Welcome to the Review of Scottish Culture, supported by the European Ethnological Centre at the University of Edinburgh. We explore and showcase Scotland’s rich culture heritage, in all its diversity and range, nationally and internationally. The journal encourages multi and interdisciplinary research on the ethnology of Scotland, and welcomes new submissions.
Ethnology, Folklore, Scottish culture, Scottish history, Scotland, Narratology, Material Culture, Archaeology, Fieldwork, Diaspora, local studies, regional studies
Copyright (c) 2025 Valentina Bold https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Ethnology, Folklore, Scottish culture, Scottish history, material culture, fieldwork, local studies, regional studies, Dumfries and Galloway, Archives
Copyright (c) 2025 Neill Martin https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Editorial and Contents of Review of Scottish Culture 30, 2025
More Than a Game: Seasonal Handball in Scotland
Traditional football and handball are found in various locations across the UK. Particularly associated with the period around Shrove Tuesday and Christmas, they have their origins in centuries-old, rough-and-ready street games. The article reflects on the degree of disorder and violence which are commonly assumed to characterise the games and reflects on the prospects for their survival in an increasingly litigious society. The focus is on the handball tradition in the Scottish Borders and Orkney, with additional comparative material from two examples of English street football. These games do not take place in a designated play-space, but rather the town centre and surrounding streets, where shops are boarded up in advance, but yet are still open for business. The events are only lightly regulated, police presence is minimal and there are no barriers to protect onlookers. The game has few rules and is highly physical. It can appear to the outsider not as a form of sport, but rather as something which resembles violent disorder. Indeed, it is frequently presented in this way in the form of video packages on YouTube. But what is violence in the context of this tradition? Can a traditional form maintain its unregulated character while presenting a risk to players, onlookers and property?
Copyright (c) 2025 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Stirling 900: Reviving Walking the Marches. The Captain’s Story
In this article, introduced by Stirling archaeologist Dr Murray Cook, McEwan presents a first-hand account of the revival of Stirling’s ancient custom of ‘Walking the Marches’. This custom, marking the historic boundaries Stirling, is unique in being a ‘perambulation’, rather than an event led by riders. McEwan, who played a key role in reviving this custom, lapsed since 1978, and in its performance in 2024, the 950th anniversary of the Royal Burgh.
'Daughters of the North': writing the biography of Jean Gordon and Mary, Queen of Scots
This article explores the creative processes of writing popular biography, from the first hand perspective. It examins their similarities to, and differences from, writing academic history or fiction. Henderson focusses on her recent book exploring the biographies, and connections, between Jean Gordon and Mary Queen of Scots, Daughters of the North. She explains how and why she made particular choices in writing about Scottish history, culture, music, literature and art.
The Joke of Wellington: The Duke of Wellington’s cone from folk act to brand
This article focusses on the Glasgow landmark, the cone on the Duke of Wellington’s statue, outside the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA). Focussing on the history of the Duke’s cone, in the wider context of similar public interactions, it discusses how the attitude of the city (both the people and the city authorities) has developed until the practice has become an informal emblem for Glasgow.
'Suppos þat þai be nocht bot fabill': Medieval Film and Robert the Bruce
This article focusses on three films about Robert the Bruce: The Bruce (1996), Outlaw King (2018) and Robert the Bruce (2019). By exploring connections between historians and film-makers views of the past, and how these are expressed through cinematic conventions, it goes beyond assessments of ‘accuracy’ to enable more nuanced assessments of these films as creative works of art.
This article reassess the role of The White Heather Club in mid-20th century Scottish culture. Rejecting preconceptions that it fostered trite representations, it shows how the programme reflected rapid innovations in broadcasting and was a technically and culturally creative approach to home entertainment on the small screen. The White Heather Club brought Scottish entertainment into Scottish homes at a pivotal post-war period when World War II was still a living memory, and popular culture and standards of living were undergoing a period of rapid change. The White Heather Club, in short, should be considered as a record of popular Scottish entertainment; it incorporated aspects of, and deserves to sit alongside, the folk revival movement.
Mr Haldane’s Hermitage: Re-discovering a Late 18th Century Immersive Poetry Tableau at Airthrey Estate, Bridge of Allan, Stirling, a Case of Disguising East India Company Profits
This article explores a previously unrecorded, late 18th century grotto in the grounds of the former Airthrey Estate, Stirling (now Stirling University) that appears to have been constructed to provide the physical setting for an immersive rendering of Oliver Goldsmith’s poem The Hermit (also known as ‘Edwin and Angelina’ from Chapter 8 of Goldsmith’s novel the Vicar of Wakefield where it is described as ‘ballad’). The article describes the structure and its history and places it in context of then fashionable Scottish garden design trends.
Slavery, Commerce, and Art: Kelvingrove House and The City Industrial Museum
In 1901, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum opened to the public, along with two other temporary exhibition halls, as one of the main attractions at the Glasgow International Exhibition. However, the history and legacy of its predecessor, the City Industrial Museum (previously known as Kelvingrove House), is far less known and largely undocumented. This article considers the early history of Kelvingrove House, adopting an interdisciplinary approach combining archival research with the analysis of material culture, maps, and museum collections. Situated within wider heritage initiatives relating to the recovery of Glasgow’s historical links with slavery, it underlines the possible significance of Kelvingrove House to future curatorial policy and civic initiatives.
‘Buaile bheag do na laoigh' (a wee fold for the calves) Historical cattle management for milk production
This article explores experiences of pastoralism in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland in their historical contexts, focussing on the oral and material cultural traditions around milking. Past studies have examined how these traditions are reflected in songs. However little has been written previously about the practical management of cattle. This article considers its significance in the social, agricultural, cultural and economic systems of the Gaelic speaking areas.
Folklore Material in Ruaraidh Erskine’s Gaelic Magazines
Gaelic magazines founded and run by Ruaraidh Erskine in the 1900s – 1930s are usually, and justifiably, perceived as cosmopolitan and admittedly elitist, focused on discussing contemporary affairs and supporting new Gaelic writing inspired by latest international developments. However, as this article demonstrates, they also featured a substantial amount of content related to Gaelic folklore and traditional culture. In all respects, Erskine’s magazines showed consistent interest in other Celtic countries, especially Ireland but also Brittany, Cornwall, Isle of Man, and Wales. This article examines the role of folklore and traditional culture play within the magazines’ vision of the Gaelic revival and Scottish independence, inspiring other influential ventures, including the quarterly Gairm (1952-2002).
William George Black, “Neomagus,” and Folk-Medicine (1876)
This article examines William George Black’s coinage of the term ‘folk medicine’, under the pseudonym ‘Neomagus’, in the Journal of the British Archaeological Association of 1878. This was prior to the publication of his seminar Folk Medicine in 1882, almost forty years after Thom’s coinage of the term ‘folk lore’. As Secretary of South Scotland for the Folk-Lore Society of London, Black – who published his seminal Folk Medicine in 1882 – played a key role in the development of the discipline. This article explores the wide-ranging influences, and probable German origins of this central term, of his ground-breaking work in defining folk medicine.
“Are You Quite Sure They Gave You Them All?”John Edward Crombie and the Personal Papers of the Rev. Walter Gregor (1825-97)
Regional studies, Aberdeenshire, Walter Gregor, Folk Lore Society, Folk-Lore Journal, New Spalding Club, John Edward Crombie, John William Crombie, Custom, Calendar Custom, Folk tale, Proverbs, Rites of passage, Fishing, Farming, Material culture, Scottish culture, Ethnology, Folklore
Folklore, Ethnology, Children’s history, Oil industry, North East Scotland, Aberdeenshire, Material Culture, Local Studies, Regional Studies, History of emotions, Families, Soft toys, seals, folklife, occupational studies, offshore life.
Folklore, Ethnology, Scottish History, Romanticism, Walter Scott, Stirling, Stirlingshire, River Forth, Archaeology, Scottish literature, Tourism, History of Tourism, Maps, Cartography, Roy, Ford of Frew, Antiquarianism, Military Survey, Local Studies, Regional Studies
Robert Burns’s Friend Robert Cleghorn in his Cultural Context
Folklore, Ethnology, Antiquarianism, Robert Burns, Scottish literature, Scottish poetry, Scottish song, Scottish music, Robert Cleghorn, Cultural History, Scottish history, Caledonian Mercury, Kingsknow, Redford, Saughton, George Thomson, Ann Hunter, Vocal music.
Folklore, Ethnology, Scottish History, Rural life, Regional Studies, Local Studies, Archaeology, Material Culture, Scottish Borders, Cultural History, Fieldwork, Excavation, Stills, Illicit Stills, Distilling, Shielings, Retting ponds, Farming History
William McGonagall, Dundee, Macbeth, Theatre Royal, Folklore, Ethnology, Drama, Scottish poetry, Scottish literature, Performance, William Shakespeare, Scottish History, Regional studies, Local studies, Celebrity
Folklore, Ethnology, Antiquarianism, Family History, Local History, Regional Studies, Edinburgh, Scottish music, Scottish song, Archives, National Library of Scotland, George Waterston, Geoffrey Waterston, William Waterston, Scottish trade, Scottish business history, mercantile, Glasgow, radical rising, radicalism, Waterloo, William Dauney, Robert Waterston, Scots airs, psalm tunes, hymn tunes, Walter Scott
“Wha would ha’e thoucht it, Stockings would ha’e boucht it?”
Scottish history, Folklore, Ethnology, Horology, Women’s History, Stockings, Popular Culture, Scottish poetry, Material Culture, Archaeology, Bannockburn, Longcase clocks, Material Culture, Narratology, Local studies, St Ninian’s, Time
Material culture, Ethnology, Folklore, Scottish History, Rural Life, Regional Studies, Local Studies, Hebrides, National Museums Scotland, Museums, Museology, European ethnology, plough, ploughing, South Uist, North Uist, Benbecula, West Kilbride, Clearances, Highland Clearances
Material culture, Farming history, Ploughing, Archives, Diaries, Kirkintilloch, Dunbartonshire, William Allison, Family history, Scottish culture, Ethnology, Folklore, Folk Life, Rural Life, Local Studies, Regional Studies
Material culture, Farming history, Archaeology, Archives, Aberdeenshire, Aberdeen Doctors, Episcopalianism, religious history, Alexander Stewart, Mastrick, Scottish culture, Ethnology, Folklore, Folk life, Rural life, Local Studies, Regional Studies
Folklore, Ethnology, Folk Religion, Scottish history, Ferenc Baranth, Albion, Scottish music, Scottish song, Calvinism, Church of Scotland, Hungary, Anglo-Saxon, Germany, Edinburgh, education, Protestantism, humour, Dean Ramsay
Editorial and contents of Review of Scottish Culture 29, 2024
Copyright (c) 2024 Review of Scottish Culture https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0