Ladies Rock

Ladies of the Royal Court in Stirling Castle used this convenient observatory from where they could safely watch the sporting spectaculars.

This rocky spot is said to derive its name from its proximity to the original ‘Valley’, a hollow (now part of the graveyard) reputed to have been used for tournaments and sporting events throughout the reigns of the Stuart monarchs. Ladies of the Royal Court in Stirling Castle used this convenient observatory from where they could safely watch the sporting spectaculars.

Funding for an indicator to identify the prominent features of the surrounding countryside was offered to Stirling Town Council in 1889 by Mr William Connal of Solsgirth, an estate nestling on the borders of Clackmannanshire, Fife and Perthshire. After some deliberation, the Council eventually accepted Mr Connal’s generous offer and commissioned James Shearer to produce a suitable chart. This was, reported ‘The Stirling Journal’, ‘executed in an excellent manner’ and ‘seems in every way to answer admirably the purpose for which it is intended.’ The newspaper also reported that on 12th August 1890 the indicator was ‘formally inaugurated by the Provost, Magistrates and Town Councillors’, a task which demanded no more of the town elders than merely looking at it. The present indicator is not the original.