Midhope Castle

Lothians: About 5 miles east and north of Linlithgow, on minor road north of A904, about 1 mile west of Hopetoun House, west of the Midhope Burn, at Midhope Castle.

Private   NT 073787   OS: 65   EH49 7NB

OPEN: The exterior of the castle may be viewed and can be visited by purchasing a vehicle pass to from Hopetoun Farm Shop (see map below).
Web: hopetoun.co.uk/estate/

hopetoun.co.uk/estate/outlander-at-hopetoun/ 

Midhope Castle is a 16th-century tower house of five storeys and a garret, to which has been added a later and lower wing. Two-storey bartizans crown three of the corners, although their conical roofs have gone, a caphouse for the stair crowning the fourth. The roof is steeply pitched. The tower forms one side of a courtyard, and there is a fine walled garden and a 17th-century lectern doocot [NT 074786].

The entrance, at first floor level, is reached by a short external stair. The basement is vaulted, and the wing contained the kitchen. The original stair was turnpike, but a scale-and-platt stair was later added. The hall, on the first floor, has been subdivided, and the inside of the tower has been much altered. There were some old wall paintings and plasterwork, but these have been lost.
  ‘Meedop’ is marked on Blaeu’s map of The Lothians in its own park, then ‘Midhop’ on Adair’s map of West Lothian, when the castle is shown in enclosures and gardens.

The property was owned by the Martin family in 1478, and they had a castle here, but passed to the Livingstones soon afterwards. James Lindsay, Lord Lindsay, had a ratification of 1592 for the lands of Midhope, with the tower and fortalice thereof. Midhope belonged to the Drummonds of Midhope, who were in possession during part of the 16th and 17th centuries, and Alexander Drummond of Midhope remodelled the tower in 1587 and his initials with those of his wife Marjorie Bruce are on a former lintel now above a gateway. Alexander Drummond of Midhope is on record in the 1640s, then Sir Robert Drummond of Midhope in 1647 and 1661.

The property passed to the Livingstones in 1664, and the intials of George Livingstone, 3rd Earl of Linlithgow are on a lintel, then went to the Hopes in 1678 and they remodelled the building. In 1710 the place was described as ‘a fine towerhouse with excellent gardens, one of the seats of the Earls of Hopetoun’.

  Midhope Castle was used to house farm workers after the building of nearby Hopetoun House, and in 1851 53 people lived here, but it was later abandoned and is now semi-derelict, although the outside was consolidated in 1988. The castle lies on the extensive Hopetoun estate.

  The castle is used as a location in the TV series Outlander, being Lallybroch, home to Jamie (Outlander locations in Hopetoun estate).