Fountain built by James V, 1538. Now restored, the design combines Gothic and Renaissance details.

Description: The fountain was added to the courtyard by James V in about 1538. The three-tiered 'wedding-cake' structure is topped by a crown. Water poured from a sun-face carved on the underside of the crown. It dropped to the upper basin and then spurted from the mouths of human and animal heads into the octagonal (8-sided) trough below. The original surviving carvings on this middle level include a drummer, a mermaid and a figure holding a scroll.

From here the water flowed out the mouths of angels and humans into the lower trough. On this bottom trough are unicorns, a lion and a winged deer supporting the joined royal arms of Scotland and France.

For the fountain to work properly it must have had a pressurised water-supply. It is thought that the palace had a piped water-supply from the Linlithgow neighbourhood of Poldrait. In 1818 workmen found lead pipes leading to the palace whilst they were digging the Union Canal. One of the pipes is said to have the date 1538 on it.