Stirling Distillery Bottles Three of the City’s Oldest Stories for Christmas

Stirling Distillery has unveiled Tales from the Rock, a trilogy of single malt whiskies named after three landmarks that have stood in the shadow of Stirling Castle for centuries: The Beheading Stone, The King's Knot and The Back Walk. Only 90 numbered bottles of each have been produced, in time for Christmas.

The distillery's Insiders can buy the full trilogy from today. Anyone else can join the waiting list here to buy on general release, when The Beheading Stone goes on sale on Monday, 16 November, with The King's Knot and The Back Walk following before Christmas. Visitors to Stirling SpiritsFEST at the Highland Hotel on Saturday, 14 November can buy all three, two days before general release. Tickets are available at https://stirlingdistillery.com/pages/spiritfest.

The whiskies are Speyside single malts from the distillery’s Sons of Scotland independent bottling range. The team finished each one in its own quarter cask, spending its final few months in the distillery’s Stirling warehouse: rum for The Beheading Stone, Oloroso sherry for The King’s Knot and Port for The Back Walk. All three are bottled at 50% abv, natural colour and non-chill filtered, in 70cl bottles priced at £90. Each bottle is numbered from 1 to 90.

The Beheading Stone sits on Gowan Hill, just below the castle. Tradition holds that it was used for executions in the 15th century, among them Murdoch Stewart, Duke of Albany, and his sons, put to death in 1425 on the orders of James I. The King's Knot is a stepped, octagonal earthwork in the King's Park, laid out as part of the royal gardens in the 1620s, though what lay there before is still debated. The Back Walk, built between 1734 and 1791, climbs around the old town walls to the castle and is known to be Scotland's oldest public road.

Telling Stirling’s stories through its spirits is central to what the distillery does. Its Battle Strength Gin marks the Battle of Stirling Bridge, and its Pink Lady Gin tells the story of the ghost said to walk Stirling Castle. Its gin and whisky experiences cover the history and folklore of Stirling and of distilling in the city, and Tales from the Rock is the latest chapter.

June McCann, co-founder of Stirling Distillery, said: "We've always made drinks that tell Stirling's stories, and these three places are all very close to the distillery. We walk past them most days but don’t often know it. With only bottles of 90 of each, we wanted the people who support us most to have first refusal of the full set. Anyone can sign up as an Insider before the general release, and they'll get the same early access."

Hugo McCann, the distillery's award-winning distiller, said: "We chose a different quarter cask for each whisky, so the three tales taste as different as the places they're named after."