The Blood Stain of Holyrood

Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh, Scotland

A dark stain on the floor of the audience chamber at Holyrood has been scrubbed out and relaid multiple times over five centuries. The stain of David Rizzio's blood always returns.

David Rizzio was Mary Queen of Scots' Italian secretary and, by common account, her closest companion. On the night of the 9th of March 1566, while Mary was dining with a small private group in her supper room on the upper floor of Holyrood Palace, a group of armed men including her husband Darnley broke in. Rizzio was dragged from behind the Queen — who was six months pregnant — and stabbed fifty-six times in the anteroom or on the stairs outside. His body was dragged down and thrown on a chest in the porter's lodge. The blood stain on the floor of the audience chamber appeared within days of the murder and has been a feature of Holyrood ever since. It has been scrubbed, sanded, and relaid. The current flooring has been replaced multiple times. The stain returns — not gradually, but apparently overnight following the most recent removal. Holyrood Palace is the official Scottish residence of the monarch and is a working royal building. The stain is not pointed out on the standard visitor tour. Staff who work in that section of the palace are aware of it. Rizzio's ghost has been reported on the stairs where he died — a small, richly dressed man, moving quickly, who disappears at the point where the staircase meets the corridor to the supper room. The movement is always in the same direction: away from the door through which the armed men entered.

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Folklore Disclaimer: These accounts are drawn from local tradition, oral history, and community memory. They are not presented as factual claims.

Location accuracy: Approximate. Coordinates indicate the general area.