This massive, ground-breaking bestseller contains the names, old and new, of thousands of streets, roads, villages, hills and other places within the modern city of Edinburgh -- an area of one hundred and five square miles. In this important reference work, Stuart Harris has endeavoured to show when and how and why each name arose, and to trace how names have changed since then.

But this book is much more than a list of place names -- it also contains many vivid details of Edinburgh's people over the centuries -- people who named places, and people who had places named after them.

In this fascinating volume, Harris explains how place names are determined by our languages, personal names, interests and outlook, as well as our social and working life in town and countryside. 'The Place Names of Edinburgh' makes it clear just how important a part of our history place names are, and how they shape the character of our town and cities. It is an important reference tool for everyone interested in Edinburgh and district.

Stuart Harris was born in Edinburgh in 1920. Educated at George Heriot's School and Edinburgh College of Art, he qualified as an architect and served on the staff of Edinburgh Corporation and the City of Edinburgh District Council from 1950 until he retired, as Senior Depute City Architect, in 1984. Amongst other projects, he led the design of the Napier College (now Napier University, Merchiston) and the Meadowbank Sports Centre, and personally directed the restoration of the fifteenth-century Tower of Merchiston.

From 1975 onwards one of his departmental responsibilities lay in the naming of streets, and it was this experience, combined with a lifelong interest in the city and its environs, as well as a lively curiosity about place names in general, that led to the present book, the first comprehensive study of the origins and history of the names of features, streets and places in the City of Edinburgh. Stuart Harris died in 1997.

'This paperback edition is a welcome development ... the wealth of detail and comprehensive treatment of the street-names ... no serious student of the city's history can afford to be without it.'
-- I A Fraser, Scottish Place-Name News

'Readers of Stuart Harris's The Place Names of Edinburgh, a huge and hugely diverting compendium of many aspects of Edinburgh's story, will come away with much absorbing information which adds to their understanding and enjoyment of the city. ...
   'The range of sources consulted and the masterly fashion in which the author marshals his material are truly impressive, and it is difficult to envisage that his work will be superseded as one of the major reference works on the history of the city. ...
   'For one man to have gathered so much information is a great achievement ... As the reference point for future writers on Edinburgh's history it will probably, and deservedly, become known simply as "Harris".'

-- Dr Tristram N Clarke, Book of the Old Edinburgh Club