exploring stories, traditions, and folklore from Scotland
In the 4th century, the relics of Saint Andrew were brought to Scotland by Saint Regulus, an event commemorated by the naming of the town of St Andrews on the east coast. Travelling with Saint Regulus’s entourage was a Greek nun, a consecrated virgin named Triduana. The young woman settled in the parish of Rescobie in Angus where she led a quiet life, dedicating herself to God, until her beauty attracted the attention of Nechtan, king of the Picts.
Redcaps are the malignant counterpart to the friendly household Brownies of Scottish folklore and can be found in the ruins of castles and towers in the Borders, especially those that have played host to bloody battles. Popular tradition attests that the foundation stones of the old Border castles were bathed in human blood by the Picts to draw these malevolent spirits to protect the buildings.
Ogham (OH-am) is an ancient Celtic alphabet made up of twenty unique symbols. It was mainly used to write in the archaic and early Irish languages, but inscriptions have also been found in old Welsh, Pictish, and Latin. There are nearly four hundred surviving Ogham inscriptions on stones found around the British Isles, dating to between the 4th and 9th centuries. These inscriptions were almost exclusively people’s names, and the stones they were inscribed on were mainly used as territory markers and memorials.
Each letter in the Ogham alphabet is composed of a vertical line, crossed or met by short perpendicular or angled strokes. This straight-lined form allows the letters to be easily carved into a stone surface, with the edge of the object being carved usually forming the central stroke. The first letter is always carved at the base of the line and the inscription read from the bottom up.
Whilst the word Ogham refers to the form of the script itself, the collection of twenty symbols, or letters, are known collectively as the Beith-Luis-Nuin, and are often referred to as the Celtic Tree Alphabet since each of its letters corresponds to the name of a tree or shrub.
| SYMBOL | LETTER | LETTER NAME | PRONUNCIATION | TREE |
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B | Beith | (BEH) | Birch |
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L | Luis | (leh-WEESH) | Rowan |
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F | Fearn | (FAIR-n) | Alder |
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S | Saille | (SAL-yuh) | Willow |
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N | Nuin | (NEE-un) | Ash |
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H | Uath | (HOO-ah) | Hawthorn |
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D | Dair | (DAW-r) | Oak |
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T | Tinne | (CHIN-yuh) | Holly |
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C | Coll | (CULL) | Hazel |
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Q | Ceirt | (kah-WAIRT) | Apple |
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M | Muin | (MUN) | Blackberry |
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G | Gort | (GORT) | Ivy |
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Ng | Gétal | (GWEH-del) | Reed |
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Z | Straif | (STRAF) | Blackthorn |
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R | Ruis | (ruh-WEESH) | Elder |
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A | Ailm | (ALM) | Pine |
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O | Oir/Onn | (UNN) | Gorse |
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U | Úr | (OO-rah) | Heather |
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E | Edad | (EH-yoh) | Aspen |
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I | Idad | (EE-yoh) | Yew |
For three hundred years, the nine of diamonds has been known as The Curse of Scotland, and it has come to be considered the most unlucky playing card in the deck. Numerous versions of the reason behind the curse have been put forward over the years.
The earliest recorded reference to the curse was published in The British Apollo, Curious Amusements for the Ingenious, a collection of questions and answers published in 1708.
Mermaids appear in the folklore of almost every country around the world, and Scotland is no exception. Given that no point in Scotland is further than sixty-six miles from the outlying seas, not to mention the myriad of inland lochs and rivers, it’s unsurprising that its mythology and folklore are packed with strange beings that make their homes in water. Known as the maighdeann-mhara (MY-jong VAH-reh) or maid of the wave, the belief in mermaids in Scotland was a common one, and their portrayals range from wraiths who steal children, bewitch men, and curse families, to much more benevolent creatures who offer advice, cure ailments, and grant wishes.
In Highland Perthshire in the 1640s the old village of Lawers sat on the north bank of Loch Tay at the foot of Ben Lawers, the highest Munro in Perthshire. There, in a two-story house known as Tigh Ban-tigheaona Labhair, the House of the Lady of Lawers, lived a spaewife, or soothsayer. She was the wife of John Stewart, the second son of the Laird of Appin, and her prophecies foretold everything from the fate of a beloved tree to the advent of the industrial age in Scotland.
On 8th November 1576, at the High Court in Edinburgh, Bessie Dunlop, an Ayrshire woman, was accused of ‘sorcery, witchcraft, and incantation, with invocation of spirits of the devil, continuing in familiarity with them at all such times as she thought expedient, dealing with charms, and jinxing the people with devilish craft of sorcery aforesaid’. But like so many people accused of witchcraft at the time of the trials, Bessie was just an ordinary woman who had never caused harm to anyone.
From the late 1800s, climbers have been reporting encounters with Am Fear Liath Mor, a tall Yeti-esque monster that stalks those descending from the summit of Ben Macdui, the highest mountain in the Cairngorms and the second highest mountain in Scotland.
At the 1925 meeting of the Cairngorm Club, respected mountaineer and scientist John Norman Collie spoke of an experience he’d had on Ben Macdui in 1890, one that had scared him so thoroughly that he hadn’t spoken of it for thirty-five years.
Wee White Hoose was originally created in 2015 to participate in the A to Z challenge but has grown to become a receptacle for my research into my first love – Scottish myth, folklore, tradition and customs, and storytelling. Grab a cuppa, coorie doon, and have read ♥
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