Northern Lights & the Battle of Flodden

Stories of Scotland

Annie and Jenny

History, Places & Travel, Society & Culture

4.8 • 728 Ratings

🗓️ 14 January 2021

⏱️ 37 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Jenny and Annie take a dance across the mythologies of the northern lights of Scotland. Upon finding their Scots legends of the aurora borealis, they end up rather unexpectedly in the Battle of Flodden: a battle said to have been written in the sky. For this episode, we used the books: Rock-bound: a Story of the Shetland Isles by Jessie Margaret Edmondston Saxby published in 1877 and Fatal Rivalry, Flodden 1513 by George Goodwin published in 2013. We read extracted from the Fife Herald published on 3rd May 1838, the poem of Flodden by W E Ayton from Harper's new monthly magazine volume 28, and the song Northern Lights of Old Aberdeen by Mary Webb. We also retold this oral history from George Peterson: www.tobarandualchais.co.uk/en/fullrecord/77252Stories of Scotland is a multi-award winning Scottish history podcast, proudly recorded in Inverness in the Highlands. We research our heritage and mythology podcast using archives, books, museum objects, and oral histories from across Scotland. You can support Stories of Scotland on Patreon! www.patreon.com/storiesofscotland Get bonus content on Patreon

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to Stories of Scotland, a podcast that is nimbly dancing through the history, mythology and nature of Scotland.
0:18.6	I'm Annie, your slightly agile archivist.
0:22.6	And I'm Jenny, your Highland Fling.
0:25.0	Oh, I do love a Kaylee, Jenny.
0:27.4	Yes.
0:28.4	Let's talk about Kaylee's, yes.
0:31.9	I can't wait until we're able to fly around the community centres again,
0:40.4	tossing around strangers and friends alike in endless circles. All the Kaylee dancing journey, the Kaylee dancing.
0:46.2	Well, the bruises, that's what I remember in the morning. It's not a good Kaylee unless you've
0:49.8	got bruises all down your arms the next morning. I'm not sure the kind of Kayleys you've been going to Jenny, do you me?
0:57.7	Glasgow Calais.
1:01.1	But until we'll be back to our respective Kayleys, we have another kind of Scottish dancers
1:07.1	to keep our dreams of Strip the Willow going.
1:13.7	Yes, these dancers go by many names,
1:21.6	the streamers, the Rory Bodies, the Nimble Men, and of course the merry dancers. But if you've never heard of these, fear not. For the name they go by most commonly out with Scotland is
1:27.2	the Northern Lights.
1:29.6	For thousands of years, humans have looked up to the sky in awe,
1:33.8	as gently shifting streaks of bright colour illuminate the dark night around them.
1:39.0	Yes, and the best places to see the Northern Lights, are the Aurora Borealis, as it's also known, is of course
1:47.0	in the north. And here's a lovely wee extract by Jesse Margaret Edmondson Saxby.
1:54.0	You know, that's called the name. From her 1877 book, Rockbound, A Story of the Shetland Isles.
2:03.0	My recollections of early childhood are, after all, scanty enough.
	...

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