Sir Walter Scott's journeys, both achieved (Belgium and Paris) and dreamt of (Iberia and the Alps), are examined in the context of the traditional Grand Tour, and the romantic age of travel that followed - though when Scott actually reached Naples and Rome, Scotland was still most in the heart and mind of this fascinating but unusual traveller.
In the early nineteenth century, Edinburgh (known as Auld Reekie) came to be regarded as the Athens of the North. Why was this? How was the notion invented? What were its consequences? Topography, architectural development, literary and social history are all examined in a quest to give meaning to an epithet known by many but understood by few.