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In this 19th-century island community of few trees, the average rural family such as the TAYLORS dwelt in an elongated single-level abode with heavy stone walls three feet thick. The longhouse included a built-in cow shed, a shelter for poultry, a room for drying and storing grain, and perhaps a stable. The entire structure was virtually a series of farm buildings joined end-to-end. Orkney folks sometimes shared a close (common doorway) with "coos," but in some places a byre (barn) stood separate from the house. The farmers of Orkney were never subjected to the same kind of European feudal system prevalent in England and Western Europe in earlier times, but there were vague similarities. Their agricultural scheme was composed of freeholders, or udalers, and a larger number of tenant farmers and crofters who paid "skats" to the landlord. In the Orkney "run rig" system of land apportioning, fees were fixed amounts which came out of whatever the share croppers were able to produce on their crazy quilt patchwork plots of ground. Cottars or "oncas," laborers who worked for wages, were available for hire on the farms.
COMIN' THRO' THE RYE
If a body meet a body,
Comin' thro' the rye,
If a body kiss a body,
Need a body cry?
Ev'ry lassie has her laddie;
Nane, they say, ha'e I;
Yet a' the lads they smile on me,
When comin' thro' the rye.
If a body meet a body,
Comin' frae the town,
If a body greet a body,
Need a body frown?
Ev'ry lassie has her laddie;
Nane, they say, ha'e I;
Yet a' the lads they smile on me,
When comin' thro' the rye.
Amang the train there is a swain,
I dearly love mysel'?
But what's his name, or where's his hame,
I dinna choose to tell.
Ev'ry lassie has her laddie;
Nane, they say, ha'e I;
Yet a' the lads they smile on me,
When comin' thro' the rye.
----Robert Burns
Late July's long days featuring the annual bog-hay cutting in meadows along banks of the burns (creeks) carried over into the following month. But at the beginning of August, country folk took time to bring fattened cattle to Kirkwall for slaughter at the three-day Lammas Fair. Originally an ancient British pagan holiday, Lammas celebrated first fruits of the grain harvest. The August 1st observance, whose name meant "loaf mass," was adopted by Christians and perpetuated at their Lammas church services by offering fresh bread baked from newly-milled flour of their recently-harvested wheat. Visiting 19th-century Kirkwall, ROBERT TAYLOR and a multitude of fellow Orcadians swarmed the Lammas festival on the Kirk Green to enjoy the entertainment and to scrutinize Orkney farm produce, local handcrafts, and other goods being exhibited for trade. Island natives also attended another Lammas Fair in Stromness each year. Lammas time brought a large gathering of ships in Kirkwall Bay and in the body of water called the String, which separated Shapinsay and Orkney's Mainland. As farm activity subsided during the shorter daylight hours of the chilly winter months, fishing increasingly consumed more of the men's time while women were active with straw plaiting. Ewes in heat were bred with compliant rams during the December rutting season to produce "ewe hoggs" (lambs) in late April and early May. Some of the flock were butchered at Hogmanay (New Year's Eve), and a count of remaining sheep was tallied up in February. "Rooing" (wool-plucking) and fleece-shearing through June and July provided the summer wool crop. The shearing process normally mesmerized the animals, easing the worker's task. |
| Copyright © 2000 Dick Taylor All Rights Reserved |