Stirling Castle (11)
I have just backed away from the castle, out over Gowanhill, where there are the remains of a small Pictish fort (there was probably a bigger one where the castle stands, but all evidence of it have been swept away by centuries of enthusiastic castle builders).  I was trying to get an interesting feature in the photo - but on looking carefully at the photo, I have now decided that it isn't in the photo at all!!  Had I flown even further backwards, included in the photo would have been, what is known as the Beheading Stone! 

The Beheading Stone is a large ice-worn boulder, set on a plinth, with a steel cage over it to stop people nicking it - or using it?!  It would seem to me to be highly improbable that a boulder would be used for this purpose, but my experience as an executioner is quite limited.  Surely an axman would want a wooden block under his victim's neck, in order to protect the carefully honed edge of his axe?  However, one of the websites I have seen states that ''a wooden block would be placed on top and holes can be seen in the stone where this would have been secured.&quot;  A metal plaque nearby reads “Beheading Stone, Protected by the Public at the Insistence of the Stirling National History &amp; Archaeological Society 1887.” 
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