Blair Castle, or Caisteil Bhlàir in Gaelic, stands near Blair Atholl in Highland Perthshire, guarding the historic route north through the central Highlands beside today’s A9. Originating in 1269 with Comyn’s Tower, built by John Comyn on the Earl of Atholl’s land, the castle grew from a medieval stronghold into a grand Scots Baronial mansion that reflects over 750 years of additions and alterations. As the ancestral home of the Stewarts and Murrays of Atholl, it played a key role in Scottish history, from visits by Mary Queen of Scots and sieges in the Civil War and the 1745 Jacobite rising, to a later royal visit by Queen Victoria that led to the creation of Europe’s last remaining private army, the Atholl Highlanders. Today, Blair Castle is a 5-star visitor attraction, famed for its fine 18th-century interiors, thirty furnished rooms open to the public, and extensive grounds that include a restored nine-acre walled garden, wooded groves, deer park, and the ruins of St Bride’s Kirk.
Blair Castle, or Caisteil Bhlàir in Gaelic, stands near Blair Atholl in Highland Perthshire, guarding the historic route north through the central Highlands beside today’s A9. Originating in 1269 with Comyn’s Tower, built by John Comyn on the Earl of Atholl’s land, the castle grew from a medieval stronghold into a grand Scots Baronial mansion that reflects over 750 years of additions and alterations. As the ancestral home of the Stewarts and Murrays of Atholl, it played a key role in Scottish history, from visits by Mary Queen of Scots and sieges in the Civil War and the 1745 Jacobite rising, to a later royal visit by Queen Victoria that led to the creation of Europe’s last remaining private army, the Atholl Highlanders. Today, Blair Castle is a 5-star visitor attraction, famed for its fine 18th-century interiors, thirty furnished rooms open to the public, and extensive grounds that include a restored nine-acre walled garden, wooded groves, deer park, and the ruins of St Bride’s Kirk.