The Earl's Palace at Birsay was built by Robert Stewart, 1st Earl of Orkney (1533 to 1593), and later passed to his son Patrick. Today it is a roofless ruin beside the village.
The Green Lady is the palace's ghost. The story as told is a short one: she was a servant girl, she had a lover, and the affair was found out. He left Birsay and she never saw him again. Her ghost is said to wander the palace waiting for him.
Ghost writers repeat the tale without naming the lovers or giving a date for any sighting, and a green lady is a stock figure at many Scottish castles. The Birsay version is worth keeping as a local tradition, but there is no named witness behind it in the sources found.
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