Ancient to medieval cosmologists used Earth, Air, Fire, and Water to explain the universe. Modern science has refined these views, but the four Elements remain essential to life.
Because each element shares one of its qualities with one other element, that leaves one element completely unrelated.
For example, air is moist like water and warm like fire, but it has nothing in common with earth. These opposing elements are on opposite sides of the diagram and are distinguished by the presence or absence of the crossbar within the triangle:
- Air and earth are opposites and have the crossbar
- Water and fire are also opposites and lack the crossbar.
Water
Take one atom of oxygen. Add two atoms of hydrogen. The result is H20. Water. Life. Available to us in its three forms of solid, liquid and gas, water is the vital fluid of all known living organisms. Watch the withering plant revive, see the Sahara turn green after a rainstorm, note the Marathon runner grasp the cup from an outstretched hand. Little wonder that the Scots Gaels called their spirit uisge beatha; the water of life.
Two distilleries can share the shadow of the same tall trees, source their barley from the same fields, yet the whisky will reveal very different characteristics should its water hail from a different burn. Science can only partially explain how the distillation of fermented barley and water in a singularly-shaped kettle can result in the gloriously complex spirit we know as malt whisky. Alchemy does the rest, and for its unknown ways, we are grateful.
The Cask
The under-appreciated elegance of a single Lafite Rothschild Barrique cask is so unique because the world-leading wine is made from carefully selected, hand-sorted grapes from the prestigious Château Lafite Rothschild estate vines in France's Bordeaux region.
This famous wine is crafted with traditional methods and aged in French oak barrels for up to 20 months, allowing the wine to develop complex and intense flavours. The cask is also extremely limited in production, making them highly sought-after and very valuable on the secondary market.
Our Mortlach we present to you today has been matured solely in a 1st-fill Lafite Rothschild Barrique cask.
Mortlach - Aged 26 Years
Single Malt Scotch Whisky - Matured in a 1st Fill Single Lafite Barrique Cask
Mortlach - Aged 27 Years
Single Malt Scotch Whisky - Matured in a 1st Fill Single Lafite Barrique Cask
£TBC
Fire
Prometheus, we salute you. For defying the gods on high Olympus to bring us the gift of fire and for paying such a cost. We know that Zeus, angered by your impertinence, ordered you to be bound to the rock and how he sent his eagle to eat your liver by day, only for it to regrow overnight. And for the eagle to return each dawn, until one happy day you were rescued by Heracles.
Fire is more than heat and the leap it enabled, from tearing at raw meat from our prey to roasting it over a flame. From huddling together in the cave in smelly skins for warmth, to sitting around the campfire trading stories, fire represents humanity striving for progress, for knowledge. In short, without fire, there would have been no civilization.
And that progress has been seen too in the making of malt. It was only 200 years ago that highlanders were boiling their barley over peat fires in hollows in the heather, look-outs posted to give early warning of the approach of the exciseman or the redcoats. Today, the furnace in the distillery may be fired by steam, gas or electricity, or yes, still by peat. But by whatever means that fusion of a tiny handful of age-old ingredients results in the drams we have to come to love, we should raise a glass to Prometheus.
