The Royal Bank of Scotland was founded in 1727. Originally opened with a staff of just eight, our first premises were in the Old Town of Edinburgh. For more than half a century, we traded solely from the Scottish capital, but in 1783 we opened our first branch in the fast-growing trading city of Glasgow. This new office was soon conducting over half of the Bank's entire business. Spurred on by this success, many more branches opened across Scotland and then, in 1874, our first office opened in London.