{"id":891710,"date":"2026-04-13T18:27:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T18:27:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/891710\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T18:27:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T18:27:18","slug":"ancient-village-packed-with-listed-buildings-and-scotlands-oldest-clock-is-just-45-minutes-from-glasgow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/891710\/","title":{"rendered":"Ancient village packed with listed buildings and Scotland’s oldest clock is just 45 minutes from Glasgow"},"content":{"rendered":"

Located in the rolling hills of South Lanarkshire, Douglas is the seat of one of Scotland’s most ennobled families\"st<\/p>\n

St Bride’s Church with its historic clock(Image: Wiki Commons\/Rosser1954)<\/p>\n

Scotland is blessed with hundreds of picturesque villages packed with character and history. And one such settlement has a unique distinction – it is home to Scotland’s oldest working clock.<\/a><\/p>\n

Located in South Lanarkshire<\/a>, the ancient village of Douglas sits on the south bank of the Douglas Water, a tributary of the River Clyde. The settlement dates from the 1200s and developed to serve nearby Douglas Castle, seat of Clan Douglas, one of the most ennobled in the UK.<\/p>\n

Taking their name from the Parish of Douglas, members include Sir Alec Douglas-Home, British Prime Minister between 1963 and 1964, the last PM to sit in the House of Lords<\/a>. Only the 17th-century corner tower remains from the original structure but the castle was the inspiration for Sir Walter Scott’s Castle Dangerous, the last of his Waverley novels.<\/p>\n

Set amid rolling hills and woodland, Douglas retains a medieval <\/a>charm with its historic buildings and narrow, windings streets. Despite its modest size, Douglas is home to 26 listed buildings and monuments.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: The ‘Gateway to Royal Deeside’ is the best place to live in Scotland for wellbeing<\/a>READ MORE: Ancient Scottish forest that transforms into a ‘sea of blue’ in spring is minutes from peaceful seaside village<\/a><\/p>\n

These include the Douglas Heritage Museum, and the A-listed St Bride’s Chapel<\/a>. Originally built in the Gothic style in the 13th or 14th century, St Bride’s was rebuilt in 1878 by architect Sir Robert Rowand Anderson. The choir became the mausoleum of the Black Douglas earls in the 14th century while the tombs include a rare ‘double effigy’ of James ‘the Gross’, 7th Earl of Douglas and his wife Beatrice Sinclair.<\/p>\n

In its listing, Historic Environment Scotland says: “St Bride’s Chapel, the choir of St Brides Church, was built in the late 13th century or early 14th century and continued in use until 1782. It was rebuilt in the late 19th century, but still contains a sequence of very important and elaborately carved medieval tombs.<\/p>\n

\" More<\/p>\n

The ancient village of Douglas in South Lanarkshire(Image: Wiki Commons\/Kim Traynor)<\/p>\n

“The reconstructed fabric, such as the external corbels carved as masks to the north and south eaves, the ribbed wooden tunnel vault ceiling and decorative encaustic tiles to the floors (that replaced stone flags) is interesting in its own right as the work of one of Scotland’s leading architects. These features combine to make the age and rarity of St Bride’s highly significant in listing terms.”<\/p>\n

While not mentioned in the listing, the clock at St Bride’s is believed to be the oldest working one in Scotland. Said to be a gift from Mary, Queen of Scots to the people of Douglas, the clock was repaired in 2008 by renowned Edinburgh<\/a> clockmakers, James Ritchie and Son.<\/p>\n

The clock dates from 1565. Douglas is just a 45-minute drive from Glasgow down the M74, making it a great place to explore on a day trip.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Located in the rolling hills of South Lanarkshire, Douglas is the seat of one of Scotland’s most ennobled…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":891711,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5009],"tags":[207316,748,12232,918,4884,109556,98612,2348,14683,8547,712,251801,183,16,15],"class_list":["post-891710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scotland","tag-bonnie-scotland","tag-britain","tag-days-out","tag-glasgow","tag-great-britain","tag-hidden-gems","tag-historic-environment-scotland","tag-history","tag-lanarkshire","tag-religion","tag-scotland","tag-south-lanarkshire","tag-travel","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116398814127695123","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=891710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/891710\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/891711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=891710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=891710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=891710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}