On 16 Jul 2009, at 09:51, Peter Alcibiades wrote:
Historically Scotland has been two cultures, the culture of the lowland cities, .... Then you have the highland culture,
Oh dear me, Peter. If there were only these two cultures, a bunch of skirt-wearing highland lassies and football-playing lowlanders, our country would have disappeared long ago. From time immemorial (I can't remember when), Scotland's culture has been defended, sold out, and oft times created by the people of the Southern Uplands. While highlanders were deciding what clothes to wear, and lowlanders were still in bed, Scottish Borderers were already in the thick of battle, displaying fearsome feats of strength and even fighting on both sides at once. And while others would head home at the end of day's fighting, those Border lads still had the strength to "attend the wounded" and relieve them of heavy burdens such as weapons, horses and coins.
In the 16th century, they taught the world the art of stealing cattle, how to hold a grudge, and introduced the word "blackmail" to the English language. The "reiving" tradition is still carried on today, although generally just at weekends and mainly by young girls.
And a selfless lot too. In the 19th century, the mills along the Tweed designed and produced tartan cloth for their highland cousins who were otherwise naked and seemed to like such colourful things.
So for those visiting Edinburgh, and who would like to see the home of the Armstrongs, Grahams, Johnstons, Kerrs, and many other notorious clans whose names don't being with Mac, I suggest you head south a little. And if you want to feel at home, here's a picture of how you might want to dress:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/iainmac/1303617693/ Cheers Dave _______________________________________________ use-revolution mailing list [email protected] Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
