Despite its title of a New Town, Cumbernauld can trace its history back two centuries and more, having been built around an old estate and an 18th century laird's house complete with picturesque park. Complete details of the town's history can be found in 'The History of Cumbernauld and Kilsyth from Earliest Times' published by the Cumbernauld Historical Society and available from the Cumbernauld Town Centre Library.
The last 200 years have seen a steady growth in that original estate and today Cumbernauld is a significant community acting as an overspill for people living in Glasgow and Edinburgh.
 The original settlement here may have taken place in Roman times under the shelter of the Antonine Wall. By the early Middle Ages the settlement must have grown to a respectable size to warrant the Comyns placing their chapel here. With the Flemings' decision to build their castle and make Cumbernauld their principal seat, the place would assume its present form which is the classical layout of a medieval Scottish town, with its principal street running from castle to church.
This ancient building owes its foundations to the early chapel built by the Comyns at the end of the twelfth century. A brief notice appears on record in 1500 when Cumbernauld like other places in Britain at this time, was badly hit by the plague - the notorious Black Death. The Village population was so decimated that the surviving inhabitants had great difficulty in carrying the bodies for burial to the parish cemetery at the old kirk of St Ninian's in Kirkintilloch, so a successful application was made to the See of Glasgow for permission to open a new burial ground "at the Chapel in Cumbernauld".
In the churchyard, the oldest visible headstone is dated 1654.
| This fine building is an excellent example of the neo-classical type of architecture as practised by the fashionable architect, William Adam, in the first half of the eighteenth century. |
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The primary building is a great rectangular block, having a central main portion projecting both frontally and to the rear; the frontal portion is surmounted by a classical triangular pediment containing the Fleming coat-of-arms, the rear portion takes the form of a bay carrying pedimented windows. The central window pediment on the first floor carries the completion date - 1731.
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This district of the New Town is based on a much older village dating from at least the 17th Century and is part of the Parish of Cumbernauld. By the nineteenth century, it had grown to a sufficient size to warrant the establishment of its own church manse, founded in 1875, and still in use. Like Cumbernauld, it was a weaving community and there still exists a number of late 18th and early 19th century, single-storey, weavers' houses such as those in the row known as Braehead Cottages. |
At the West end of the village is Dalshannon Farm. This farmhouse is the best example in the District of a "longhouse", of 17th century date.
The development of the village of Dullatur was due to the Glasgow to Edinburgh Railway which, in 1876, opened a station to encourage Glasgow commuters to move to the district. Prior to the station there had been a small group of houses and two examples of the older dwellings are Dullatur House, of 18th century origin and East Dullatur House, which was built around the 1800's. The commuters caused the 'Dullatur Villas' to be constructed and, along with the land on which they were built, the village was designated a Conservation Area. Two of these villas, Dunluce and Woodend in Prospect Road, are of particular interest since both were designed by Alexander 'Greek' Thomson, who has many other examples of classic Greek styling in the Glasgow area.
 Dullatur, 'Dubh Leitir' or 'Dark Hill Slope', has long been associated with local history, especially the Antonine Wall. Built by Lullius Urbicus, The Governor of Britain in AD 142 on the orders of Emperor Antonius Pius, it passed to the north of the present Cumbernauld on the north slope of the ridge at Dullatur. A Roman camp at Dullatur, actually under Dullatur House, one of the primary forts at Castlecary and the secondary forts at Westerwood and Croy Hill were all occupied by the 2nd and 6th Legions. The legionnaires kept guard at these far-flung and most northerly outposts of the Roman Empire, scanning northwards across the Kelvin Valley to the Kilsyth Hills and beyond, ever watchful and aware of possible surprise attacks from the wild northern Picts.
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