgh Scotland

Old photograph of the Roman Bridge in Musselburgh, East Lothian, Scotland. Musselburgh is the largest settlement in East Lothian, located on the coast of the Firth of Forth, six miles east of Edinburgh city centre. Musselburgh was first settled by the Romans in the years following their invasion of Scotland in AD80. They built a fort a little inland from the mouth of the River Esk and bridged the river here. In doing so they established the line of the main eastern approach to Scotland's capital for most of the next two thousand years. The bridge built by the Romans outlasted them by many centuries. It was rebuilt on the original Roman foundations some time before 1300, and in 1597 it was rebuilt again, this time with a third arch added on the east side of the river. The Old Bridge is also known as the Roman Bridge and remains in use today by pedestrians. To its north is the New Bridge, designed by John Rennie the Elder and built in 1806. This in turn was considerably widened in 1925. Tour Roman Scotland.



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