On Monday night , I delivered the Naomi Mitchison
lecture on Women in Rural Society at Glasgow University. Earlier that day, I had written an opinion piece for the Scotsman, reproduced below, calling for the establishment of a celebration of women in Scottish national life. The lecture was well received and the audience comments were very articulate and robust in supporting the vital role of women in developing rural life. Never one to miss an opportunity, later that evening, with members of the Scottish Pen group in the Left Bank, a wee plan was hatched. Could we get a national holiday to celebrate one of 'the big Women'; Bride.The call to action is read the article and join the Facebook Group - Bride Day Action Group.
The Scotsman opinion piece;
Am I the only Scot who doesn’t want a holiday on Saint Andrews Day?
Papers and politicians are aghast that only 22 per cent of Scots could name the day Scotland’s patron saint is celebrated.
Actually this percentage makes sense – it roughly coincides with the proportion of Scots who regularly attend Christian worship. For this minority, saints may be accorded automatic status. For the rest of us, Saint Andrew is a big unknown.
So the question must be asked. With a history as rich and varied as that of Scotland, and with the values of 2007 not 1207, should St Andrew be celebrated above all other possible candidates as the figurehead of modern Scotland?
According to the National Archives, “Andrew was a fisherman from Galilee and the first disciple of Christ believed to have been martyred by crucifixion in Patras (now part of Greece) on 30 November in the year AD 60.”
The Scottish connection rests on the claim that the monastery of Kilrymont (later St Andrews) acquired three fingers of the saint's right hand, a part of one of his arms, one kneecap, and one of his teeth when the Bishop of Patras fled Greece with the relics in AD345, and was shipwrecked off Fife.
Is this a good enough reason to set up St Andrew as the embodiment of the modern Scottish state?
Admittedly the saint’s Scottish connection helped Scottish kings, nobles and churchmen ward off English challenges to Scotland’s independence since medieval times. Thanks to the alleged possession of St Andrew’s relics, the Scots acquired a top-rank patron saint, a separate identity from England, and a Scottish Church founded centuries before the English converted to Christianity. The connection persuaded Pope Boniface to demand that Edward I end war against Scotland in 1299, and decades later the saint was referred to in the Declaration of Arbroath.
Clearly St Andrew has been helpful to Scotland in the past – and the 'saltire' of our national flag derives from the diagonal cross used to crucify him.
But if nationalists question the continuing tradition of the monarchy in a modern Scotland, surely the continuing tradition of St Andrew merits re-consideration too? Devolution of power gives Scots the ability to choose what’s right for Scotland in 2007 – not the requirement to rubberstamp what seemed right a thousand years ago.
There’s no doubt Scots have been irritated at the relative obscurity of all things Scottish compared with all things Irish. St Patrick’s Day is a worldwide source of fun and pride for the Irish diaspora – surely Scotland could have the same fun and profile with St Andrew?
Probably not.
Just as the Irish with their impressive array of celebrated writers have not managed to create an equivalent of Burns’ Night, so the Scots will struggle to create more than a pale imitation of Paddy’s Day for a whole host of reasons.
The Irish have loved, pilloried and employed St Patrick in their culture for centuries. His myth is embedded in the Irish psyche because it embodies the country’s transition from a Catholic to a secular state. Is that true of St Andrew in Scotland?
Some will say the choice of saint is largely symbolic – the aim is to have a national day that celebrates Scottish not British history.
And that’s fine, because it means Scotland’s glorious mythical canon can be examined in its entirety before a figure-head is selected.
Someone, perhaps, whose choice would say something new about Scotland. Someone like Brigid or St Bride.
Yip, a woman whose festival day on February 1, heralds the return of the life-giving forces of spring.
Free Church going gaels will doubtless cavil but the Hebrides were named after the pre-Christian fire goddess Brigid -- adapted by early Christians to St Bride, the midwife of Christ.
The choice of such a powerful female figurehead would remind Scots that the absence of women from public life is neither “natural” nor “traditional.” And it would be timely. Without a resurgence of girl power, rural areas like the Outer Hebrides face depopulation and stagnation. Twice as many young women as young men are peeling away from traditional crofting areas and 71% of Hebridean incomers are men. Without native women, more schools will close, fewer caring jobs will be filled and fewer island children will speak Gaelic. The same fears of a mass exodus were voiced last week by the Shetland Islands Council.
It’s time to embrace the discovery made by the Norwegian government a decade ago that the departure of women not men hastens the depopulation of an island, county or country.
So if it’s time for Scotland to embrace a “Big Woman”, Bride -- whose name means “The Exalted One” – is the Mummy of them all. Kilbride and Brechin bear her name, as does Bregenz in Austria -- once the capital of the Brigantii, the most powerful tribe and political unit in Celtic Britain. But Bride was no warrior – she was revered for powers of poetry, healing, and smithcraft. The celebrated Gaelic folklorist Alexander Carmichael wrote of her:
Bride with her white wand is said to breathe life into the mouth of the dead Winter and to bring him to open his eyes to the tears and the smiles, the sighs and the laughter of Spring. The venom of the cold is said to tremble for its safety on Bride’s Day.
Scotland needs a radical change in the status of women and an empowering figurehead from our own past – not an artificial holiday celebrating a character from another time and place.
The final choice might belong to “our national conversation.” But then history is written by the winners. Not the people, poets, feminists or folklorists.
Shame.
Matt Shaw contacted me a while ago about the proposed closure of the Healthworks leisure complex in Perth. The campaign group, Save the Gym , have been active in gathering support in the local press, national media and politicians. The deadline for closure is today. How ironic that this should be happening the day after the Sports Minister Stewart Maxwell said ;
