Musselburgh Links

Musselburgh Links in Musselburgh, East Lothian, Scotland, is one of the oldest golf courses in the world, and claims to be the oldest on which play has been continuous. There is documentary evidence that golf was played at the links in 1672, and it is reputed that Mary Queen of Scots played there in 1567. There were originally seven holes. An eighth was added in 1838 and a ninth in 1870.

Musselburgh was one of the three courses which staged The Open Championship in rotation in the 1870s and 1880s, alongside Prestwick and the Old Course at St Andrews. It was selected because it was used by the prestigious Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, and it hosted six Opens in all, the first in 1874 and the last in 1889. When the Honorable Company built itself a private club at Muirfield, Musselburgh dropped out of the rotation for the Open. It left a lasting legacy to the game however. The four and a quarter inch measurement of a golf hole was the width of the implement used to cut the holes at Musselburgh and, in 1893, the R&A adopted the measurement as a mandatory requirement for holes.

Musselburgh is a now a publicly owned course, administered by East Lothian Council. The course still has just nine holes, and is a par 34. The fact that there are only nine holes severely restricts its appeal, and memberships are readily available and inexpensive. Season tickets for course play only are also available.