The Scottish burghs established by David I (see Economy section of Scotland in the High Middle Ages) drew upon the burgh model of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and used a number of French or Germanic words for townscape features. Aberdeen City Council refers to vennels having been part of the old town and historical records suggest Arbroath had a vennel. In the City of Durham, like Newcastle, part of the old kingdom of Northumbria, lanes are also known colloquially as vennels. There are vennels in Ardersier, Cromarty, Culross, Dumfries, Dalry, Dumfries, Edinburgh,Photos and history of The Vennel in Edinburgh Elie, Eyemouth, Forfar, Irvine, Lanark, Linlithgow, Maybole, North Berwick, Peebles, Perth, South Queensferry, Stirling and Wigtown.
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There are also vennels in the towns of Glenarm and Bangor in Northern Ireland, likely reflecting the Scottish influence in the eastern parts of the province of Ulster. For example, the old name for High Street in Comber was Cow Lane, an anglicisation of its Ulster Scots name Coo Vennel The city of Perth has lost many vennels with the gradual transformation of its medieval centre, but some have survived and are still used: Guard Vennel, Cow Vennel, Baxters Vennel, Fleshers Vennel, Oliphants Vennel, Water Vennel and Cutlog Vennel. The Vennel off the Grassmarket in Edinburgh appears in the film The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969) when Brodie takes her girls on a walk through the Old Town, ending up in Greyfriars Kirkyard. It was announced on 2 June 2018 that The Vennel steps have been renamed Miss Jean Brodie Steps to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the birth of author Muriel Spark.
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By the sixteenth century perhaps ten per cent of the population lived in one of the many burghs.E. Gemmill and N. J. Mayhew, Changing Values in Medieval Scotland: a Study of Prices, Money, and Weights and Measures (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), , pp. 8–10. A characteristic of Scottish burghs were long main streets of tall buildings, with vennels, wynds and alleys leading off it, many of which survive today.R. Mitchison, Lordship to Patronage, Scotland 1603–1745 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1983), , pp. 99–100.
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In many places wynds link streets at different heights and thus are mostly thought of as being ways up or down hills. A pend is a passageway that passes through a building, often from a street through to a courtyard, and typically designed for vehicular rather than exclusively pedestrian access. A pend is distinct from a vennel or a close, as it has rooms directly above it, whereas vennels and closes are not covered over. A vennel is a passageway between the gables of two buildings which can in effect be a minor street in Scotland and the north east of England, particularly in the old centre of Durham.
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In contrast, many Lowland cottages had distinct rooms and chambers, were clad with plaster or paint and even had glazed windows. Perhaps ten per cent of the population lived in one of many burghs that had grown up in the later Medieval period, mainly in the east and south of the country.E. Gemmill and N. J. Mayhew, Changing Values in Medieval Scotland: a Study of Prices, Money, and Weights and Measures (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), , pp. 8–10. A characteristic of Scottish burghs was a long main street of tall buildings, with vennels, wynds and alleys leading off it, many of which survive today.R. Mitchison, Lordship to Patronage, Scotland 1603–1745 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1983), , pp. 99–100.
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A pend in Edinburgh for both vehicles and pedestrians Pend is a Scottish architectural term referring to a passageway that passes through a building, often from a street through to a courtyard or 'back court', and may be for both vehicles and pedestrian access or exclusively pedestrians. The term "common pend" can often be found in descriptions of Scottish property for sale, such as "a common pend shared with the residential dwellings above" . A typical pedestrian-only pend in Broxburn, West Lothian A pend is distinct from a vennel or a close, as it has rooms directly above it, whereas vennels and closes tend not to be covered over and are typically passageways between separate buildings. However, a 'close' also means a common entry to multi- dwelling tenement properties in Scotland.
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