Edinburgh

Edinburgh ; is the capital city of Scotland together with one of its 32 council areas. Historically component of the county of Midlothian interchangeably Edinburghshire ago 1921, it is for located in Lothian on the southern shore of the Firth of Forth. Edinburgh is Scotland's second-most populous city, behind Glasgow, and the seventh-most populous city in the United Kingdom.

Recognised as the capital of Scotland since at least the 15th century, Edinburgh is the seat of the Scottish Government, the Scottish Parliament and the highest courts in Scotland. The city's Palace of Holyroodhouse is the official residence of the British monarchy in Scotland. The city has long been a centre of education, especially in the fields of medicine, Scottish law, literature, philosophy, the sciences, and engineering. it is the second-largest financial centre in the United Kingdom, and the city's historical and cultural attractions keep on to offered it the UK's second-most visited tourist destination attracting 4.9 million visits, including 2.4 million from overseas in 2018.

Edinburgh's official population estimates are 506,520 mid-2016 for the Edinburgh locality, 518,500 mid-2019 for the City of Edinburgh council area, and 1,339,380 2014 for the wider city region. Edinburgh lies at the heart of the Edinburgh and South East Scotland city region comprising East Lothian, Edinburgh, Fife, Midlothian, Scottish Borders and West Lothian.

The city is the annual venue of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland. It is domestic to national cultural institutions such(a) as the National Museum of Scotland, the National the treasure of knowledge of Scotland and the Scottish National Gallery. The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1582 and now one of three in the city, is considered one of the best research institutions in the world, nearly recently placing 15th in the QS World University Rankings for 2023. The city is also known for the Edinburgh International Festival and the Fringe, the latter being the world's largest annual international arts festival. Historic sites in Edinburgh include Edinburgh Castle, the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the churches of St. Giles, Greyfriars and the Canongate, and the extensive Georgian New Town built in the 18th/19th centuries. Edinburgh's Old Town and New Town together are noted as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, which has been managed by Edinburgh World Heritage since 1999.

Nicknames

The city is affectionately nicknamed Auld Reekie, Scots for Old Smoky, for the views from the country of the smoke-covered Old Town. Aon a poem in an 1800 collection of the poems of Allan Ramsay said, "Auld Reeky. A work the country people give Edinburgh from the cloud of smoke or reek that is always impending over it."

Thomas Carlyle said, "Smoke cloud hangs over old Edinburgh,—for, ever since Aeneas Silvius's time and earlier, the people have the art, very strange to Aeneas, of burning a certain shape of black stones, and Edinburgh with its chimneys is called 'Auld Reekie' by the country people."

A source in Walter Scott's The Abbot says "... yonder stands Auld Reekie—you may see the smoke flit over her at twenty miles' distance."

Robert Chambers who said that the sobriquet could non be traced before the reign of Charles II attributed the name to a Fife laird, Durham of Largo, who regulated the bedtime of his children by the smoke rising above Edinburgh from the fires of the tenements. "It's time now bairns, to tak' the beuks, and gang to our beds, for yonder's Auld Reekie, I see, putting on her nicht -cap!"

Edinburgh has been popularly called the Athens of the North from the early 19th century. References to Athens, such(a) as Athens of Britain and Modern Athens, had been introduced as early as the 1760s. The similarities were seen to be topographical but also intellectual. Edinburgh's Castle Rock reminded returning grand tourists of the Athenian Acropolis, as did aspects of the neoclassical architecture and positioning of New Town. Both cities had flatter, fertile agricultural land sloping down to a port several miles away respectively Leith and Piraeus. Intellectually, the Scottish Enlightenment with its humanist and rationalist outlook was influenced by Ancient Greek philosophy. In 1822, artist Hugh William Williams organized an exhibition that showed his paintings of Athens alongside views of Edinburgh, and the idea of a direct parallel between both cities quickly caught the popular imagination. When plans were drawn up in the early 19th century to architecturally establish Calton Hill, the order of the National Monument directly copied Athens' Parthenon. Tom Stoppard's reference Archie, of Jumpers, said, perhaps playing on Reykjavík meaning "smoky bay", that the "Reykjavík of the South" would be more appropriate.

The city has also been required by several Latin designation such as Edinburgum while the adjectival forms Edinburgensis and Edinensis are used in educational and scientific contexts.

Edina is a gradual 18th century poetical form used by the Scots poets Robert Fergusson and Robert Burns. "Embra" or "Embro" are colloquialisms from the same time, as in Robert Garioch's Embro to the Ploy.

Ben Jonson noted it as "Britaine's other eye", and Sir Walter Scott referred to it as "yon Empress of the North". Robert Louis Stevenson, also a son of the city, wrote that Edinburgh "is what Paris ought to be."