Stirling Castle

On Friday I visited Stirling Castle in (predictably) the town of Stirling.  Stirling Castle, like Edinburgh Castle, is one of the "must-see" visitor attractions in this part of Scotland, so I figured I'd better take a look.

Like many castles in Scotland, Stirling has had people and structures of various sorts occupying the site for a long time.  The earliest evidence they have of a building at Stirling is the remains of a chapel (no visible evidence remains, they must have found it with archeological wiles) dating back to the 12th century.  That said, they suspect that there were people there well before that.

The castle was subsequently built and rebuilt, captured by the English in the Wars of Independence, re-captured by the Stewarts, and re-designed by James IV and V in the 1500s.  Mary, Queen of Scots spend part of her childhood there, and was crowned at Stirling.  Post-Stewarts, the castle fell into the hands of the military in the 1700s, and was used as a base and training ground until 1964, when it was given to the preservation people.

What you see when you visit Stirling is largely the work done in the 1500s by James IV and V.  This includes the entrance (or "forework"), Great Hall, and Royal Palace.  Most of the surrounding fortifications were built in the 18th century, and there are a few odd buildings from the military's ownership in the 18th and 19th centuries, including a prison.

Stirling is also one of the homes of the famous Unicorn Tapestries, which you can see at the cloisters in NYC if you're nearby.  They're really worth a visit.  Anyway, I'm sure Stirling Castle would love to have the real things, but the Metropolitan owns them and probably isn't keen to give them up.  So, private donors have sponsored an almost-completed project to re-weave the Unicorn Tapestries (I believe there are seven of them)  Most of the new tapestries are already hanging at Stirling Castle.  I have seen the real Unicorn Tapestries a few times at the Cloisters but was unaware of their connection with Stirling Castle, so I was pleasantly surprised to walk in and find new, colorful ones hanging there.

 A statue of Robert the Bruce greets you as you approach Stirling Castle.

 The front entrance and side of the King's Palace from the formal gardens below.  This part really looks more like a fairy-tale castle than anything I've seen here so far.

 The orange building on the right is the Great Hall.  It's stone, like the rest of the buildings.  The strange color comes from a lime-wash (a very fresh coat, actually, they've done a lot of restorations in the past 10-15 years).

 Inside the Great Hall.  Castles are very dark!

 The bedchambers of Mary of Guise (Mary, Queen of Scots' mother).  The little queen would have played here as a child.

 The receiving room where subjects would have met with the queen.  See the newly-woven Unicorn Tapestries on the walls?

 Another thing Stirling is known for is the "Stirling Heads."  When they built the Royal Palace, the King's receiving chamber had a ceiling covered in approximately three-foot round portraits of courtiers, members of the royal line, and even a few gods and jesters.  Part of the ceiling collapsed when the military had the castle, and they tore the rest of it down.  However, many of the original heads have been recovered, although they lack their original paint (see above).  The ceiling has also been recreated and freshly painted.  It's strange to be somewhere so old and see such bright paint everywhere.

 The outside of the royal chapel, which has statures of several gods and the king.

 Some of the heads are quite worn and twisted, making them look a bit gruesome, like this one.

On my way down from Stirling, I stopped at a little coffee shop and had a bowl of the best soup I've ever eaten.  It was called honey-buttered carrot soup, but it wasn't sweet, really... It was great, and in a charming little place.