Stirling Examples

Stirling Castle

The Castle of Stirling was a wonderful place to wander in, around, and a'boot. You talk about a place full of history, well this is the real deal.

I was very much captivated by the many figures that decorated the exterior walls of the castle, from the royal to the demonic, and so I post a selection of them here for your consideration.

The Royals

The Demons and the Grotesque

Devil figure close-up

And the guy with the crossbow protecting the battlements

 Colin

Aging Sculpture

Everything gets older, hell even the stone that we carve our memorials is aging in it's own particular way; it's eroding, it's softening, the figures may be blurring, fading, sometimes to the point of losing the shape
of whatever it originally depicted.

What is it besides likely bovine?

When Sid and I visited York in England we went to the old mediaeval cathedral there, York Minster. I was hoping to wander around the outside of the building and take photographs of the figures on the roofs and walls. Unfortunately the grounds were largely gated off while extensive restoration was going on and the only figure that was close enough to me to photograph was this particular one, on the point of fading to obscurity.

Gargoyles and other hangers on.

I'd like to introduce another theme here that's been one of my photographic interests for years.

Blech

I've always been fascinated by the creatures that sit or cling to walls and roofs, the ones that strive under window casements, and those that are stuck away in isolated nooks and crannies. Often, particularly in this busy world of ours, these silent sentinels are ignored or forgotten. They are also, even though cast in stone, aging.

Here are a few examples from Westminister Abbey (old churches, gothic ones in particular, are often great locations for gargoyle hunting).

The only problem is that they mostly occupy the higher realms.

Figures out of nightmare, figures out of time, many appearing to be quite ticked off.

I spy with my little eye something that is...

And mixed in with the menagerie of creatures are often the faces of people.