Two rare bottles of Royal Welsh Whisky have sold for a combined total of nearly £15,000.

The whisky, distilled at Frongoch near Bala at the turn of the 19th century are thought to be two of only a handful left in existence.

The auction had attracted bidders from as far away as Denmark, Malaysia and China with three bidders competing for the two rare bottles. 

One bottle sold for £7,200 while the other sold for £7,300 as the auction finished on Monday.

However, despite the international interest auctioneer Charles Hampshire, of Peter Francis Auctioneers, has revealed that at least one of the bottles is staying in Wales.

Charles said: "After the auction closed, she spoke to my coleagues and there were one or two expletives of joy when they told her how much, then she rang back again to say thank you,

"She told us that the money is for her grandchildren, ahd she was happy to know that one bottle with it's paperwork is staying in Wales. That was out of our control but that made her happy as well. She'll take a couple of days to get over it I think, but it's a good start to Christmas for everyone."

The original estimate for the whisky was £1,500 to £2,000. However, Charles says the bidding rattled past it's estimate by a long way in the final hours.

"Well, at the start of the day one was £4,000 and one was at £2,000 and that would've been wonderful," Charles continued.

"But there were three people bidding on both lots and as you get into the thousands the increments increase, so the price can ramp up quite quickly, and every time someone bids  in the last ten minutes it extends the auction for another ten minutes so there's no swooping in.

"How high it'd go, I didn't know. I spoke to one chap, he said that's me done, and then he just kept going. He must've thought he wouldn't get hold of one again."