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Fa'side Castle (Faside Estate) is a 15th-century keep located in East Lothian. The Fawsydes acquired land in the area in 1371. The earliest part of the present building was constructed by the Fawsydes in the 15th century.
The castle was burned by the English before the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh, which was fought nearby on 10 September 1547, suffocating or burning all those inside. Mary, Queen of Scots left Fa'side on the morning of 15 June 1567 for the Battle of Carberry Hill.
The castle was rebuilt and extended to the south in the late 16th century. A surviving oak bed, now at Biggar Museum, was made for Margaret Fawside, who married Patrick Levingstone of Saltcoats near Gullane.
The Fawsydes sold the castle in 1631 to an Edinburgh burgess and merchant called Hamilton. By the 19th century it had fallen into ruin, and was close to being demolished altogether in the 1970s. The restoration work began in 1976 was completed by 1982. The castle remains in private ownership. Faside Estate includes a stud farm and a bed & breakfast business. The building has five bedrooms while the tourist accommodation is in a tower and two cottages.
Fa'side is a L-plan building, being a fifteenth-century four-storey keep with a later turreted block added. There is a vaulted basement. The castle stands on a high ridge with extensive views over East Lothian and the Firth of Forth.
References:The Jan Hus Memorial stands at one end of Old Town Square. The huge monument depicts victorious Hussite warriors and Protestants who were forced into exile 200 years after Hus, and a young mother who symbolises national rebirth. The monument was so large that the sculptor designed and built his own villa and studio where the work could be carried out. It was unveiled in 1915 to commemorate the 500th anniversary of Jan Hus' martyrdom. The memorial was designed by Ladislav Šaloun and paid for solely by public donations.
Born in 1369, Hus became an influential religious thinker, philosopher, and reformer in Prague. He was a key predecessor to the Protestant movement of the sixteenth century. In his works he criticized religious moral decay of the Catholic Church. Accordingly, the Czech patriot Hus believed that mass should be given in the vernacular, or local language, rather than in Latin. He was inspired by the teachings of John Wycliffe.