How did people live day to day?

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The houses were still blackhouses made of stone and turf with the animals living in the same building and, as Rev Findlater remarked in his contribution to the Second Statistical Account which he wrote in 1834, animals and people still use the same door. 

 

The hearth was in the centre of the house and there was no chimney.  By 1834 Rev Findlater notes that there are now a few houses with the fire at the gable and an opening or chimney for the smoke but this was unusual at this time.

 

Houses had earth floors.  Bog myrtle was often scattered on the floor to provide a peasant scent. 

 

 

Bog Myrtle - Roid

 

Roid

Tha mis dha do bhuain,

A roid ruadh réidh,

An ainm Àthair nam buadh,

An ainm Mac mo luaidh,

An ainm Spiorad buan Dhé.

 

Air bhuadh deagh fhear,

Air bhuadh deagh réis,

Air bhuadh deagh bhean,

Air bhuadh deagh bheatha,

Air bhuadh deagh cheum.

 

Air buadh deagh ghaol,

Air bhuadh deagh leum,

Air bhuadh deagh adhbhar,

Air bhuadh deagh shaoghal

Gun bhaoghal gun bheum.

Bog-Myrtle

I am plucking thee,

Thou gracious red myrtle,

In the name of the Father of virtues,

In name of the Son Whom I love,

In name of God’s eternal Spirit.

 

For virtue of good man,

For virtue of good span,

For virtue of good woman,

For virtue of good life,

For virtue of good step.

 

For virtue of good love,

For virtue of good leap,

For virtue of good cuase,

For virtue of good life

Without peril without reproach.[1]

 

 

Mary Beith comments that:

 

“they’ve done work on that for repelling midges, and years ago, when I lived at the bottom of a hill in Argyllshire and my youngest daughter – I tried this bog-myrtle, rubbed her, leaves on her and sent her up the hill.  Aren’t I mean?  I didn’t do it myself.  Sent her up the hill.  And she came back down in an absolute fury.  She said, yes, the midges had kept away, but it attracted the cleggs.

 

It was used … the scent of it was used for scenting linen, and it was used as a strewing for the floor.  Now this is, you know, before people had carpets.  I mean, we’re going way back, now.  And bog-myrtle …  Thyme, of course, was used – because that tends not to grow in the bog itself but it grows on the nearby rocks and things.  Lavender doesn’t grow well here unless it’s tended in the garden.  So, plants like that we used for putting among the linen and strewing on the floor. 

 

And the interesting thing is of course at the end of the winter the carpet was swept out and it was used, as the old thatched roof was, was recycled into fertiliser for the fields.  And this was probably a hangover from an old Celtic custom – the Celts were great recyclers.  And where you find Roman settlements among – in Celtic areas, lots of Roman remains – very few Celtic remains, because the Celts were busy recycling. 

 

And that may be one of the things behind the belief among the so-called (???) movement of the Wessex archaeologists who think the Celts were never properly in Britain.  This is very much a political thing and it works the other way round in France and Poland, but that’s another story.   (???) finding a  lot of Anglo-Saxon – but a lot of the Anglo-Saxon jewellery was made by Celtic craftsmen – Pictish craftsmen, you know. 

 

And so they were great recyclers, and they swept the carpet out, it was recycled on the field and they got new plants in.  You know, things seem to have been growing in abundance.  Whether they over-used them, that’s another matter because, of course, the Neolithic farmers’ intensive farming led to this wasteland.”[2] 

 

 

Garbhag an t-slèibhe  (‘little rough one of the high moorland’) - Fir club moss

“An infusion of the moss was used as a skin tonic by women and girls.  A woman who was born and brought up near Kinlochbervie in the early twentieth century has described how she and her brothers and sisters were regularly sent by their mother to collect large amounts of this moss.  When the children returned with their haul, their mother would steep the moss in a big pot of boiling water which would be left to simmer for a while.  The liquid was then strained off, left to cool, and used as a soothing and softening lotion for the women's and girls' faces, arms and hands.”

 

Garbhag an t-Sléibh 

Garbhag an t-sleibh air mo shuibhal,

Chan eirich domh beud no pudhar;

Cha mharbh garmaisg, cha dearg iubhar mi,

Cha riab grianuisg no glaislig uidhir mi.

The Club Moss 

The club moss is on my person,

No harm nor mishap can me befall;

No sprite shall slay me, no arrow shall wound me,

No fay nor dun water-nymph shall tear me.

 

 

Garbhag an t-Sléibh

Fhir a shuibhlas gu subhach,

Chan éirich dhut beud na pudhar

Ris a’ ghréin na ris dubhar

‘S garabhag an t-sléibh air a shuibhal. 

The Club Moss

Thou man who travellest blithely,

Nor hurt nor harm shall befall thee

No rin sunshine nor in darkness

If but the club-moss be on thy pathway.

 

“There’s an interesting one from the Kinlochbervie area.  Seordag Mackay, born Seordag Falconer, from Achlyness, remembers being asked by her mother to go with her brothers and sisters onto the bog – the boggy bit at the bottom of the hill – to collect fir club moss.  Which they did, and they had to collect it in a clean white sheet or tablecloth.  And this was very important. 

 

And then they took it back, the mother boiled the moss up, and put it in a – sorry, strained it and cooled the mixture, and then the women used it as a sort of cosmetic.  A moisturising liquid, and they bathed their arms and knees and faces.  The knees were important, apparently, for when you go dancing – it exposed them, even long ago!  The men weren’t – the men here weren’t looking at ankles, they were looking at knees!  Possibly for women who were going to be good at scrubbing the floor later on, I don’t know.

 

But anyway, that is one of the very interesting ones because, of course, fir club moss contains a material which at one time was certainly used for coating pills to stop them sticking together, because it repels moisture.  Can’t remember the name of the substance in it.  But Pliny the Elder, whose Natural History was written in Rome in about 73AD, writes that the Druids of Gaul, who would have been, you know, a similar people to the Celts here, had a particular ritual with fir club moss.  When they collected it they had to wash from head to toe and dress in clean white linen or cloth.  And they used it for something to do with the eyes.  And isn’t that interesting: the clean white clothes and the clean white cloth, nearly two thousand years later.”[3]

 

What did folk eat in the 18th and 19th centuries?

No sugar, no tea, no coffee, no chocolate, no bread, no jam.

 

Sugar plantations under English control became established in Bermuda and elsewhere from 1616 onwards.  In Scotland Glasgow became the centre of the sugar trade.  However sugar was an expensive high status item for a long time to come.  It was not until domestic production of sugar beet became established in the second half of the 19th century that prices fell.  It was at this point that ordinary folk could afford sugar and the making of items like rhubarb and ginger jam and pancakes became commonplace.  Although in many places honey was used as a sweetner there is no evidence to date of hives being kept in the northern Highlands.  Likewise in the north wild honey was not generally available. 

 

The habit of serving ‘sweetmeats’ after dinner emerged in the 16th century in very wealthy high status households.  Sugar was also used medicinally.  Sugar was an impossibly expensive status symbol during the 17th century.  By the 18th century the desert course was introduced but still only in very wealthy households until gradually sugar became available in grocery shops and form travelling pedlars. 

 

Coffee reached Scotland in the mid 17th century and by the time of the Union in 1707 Dutch coffee was being sold in the new Edinburgh Coffee Houses.  In Nairn, Moray and Caithness by 1811 coffee was being imported from London.  Chocolate too arrived in Scotland in the 17th century and was taken as a hot drink.  As coffee gained popularity in the Big Houses and Coffee Shops a whole news set of household equipment was developed to serve the elite’s new taste for hot drinks. These are items which today we would think of as basics in the household – cups, saucers, milk jugs, coffee pots, kettles – and soon teapots too.  Tea arrived in the late 17th century but again as an indulgence for the wealthy. 

 

By the mid 19th century ‘hot chocolate’ in the form of dried cocoa became a commonplace in the home.  By the late 18th century tea is becoming known in even the humbler homes.  It has been suggested that the faster and more widespread adoption of tea drinking was aided by the Scottish enthusiasm for smuggling which made it more widely available more cheaply than chocolate and coffee.  Ministers expressed concern in the ate 18th and early 19th century about the adoption of the tea drinking habit morning and afternoon.  By the early decades of the 19th century both tea and sugar are becoming known in every home.  Alongside this came the early expansion of kitchen equipment – initiated by the new taste for hot drinks. 

 

 

Daily Food

By the mid 19th century the habit of 3 meals a day had become established in many ordinary households having been adopted by the elite in the previous century instead of the medieval practise of 2 meals a day.  All of those meals would be mainly based on oatmeal and milk with a seasonal addition of seafish.  Meat was a rare addition in the autumn.  Once the potato was adopted in the later years of the 18th century this became the main item. 

 

Spring and early summer were a time when food was scare.  The winter supplies of oats – and by the end of the 18th century potatoes too – were dwindling fast and the crops and wild plants had yet to grow.  As is noted in both Statistical Accounts at this time oatmeal and milk were the staples.  Oatmeal was used for broses and oatcakes but also for ‘sowens’ – made from fine meal ground from the oat husks, steeped in water, fermented, boiled and then eaten. 

 

It is stated in the Second Statistical Account that bowel complaints and dyspepsia are common spring and autumn, possibly because of the abrupt change of diet to mainly milk and oatmeal. 

 

Cooking was done over the fire – the pot or girdle hung on a hook above the fire.  For many centuries flat stones which were heated beside the fire were commonplace for baking oatcakes.  In living memory bannocks were still being made by using a scone like mix inside a pot.  Burning peats are then piled on the lid to create a kind of oven.  This approach was exported along with out-migrants and was a characteristic staple of the diet of the ‘voyaguers’ – the hunters, traders and explorers in North America.  Even by the late 19th century ovens were only just appearing in ‘The Big House’.  Ordinary folk did not have such a thing until well into the 20th century. 

 

Milk of course does not keep easily so it was made into butter and cheeses.  The by-products of cheese and butter making were also staple foodstuffs – buttermilk, curds and whey.  Even in the early 20th century curds was not unheard of in rural Scotland as a teatime or supper dish.  Crowdie is still well know today but other cheeses, including hard cheeses which can keep were made too.  Sometimes caraway seeds were used as a seasoning but generally just a little salt. 

 

 

Eating Your Greens

Kale was a staple from early times.  The First Statistical Account written published in c. 1791 - 99 mentions that cabbages, green kail, turnips and other ‘carrots are planted in domestic gardens.  The ‘swede’ was only adopted in Scotland in the 18th century but the wee white turnip was in use ahead of this innovation.  It also mentions ‘great quantities of potatoes’ planted each year – indicating early and rapid adoption of this new crop. 

 

 

Finds – The Rennet Jar

 

Given the high reliance on milk in the local diet cheese making was important.  Local plants could also be used as a substitute for rennet.

 

Butterwort is an example.

 

Uses of plants was also accompanied by a great deal of lore.

 

Mòthan – ‘Bog Violet’ or Butterwort – and Sundew

There has been some debate about whether mòthan is pearlwort as stated by Carmichael or butterwort as indicated in Dwelly.  Beith suggests that in most places mòthan is indeed butterwort (Pinguicula vulgaris) and Black provides notes on the range of plants (Gaelic and English names) also associated with mòthan in different parts of the Gaidhealtachd.

 

According to Carmichael mòthan was used to promote and conserve happiness of the people, in securing love, in ensuring life, in bringing good and in warding away evil.[4]  To secure love the woman goes on her left knee to pluck nine roots of the plant.  The roots are knotted together to form a cuach or ring.  She puts this in her mouth. Mòthan is also put under a partureint woman to ensure delivery and carried by wayfarers to safeguard them on journeys.  Women sew the plant into their bodice for protection and men carry it under their left arm.  Black notes that mòthan ‘protected its possessor against fire and the attacks of the Fairy women’.

 

From the Carmina Gadelica here is an example of the kind of incantation associated with mòthan.  This example was not collected in Caithness and Sutherland but is typical of the kind of incantation which was commonly called upon in Gaidhealtachd communities:

 

Am Mòthan

Buainidh mi am mòthan,

Luibh nan naodh alt,

Buainiadh agus boinichidh,

Do Bhride bhorr 's dh' a Dalt.

 

Buainidh mi am mòthan,

A dh' orduich Righ nam feart,

Buainidh agus boinichidh,

Do Mhoire mhor 's dh' a Mac.

 

Buainidh mi am mòthan,

A dh' orduich Righ nan dul,

Bhier buaidh air gach foirneart,

Is ob air obi shul.

The ' Mòthan '

Pluck will I the ' mòthan ',

Plant of the nine joints,

Pluck will I and vow me,

To noble Bride and her Fosterling.

 

Pluck will I the ' mòthan ',

As ordained of the King of power,

Pluck will I and vow me,

To great Mary and her Son.

 

Pluck will I the ' mòthan ',

As ordained of the King of life,

To overcome all oppression,

And the spell of evil eye.[5]

 

Mary Beith focuses on medicinal and domestic uses for butterwort as opposed to the plant’s spiritual role:

 

“Sundew … well, yes, in fact sundew and bog-violet or butterwort are both insectivorous plants, which is one link, but another link is that both were used for making a potion for the chest, for bronchitis, asthma and so forth.  And also both were used for skin ailments – a lotion was used.  And I was giving a talk once in Raigmore Hospital to a collection of doctors and surgeons from all over Scotland, and they were able to answer a question which had puzzled me, because I said: “What is the connection between … why should so often, not just sundew and butterwort but also other plants, why are the ones that are good for the chest are also good for the skin, for eczema …”

 

They said, and they all more or less shouted in unison: “Because asthma and eczema are related!” 

 

Yeah – similar causes, similar circumstances and so forth.  And I think this shows you the intellect of people.  They were making experiments, they were making judgements, they were noticing relationships between things.  They didn’t have the scientific language or the scientific instruments, but they were certainly on the right lines.

 

IM:   That’s a good point.  What was done – do you know what was done with the sundew and butterwort for those sort of purposes?

 

MB:  Well, they would have been boiled up.  And things were quite extensively boiled.  One thing was – which is also an interesting connection with Native American medicine – you see in most herbal medicine that they’re just making an infusion – pouring the water on the herb, letting it rest and then pouring it off, the water off, after about five minutes. 

 

But the Gaels and the American Indians or native people really, you know, boiled the substance on and on and on.  I mean, I remember people here, I mean, there was an old man who lived in a caravan in Portvasgo, Donald Gunn, and I was down there one day and was I … could I do anything.  Would he – would I make him a cup of tea?  And he looked at this tea that I’d made and he threw it away!  He said, “I want proper tea!”, he said.  He wanted three teabags, well stewed and boiled.

 

MB:  Yes, so it was … it was a similar way of …  But, of course, tea is a herb, you know.  It’s camellia – it’s a form of camellia.  And so that was that.  So I learnt my lesson there – I learnt how to make him a proper mug of tea with three teabags in one mug and then boiled …”

 

 

 

[1] pp 136 – 137 in A. Carmichael 1941 Carmina Gadelica: Hymns and Incantations Vol IV Oliver & Boyde, Edinburgh

 

[2] Interview with Mary Beith by Issie MacPhail for this study.  October 2006 (Mary Beith 2)