One O'Clock Gun
The One O'Clock Gun is a field gun fired from Edinburgh Castle at 1pm every day except Sundays, Good Friday and Christmas Day, a tradition that began in 1861 as a time signal for ships. Captains in the port of Leith and on the Firth of Forth set their chronometers by it.
In practice
The first gun was fired on 7 June 1861. A visual signal already existed - the time ball on the Nelson Monument on Calton Hill drops at the same moment - but it could not be seen in fog, so the gun added a sound that carried across the city and the Forth. The original was a muzzle-loading 64-pounder; since 2001 a modern 105mm field gun has been used, fired from Mills Mount Battery. Visitors to the Castle can watch the firing.
Why it matters to newcomers
If you work in the city centre, the bang at 1pm will startle you for a week and then become a lunch bell. Locals check their watches by it, and tour guides like to point out that it is fired at one o'clock rather than noon because a single shot costs less than twelve - a story worth enjoying rather than quoting as fact.
Related
- Royal Mile - which runs from the Castle esplanade down to Holyrood
- Haar - the sea fog that made a sound signal necessary
- New Town - where Calton Hill and its time ball stand
Source: Edinburgh Castle: One o'Clock Gun.