The Banshee Labyrinth

Hidden beneath the streets of Edinburgh's Old Town, The Banshee Labyrinth is exactly the sort of pub where getting slightly lost feels like part of the experience. From its entrance at 29–35 Niddry Street, corridors disappear down staircases and through a confusing collection of stone rooms, bars and underground chambers. Parts of the venue occupy Edinburgh's historic South Bridge Vaults, and the pub has enthusiastically embraced everything that comes with that location: ghosts, horror films, strange noises and a reputation as “Scotland's most haunted pub”. Whether the ghosts cooperate is another matter.

The underground setting is very real. South Bridge was constructed between 1785 and 1788 to carry a new street across the deep Cowgate valley. Although it looks like an ordinary city street today, the bridge actually consists of nineteen stone arches, eighteen of which have been almost completely hidden by later buildings. The spaces inside and beneath those arches were divided into around 120 vaulted rooms and initially rented to merchants, tradespeople, taverns and businesses requiring storage space.

Unfortunately, somebody had overlooked a rather important detail when building underground rooms in Scotland: water. The bridge was poorly waterproofed, and rain gradually seeped through the stone. The vaults became damp, dark and increasingly unpleasant. Legitimate businesses began moving out, leaving behind spaces that were cheap, hidden and useful to people who had very few alternatives.

During the early 19th century, some of the abandoned vaults became associated with Edinburgh's poorest inhabitants and its underground economy. Taverns operated without licences, illegal whisky was distilled, gambling took place and people slept in rooms with little ventilation, no natural light and virtually no sanitation. Archaeological excavations have uncovered objects connected with people living and working below ground. Stories that body snatchers stored corpses in the vaults – or that Burke and Hare hunted victims there – are frequently repeated, but there is no solid evidence linking the famous murderers directly to the vaults.

Eventually many of the chambers were filled with rubble and effectively forgotten. They remained hidden for generations until sections were rediscovered and excavated during the 1980s. The result is one of the stranger features of modern Edinburgh: behind perfectly ordinary doors in the Old Town, staircases can still descend into rooms created inside an 18th-century bridge.

The Banshee Labyrinth emerged in its present form around 2010, taking over premises that had previously included a pub called Nicol Edwards. The new venue was apparently going to be called simply The Labyrinth, which would already have been a fairly accurate description of the place. Then something happened during the renovation that gave the owners a better name.

According to the story told by the pub, two workmen were renovating the lower vaults when they heard an extremely loud scream coming from somewhere inside the otherwise empty building. They stopped work and went upstairs. Shortly afterwards, one of the men received a telephone call telling him that a member of his family had died. In Scottish and Irish folklore, a banshee is a supernatural female spirit whose scream or wail is believed to announce an approaching death. The Banshee Labyrinth suddenly seemed considerably more appropriate than just The Labyrinth.

The story has grown into the pub's own founding legend, but it is worth keeping the distinction clear: this is a paranormal account rather than something that can be independently verified. The same applies to the many stories that have followed. Staff and customers have reported glasses moving across tables, objects falling from shelves, unexplained noises and equipment apparently switching itself on and off. One recurring story describes glasses sliding across completely dry tables, changing direction and then falling to the floor as though somebody had deliberately pushed them.

Another supposed presence is connected with the building's earlier history. The pub tells stories about Nicol Edwards, traditionally described as a wealthy Edinburgh figure and witch hunter who supposedly kept a private chamber where women accused of witchcraft were interrogated or tortured. He and his victims have subsequently been worked into the supernatural mythology of the building. As with many Edinburgh ghost stories, however, the legend has become much easier to find than firm historical evidence for all of its details.

What is beyond dispute is that The Banshee Labyrinth makes very good use of its underground surroundings. The venue contains three bars spread through narrow passages, vaulted rooms and staircases, along with spaces used for rock and metal concerts, comedy, alternative events and other performances. There is even a small cinema with around fifty seats hidden inside the complex.

The cinema is perhaps the most appropriate room of all. Horror films, cult movies, exploitation cinema and famously bad films regularly appear on the programme, meaning it is possible to descend into an allegedly haunted vault beneath Edinburgh and watch other people make the questionable decision to enter an allegedly haunted building. The venue's long connection with rock, punk and metal makes the rest of the place feel less like a carefully designed haunted-house attraction and more like an alternative bar that happens to have inherited an unusually good basement.