BRIDOL is the British Sundial Society's Register of Fixed and Mass Dials, which gives detail and photographs of about 8000 fixed sundials and 3000 mass dials in the UK.
Some of these are in private gardens, but the majority are publicly available.
The dial, some 10 ft high overall, stands on a cobbled area painted with wavy bands representing the heraldic device of the Drummonds. It was restored in 1986. A Latin inscription on the shaft has been translated by Dr Philip Pattenden. It gives an explanation of the hour lines and colours on the dial. Individual dials show Babylonian, Italian, Jewish and Equinoctial hours, signs of the zodiac, azimuth lines, almacantars and astrological houses. It has new gnomons in copper but some are wrongly placed; the remainder are in stone.
The shaft has four square panels on the E, S and W sides with hollows and vertical dials. The lower half of the N side has the long Latin inscription with names ’Jonne E Perth’, ’Jean C Perth’.
The boss has a central octagonal band with no hollows but eight verticals and eight each of inclining and reclining dials. The finial has seven panels on each side, the central ones bearing date, Coats of Arms etc. It is topped with a ball and a fine painted pinnacle.
John Milne was Master Mason to Charles I. Garden created by 2nd Earl of Perth in 1630.
Ref: A R Somerville, Proc Soc Antiq Scot, 117, 1987, "The Ancient Sundials of Scotland", p9 (A10).
