St Andrews Time Walk

15 ECHOES

Location: St. Andrews, Fife, Scotland, United Kingdom

LIZ CRICHTON

Since graduating with a first class honours degree in Fine Art from the University of Highlands and Islands, Liz has completed a MLitt in Theology, Imagination and the Arts at the University of St Andrews, and an MA in Art and Social Practice. Working with a variety of media and in participation with the public, her work seeks to inspire others to step out beyond what they know for certain. Having previously won a Graham-Barns scholarship, in 2018 she was one of only five Invited Graduates at the SSA Exhibition at the RSA in Edinburgh. www.revelationarts.org.uk

This short stroll around the town beginning and ending in the same place St Mary’s quad offers a different perspective on features many walk past frequently, but which few notice. Part historical, part theological, it offers a personal philosophical reflection on the significance and possible continued relevance of some of these time-based features of this ancient town and its turbulent history.

1 Holm Oak

A constant presence, evergreen not even affected by the changing seasons, witnessing the many developments that have taken place around about it. Veteran trees like these are a special link to the past: no other living things are as old, or gather so many legends around them. This tree was here well before you and will be here long after you – still living

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2 Town Hall Clock

This clock and the building that supports it stands as a reminder of the efforts of the then Provest Hugh Playfairs in the early Victorian era, to put St Andrews back on the map as a place worth visiting and to restore the pride of its residents, in their town and heritage after the towns demise following political and religious strife had reduced it to a mere village

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3 TSB Grandfather Clock

The clock - a striking feature of the bank also raises questions about the relationship between time and money., Time is often said to be money, but can money buy time? What is the currency of time?

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4 The Central Clock

How long this clock has willed away the hours here is unknown, but there have been licenced premises here since 1887. It has now, called time, for the time being due to coronavirus. The moto on the pub’s sign ‘Dum spiro spero’ means- while I breath, I hope. Perhaps appropriate for this time when we are living under the threat of a respiratory virus, it is a motto attributed to St Andrew

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5 Culross Court Sundial

Bearing the inscription 2002, this was perhaps erected when the property was renovated. Even in this modern age of digital technology and timepieces able to track time with mind blowing accuracy, it is interesting that here the architect sought to maintain that link between the passing of time and the movement of the sun, to maintain a universal perspective, a symbol of Gods connection with humanity.

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6 St Savator's Clock

Able to be seen from almost anywhere in town, this clock is a landmark, a marker from which to navigate and orientate oneself, a constant feature in an ever changing landscape, as time itself remains a constant thread or marker in our existence.

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7 Hebdomadar's Bell

The college bell rings at 5 o'clock each morning after which the janitor will wake any students still asleep and will light candles. A regent will inspect the chambers at 6 o'clock to check that all are present and studying studiously. Another bell at 7 will call you to public prayers...

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8 All Saints War Memorial

Christ's passion has found its parallel in the deeds of soldiers, who sacrifice themselves for the nation. Blood sacrifice creates the nation, the soldier is equated with Christ, whose sacrificial death leads to national resurrection. The soldier—crucified in battle—is raised from the dead.

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9 The Ebb and Flow of The Tide

The rise and fall of the ocean is a natural phenomenon that man cannot control. Movement and change are a part of life and something to be accepted, even celebrated rather than feared. Sometimes we have so little faith in the ebb and flow of life, of love, of relationships. We leap at the flow of the tide and resist in terror its ebb. We are afraid it will never return. We insist on permanency, on duration, on continuity; when the only continuity possible, in life as in love, is in growth, in fluidity –in freedom…

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10 Cathedral Graves

The grave stones here are a momento-mori reminding us of our mortality, but while the cathedral ruins invite us to take seriously the history of the site, the juxtaposition of the sea and the cemetery makes us think of death eschatologically. In Eschatology, death creates a real future and a real presence. The cemetery’s presence is a reminder that death remains in control of the penultimate fate. Death is a non-negotiable reality.

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11 Sundial 19 South St

Quite apart from the beauty of the stone sculpture itself, a sundial is like painting with light. Here the stone monument is designed to incorporate something more temporary and fleeting; a slave to time and place, it becomes part of something much bigger than itself. A sense of place is created by all sorts of associations and significances accumulated over time.

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12 Gregory's Timeline

Is time local or universal? Natural time governs the universal order and so is objective and scientifically measured, but time itself cannot do anything, it simply is. Memories may fade, but time cannot remedy our wrongdoings. Time can be thought of as linear; something with a past, present and future, but it is also cyclical in nature, as it repeats itself in potentially endless cycles of planetary motion. How objective is your timeline?

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13 St Mary's Gate

In principio erat Verbum – in the beginning was the word is “Perhaps a particularly apt text for those entering University precinct’s, for universities are all about words, reading them, writing them, teaching them, researching them, memorising and savouring them. Overarching them all as over this gateway is the Word with a capital W – the logos, the Word made flesh, the great cosmic principal of order, forming order from chaos embodied for Christians in the person Jesus Christ. In the beginning is the Word and Christians believe too that in the end is the Word gathering all things up, the alpha and the omega

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14 Founder's House Bell

Now this bell rests silent in its stone housing, but you can imagine this bell being rung in those years before personal time pieces became common, to mark the hours and regulate the days, the bell tolling as a call to a time of prayer, or as an indication of times to eat or rest or work. Perhaps too this bell would have rung out in times of celebration, times of danger and to mark someone’s death

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15 Dr Walter Comrie Sundial

Modern sundials are often commissioned as a memorial, as perhaps this one was, they serve as a momento-mori – a reflection on mortality, a means of considering the vanity of earthly life and the transient nature of all earthly goods and pursuits.

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