Tossing the caber is among the oldest and most traditional of Scottish metaphors. In this event, Scotland, represented here by a big bloke in a kilt, tries to throw off English rule, played by a tree trunk. It’s three centuries since the Scots lost their independence – now it seems they want it back.
Most of the Scots owe little to the highland image which has launched a thousand shortbread tins.
For a start most of them live in big cities.
Clark: So does it matter that the kilt was invented by an Englishman and that most Scots wouldn’t know one end of the Bagpipes from another, very possibly not I suspect. But there is a debate going on here at the moment about what it means to be Scottish and I’m delighted to report that then Scots are tackling the Topic with their characteristic good humour.
Brian (comedian): As a sporting nation Scotland is famous for being fucking shite but tonight I am pleased to welcome one of the foremost Exponents of the growing art of Scottish Karate, Bill McHavoc. Good evening Bill.
Bill: Alright Son
Brian: Indeed. Now Bill, Scottish Karate. I understand that kicking is important.
Bill: That’s right son, the Japanese Karate goes way over the top with the Kicking. It’s far too high.
Brain: Isn’t it the idea to kick your opponent in the stomach.
Bill: Aye, but your forgetting one of the fundamentals of Scottish combat. Only take on people who you know you can fucking beat. I would recommend small people, pets and maybe even people who have fell out their wheel chairs.
Brian: Excellent.
Brian Hinnigen and Bill Dewar useless guide to Scotland,
tells you everything you never needed to know.
In Scotland mocking the English verges on obsession.
Brian: The English have discovered that through watching a combination of James Bond, Dad’s army and Star Trek they can put together an authentic Scottish vocabulary.
Bill: Indeed with just a few key phrases its possible to become a genuine Scottish person.
For Example; Och I
Brian: Oh yes, indeed
Bill: The noo
Brian: Now, indeed
Bill: Cairn
Brian: No, indeed, Kenneth
There’ve always been plenty of Scots that have resented English rule but this time it feels different, even to the Scots.
Brian Hennigan: I think that part the problem has been in the past that wanting to be Scottish was seen as being synonymous with hating the English. And the point is that the whole thing has reached the maturity now where that aspect of dislike of the English is still there in a very humorous way, but that’s not why we want to be separate. We wish to be separate and independent so we can govern ourselves.
Bill Dewar: I don’t have a problem with the English people I have many many English friends. I don’t have a problem with English people at all. I have a problem with the English government and the way they’ve run this country for 300 years.
Scotland might not go its own way there are big financial implications for a start. But that’s not what concerns the Scots at present. To outsiders the Scottish identity seems rooted in the past. I wonder if Scots feel the same way? Why are Scots from so many different backgrounds riding the independence train?
The Isle of Skye, over the sea to…Bonnie Prince Charlie and all that.
Dunvegan castle on Skye is the ancestral seat of the MacLeods and John MacLeod is the 29th clan chief. It’s a heritage, which this one time professional actor and singer traces back to the days when Norse raiders controlled this coast.
MacLeod: I often relate to my Viking ancestors, I really do feel that…
These days there’s not a lot of call for pillaging, although like his forebears, he has a full time job keeping a roof on the castle.
MacLeod: As soon as I succeeded this roof had dry rot right through it in seven years of being put down as a new roof at the end of the 1950’s and I repaired it in 1966/67.
The unvarnished history of the MacLeod’s includes its less principled side.
MacLeod: He was a very wicked man, I mean he was known as the wicked man.
Over the centuries they sided with the English either when it suited them or because they had little choice. Soldiers of fortune some…they helped build the British Empire
MacLeod: and when his son, whose that chap over there, married all the literature of the time said what’s that charming Miss Brody doing marry that absolute…he’s John MacLeod.
Now this John MacLeod plays occasional tour guide in his own castle, just to stop the thing falling into the sea
MacLeod: It’s the only castle in Scotland that’s still got it’s family and it’s roof, ever since recorded time, even though the roof is in bad state of repair.
The fortunes of the MacLeod's have certainly waxed and waned over the generations of English rule.
MacLeod: Finance and economics is what you have in this room because three of my ancestors in this room have been completely ruined by the conditions of their lives. The chief who was at the time of the ’45, his grandson and last my Great Great Grandfather who was knocked out by the potato famine and left the castle in 1851 and it was eighty years before the chief was able to come back and live here and that chief was my Great Grandfather and my grandmother was his daughter and was accustomed to the fact that there was actually money, she’d had forty years to spend it and she did
MacLeod: Financially, of course, I was in a completely different situation to her.
MacLeod: On one side I had a real financial problem and on the other side I had all the feelings that anybody had about being invaded.
Which means turning your castle into one of Scotland’s leading tourist attractions.
So why does this Eton educated MacLeod with his English accent believe in Scottish independence?
MacLeod: It’s a question of feeling more than anything else and I feel myself to be Scottish to the extent that when I was a boy, even in the train, in the sleeper, I always knew when I crossed the border from England into Scotland, from Scotland into England. I always, always felt and still do that in England I am in a foreign country.
But what do people mean when they say they feel Scottish –and what makes the Scots different from anyone else?
The Scottish people differ from other species in one respect while other nations might make love, enjoy sexual relations or commit bodily to one other;
Scottish people simply mate, often for life. Now this may, or may not include shagging.
Brian: There are two courtship procedures
Bill: One short and one long.
Brian: Now ladies and Gentlemen, the short courtship procedure
Brian: Hey doll, do you fancy a dance?
Bill: Nay thanks
Brian: Fuckin' whoer
Bill: And now the long courtship procedure
Brian: Hey doll, do you fancy a dance
Bill: Nay thanks
Brian: Why no?
Bill: I’m out with my pals tonight
Brian: You fuckin' lesbian
Bill Dewar: I think it’s difficult to put a time scale on it. I think that we will probably be independent in the next 10 or 15 years. I don’t think its going to happen overnight, but it will happen eventually.
Brian Hennigan: I think that in the seventies and eighties devolution was being pushed along, independence was pushed along by a select few. Now there’s actually general consensus among a wide spectrum of Scottish opinion that the time is ripe now and it’s simply a matter of ‘it will come’. Not a matter of if but when.
If there’s to be a tartan revolution there’ll be no shortage of ammunition. Few countries could have done more to merchandise a national image
Guide: This is the Millennium tartan.Long after the power of the highland chiefs has been smashed, it was the weavers of the Scottish lowlands who helped create the tartan tradition we know today.
Guide: This was done for the Olympic games in 1996 and they’re still at it. There’s even a Princess of Wales tartan.Guide: And for our Australian friends there’s an Australian tartan. Perhaps no corner of the globe is untouched by tartan.
Clark: This is Princess street, Edinburgh’s busiest shopping street where I’m told it’s possible to sometimes see a Scotsman actually wearing a kilt. It’s about 17 to 18 degrees, just a light breeze blowing, perfect conditions.
Perfect conditions maybe, but Scotsmen clearly have better things to do.
You see the odd one or two, but purely ceremonial, not what we’re after at all.
Of course Scotsmen do wear Kilts, you just have to know where to look. Highland games are a kilt spotters dream.
Highland games seem to be part sport, part vaudeville.
These games were opened by a man who appears to be wearing the uniform of the 3rd battalion, the queen’s own highland ice-cream salesmen.
The highland games are an extraordinary window into an age and way of life, which has all but disappeared.
Brian Hennigan: Throwing the big weight over the pole
Bill: and Brian do you know how that actually developed.
No how did it happen Bill?
Well of course in medieval times when Scotland was at war with England, they had to block up the doors in the house see and there was no access from the ground.
Of course, the fish and chip meals that were brought back from the fish and chip shops had to be thrown in through the upper windows and sometimes they were of considerable weight and that’s how they practiced.
And of course that’s why you need a big tosser in the family.
That’s right. There’s a few big tossers here to day.
That’s right. Indeed this is the gathering of the biggest tossers in the highlands.
Brian: I think it’s great. It’s invention, its contrived, its cheap it’s colourful, everything the Scots people generally aren’t and it’s fun to be at. I don’t care whether it’s made up or not.
Bill: Its also part of a huge marketing campaign for us to sell loads and loads of tacky souvenirs to the tourists from Australia, Canada, New Zealand. That lot, we’ve got them. Brian: My mum’s pension depends on it. Bill: Exactly, so lets keep up those stereotypes.
It’s true the Scots do have an uphill battle countering stereotypes, which are largely their own creation.
MacLeod: People are always wanting to think of you as an Historical relic so people are rather. I think that when people see me they expect to see heather growing out of my ears and all sorts of strange things and I don’t feel like that at all, like, I feel very much a part of this century and going into the millennium and as far as this place is concerned. It’s going to stay alive.
MacLeod: In legal terms we own goodness knows how many acres, legally I still own the Cuillians, legally I still own the tables, legally I still own this land here. I mean I own a very considerable number of acres.
Clark: You don’t own the seals though.
MacLeod: No but I own the land they lie on. (Laughs)
If Scotland has been plagued by too many negative images in the past, what, I asked John MacLeod, was so valuable about the clan tradition that he believes in perpetuating?
MacLeod: People don’t obey their political superiors or at least in the clan system, the chief was supposed to be able to guarantee his clan, but of course he never could.
Clark: So what is the essence of the Clan tradition?
MacLeod: Well, I don’t know what the essence is, but it always seems to me that I have great relationships with people who know what it is to live in a tribal environment.
A tribal environment, perhaps that helps explains the Kilt’s universal appeal.
Shop worker: Can I help at all?
Clark: Yes, I’d like to buy a kilt for a friend
Shop worker: Has he got a particular tartan?
Clark: No I don’t think so.
Worker: Well we do have tartans that aren’t clan affiliated, such as army, or football tartans even.
Clark: He’s mad on football
When choosing a tartan for someone it’s important to try to match the cloth to the character.
Worker: Well if your friend want to make a statement
Clark: He’s certainly bold personality.
Once outlawed by the English, these days the kilt is worn by wannabe Scots from Texas to Tokyo. There’s clearly more to Scottish identity than a pile of pleated tartan…but why independence?
Are the people who live on Scotland's run down housing estates going to notice a difference if Scotland goes it alone?
Brian: Everything that’s happened so far has been a failure, be it from whatever side of politics, Labour or Conservative, and I think that independence will in effect give people reason to think that their people will take more care of them than in the past.
Bill: This is very very far from London and the English don’t really care about the people who live here and the problems, and the problems they’re encountering.
MacLeod: We are an independent minded people and we do not like interference from government at all but if there’s going to be any government, we’d much rather be governed from Scotland than from Westminster, I do believe that’s so.
Next year, Scots will get their own Parliament with limited powers. Many believe that will kill off the independent movement – so far it’s simply sharpened the appetites for a complete break.
Bill: For me Scotland has always been and always will be a different country. A country that has a different language, different currency, different legal system, different educational system.
Brian: And different values. That’s the main thing about cultural identity. We have different values from England and the common links that unite the different viewpoints of, say, the Scottish working class, Scottish middle-class and Scottish upper class are actually quite strong links in terms of making us Scottish, there’s much more uniting us than dividing us.
Many Scots have prospered through the 3 centuries of union with England…now as Scottish identity reasserts itself, there’s a feeling that being tied to the English is holding the Scottish back.
MacLeod: Scotland has never had any problems with Europe. England on the other hand, have genuinely had a problem and still have a problem with people who are not themselves, who are Europeans.
MacLeod: If there is one reason why I would be keen on Scottish independence is because I don’t want to be represented in Europe by people who think like the English do.
Clark: Is the debate that’s going on in Scotland about its future a sensible level headed sort of debate?
MacLeod: In so far as Scots can be level headed then I would say yes. I think so.
But when all’s said and done, aren’t the Scots just like the rest of us?
Brian: The Scottish character can be summed up in its whisky. The Highland’s quite smooth, the Islay quite rough and textured and the lowland is quite refined. And that gives us the Scottish character.
Bill: Err, but what one of these is mine Brian?
Brian: No, No your missing the point BillThe Highland is smooth, the Islay quite rough and textured and the lowland is quite refined.
Bill: I don’t really give a damn, which one is mine?
Brian: I’m wasting my time here
Worker: So that’s Anderson tartan in modern colours, in the ehavy weight, eight yards. Who am I sending it to?
Clark: Mr George Nexus
As a national costume the kilt owes more to retailing than a respect for Cultural identity.
Now it seems, everyone from urban comedians to urban chieftains want the English off their backs
Most of the Scots owe little to the highland image which has launched a thousand shortbread tins.
For a start most of them live in big cities.
Clark: So does it matter that the kilt was invented by an Englishman and that most Scots wouldn’t know one end of the Bagpipes from another, very possibly not I suspect. But there is a debate going on here at the moment about what it means to be Scottish and I’m delighted to report that then Scots are tackling the Topic with their characteristic good humour.
Brian (comedian): As a sporting nation Scotland is famous for being fucking shite but tonight I am pleased to welcome one of the foremost Exponents of the growing art of Scottish Karate, Bill McHavoc. Good evening Bill.
Bill: Alright Son
Brian: Indeed. Now Bill, Scottish Karate. I understand that kicking is important.
Bill: That’s right son, the Japanese Karate goes way over the top with the Kicking. It’s far too high.
Brain: Isn’t it the idea to kick your opponent in the stomach.
Bill: Aye, but your forgetting one of the fundamentals of Scottish combat. Only take on people who you know you can fucking beat. I would recommend small people, pets and maybe even people who have fell out their wheel chairs.
Brian: Excellent.
Brian Hinnigen and Bill Dewar useless guide to Scotland,
tells you everything you never needed to know.
In Scotland mocking the English verges on obsession.
Brian: The English have discovered that through watching a combination of James Bond, Dad’s army and Star Trek they can put together an authentic Scottish vocabulary.
Bill: Indeed with just a few key phrases its possible to become a genuine Scottish person.
For Example; Och I
Brian: Oh yes, indeed
Bill: The noo
Brian: Now, indeed
Bill: Cairn
Brian: No, indeed, Kenneth
There’ve always been plenty of Scots that have resented English rule but this time it feels different, even to the Scots.
Brian Hennigan: I think that part the problem has been in the past that wanting to be Scottish was seen as being synonymous with hating the English. And the point is that the whole thing has reached the maturity now where that aspect of dislike of the English is still there in a very humorous way, but that’s not why we want to be separate. We wish to be separate and independent so we can govern ourselves.
Bill Dewar: I don’t have a problem with the English people I have many many English friends. I don’t have a problem with English people at all. I have a problem with the English government and the way they’ve run this country for 300 years.
Scotland might not go its own way there are big financial implications for a start. But that’s not what concerns the Scots at present. To outsiders the Scottish identity seems rooted in the past. I wonder if Scots feel the same way? Why are Scots from so many different backgrounds riding the independence train?
The Isle of Skye, over the sea to…Bonnie Prince Charlie and all that.
Dunvegan castle on Skye is the ancestral seat of the MacLeods and John MacLeod is the 29th clan chief. It’s a heritage, which this one time professional actor and singer traces back to the days when Norse raiders controlled this coast.
MacLeod: I often relate to my Viking ancestors, I really do feel that…
These days there’s not a lot of call for pillaging, although like his forebears, he has a full time job keeping a roof on the castle.
MacLeod: As soon as I succeeded this roof had dry rot right through it in seven years of being put down as a new roof at the end of the 1950’s and I repaired it in 1966/67.
The unvarnished history of the MacLeod’s includes its less principled side.
MacLeod: He was a very wicked man, I mean he was known as the wicked man.
Over the centuries they sided with the English either when it suited them or because they had little choice. Soldiers of fortune some…they helped build the British Empire
MacLeod: and when his son, whose that chap over there, married all the literature of the time said what’s that charming Miss Brody doing marry that absolute…he’s John MacLeod.
Now this John MacLeod plays occasional tour guide in his own castle, just to stop the thing falling into the sea
MacLeod: It’s the only castle in Scotland that’s still got it’s family and it’s roof, ever since recorded time, even though the roof is in bad state of repair.
The fortunes of the MacLeod's have certainly waxed and waned over the generations of English rule.
MacLeod: Finance and economics is what you have in this room because three of my ancestors in this room have been completely ruined by the conditions of their lives. The chief who was at the time of the ’45, his grandson and last my Great Great Grandfather who was knocked out by the potato famine and left the castle in 1851 and it was eighty years before the chief was able to come back and live here and that chief was my Great Grandfather and my grandmother was his daughter and was accustomed to the fact that there was actually money, she’d had forty years to spend it and she did
MacLeod: Financially, of course, I was in a completely different situation to her.
MacLeod: On one side I had a real financial problem and on the other side I had all the feelings that anybody had about being invaded.
Which means turning your castle into one of Scotland’s leading tourist attractions.
So why does this Eton educated MacLeod with his English accent believe in Scottish independence?
MacLeod: It’s a question of feeling more than anything else and I feel myself to be Scottish to the extent that when I was a boy, even in the train, in the sleeper, I always knew when I crossed the border from England into Scotland, from Scotland into England. I always, always felt and still do that in England I am in a foreign country.
But what do people mean when they say they feel Scottish –and what makes the Scots different from anyone else?
The Scottish people differ from other species in one respect while other nations might make love, enjoy sexual relations or commit bodily to one other;
Scottish people simply mate, often for life. Now this may, or may not include shagging.
Brian: There are two courtship procedures
Bill: One short and one long.
Brian: Now ladies and Gentlemen, the short courtship procedure
Brian: Hey doll, do you fancy a dance?
Bill: Nay thanks
Brian: Fuckin' whoer
Bill: And now the long courtship procedure
Brian: Hey doll, do you fancy a dance
Bill: Nay thanks
Brian: Why no?
Bill: I’m out with my pals tonight
Brian: You fuckin' lesbian
Bill Dewar: I think it’s difficult to put a time scale on it. I think that we will probably be independent in the next 10 or 15 years. I don’t think its going to happen overnight, but it will happen eventually.
Brian Hennigan: I think that in the seventies and eighties devolution was being pushed along, independence was pushed along by a select few. Now there’s actually general consensus among a wide spectrum of Scottish opinion that the time is ripe now and it’s simply a matter of ‘it will come’. Not a matter of if but when.
If there’s to be a tartan revolution there’ll be no shortage of ammunition. Few countries could have done more to merchandise a national image
Guide: This is the Millennium tartan.Long after the power of the highland chiefs has been smashed, it was the weavers of the Scottish lowlands who helped create the tartan tradition we know today.
Guide: This was done for the Olympic games in 1996 and they’re still at it. There’s even a Princess of Wales tartan.Guide: And for our Australian friends there’s an Australian tartan. Perhaps no corner of the globe is untouched by tartan.
Clark: This is Princess street, Edinburgh’s busiest shopping street where I’m told it’s possible to sometimes see a Scotsman actually wearing a kilt. It’s about 17 to 18 degrees, just a light breeze blowing, perfect conditions.
Perfect conditions maybe, but Scotsmen clearly have better things to do.
You see the odd one or two, but purely ceremonial, not what we’re after at all.
Of course Scotsmen do wear Kilts, you just have to know where to look. Highland games are a kilt spotters dream.
Highland games seem to be part sport, part vaudeville.
These games were opened by a man who appears to be wearing the uniform of the 3rd battalion, the queen’s own highland ice-cream salesmen.
The highland games are an extraordinary window into an age and way of life, which has all but disappeared.
Brian Hennigan: Throwing the big weight over the pole
Bill: and Brian do you know how that actually developed.
No how did it happen Bill?
Well of course in medieval times when Scotland was at war with England, they had to block up the doors in the house see and there was no access from the ground.
Of course, the fish and chip meals that were brought back from the fish and chip shops had to be thrown in through the upper windows and sometimes they were of considerable weight and that’s how they practiced.
And of course that’s why you need a big tosser in the family.
That’s right. There’s a few big tossers here to day.
That’s right. Indeed this is the gathering of the biggest tossers in the highlands.
Brian: I think it’s great. It’s invention, its contrived, its cheap it’s colourful, everything the Scots people generally aren’t and it’s fun to be at. I don’t care whether it’s made up or not.
Bill: Its also part of a huge marketing campaign for us to sell loads and loads of tacky souvenirs to the tourists from Australia, Canada, New Zealand. That lot, we’ve got them. Brian: My mum’s pension depends on it. Bill: Exactly, so lets keep up those stereotypes.
It’s true the Scots do have an uphill battle countering stereotypes, which are largely their own creation.
MacLeod: People are always wanting to think of you as an Historical relic so people are rather. I think that when people see me they expect to see heather growing out of my ears and all sorts of strange things and I don’t feel like that at all, like, I feel very much a part of this century and going into the millennium and as far as this place is concerned. It’s going to stay alive.
MacLeod: In legal terms we own goodness knows how many acres, legally I still own the Cuillians, legally I still own the tables, legally I still own this land here. I mean I own a very considerable number of acres.
Clark: You don’t own the seals though.
MacLeod: No but I own the land they lie on. (Laughs)
If Scotland has been plagued by too many negative images in the past, what, I asked John MacLeod, was so valuable about the clan tradition that he believes in perpetuating?
MacLeod: People don’t obey their political superiors or at least in the clan system, the chief was supposed to be able to guarantee his clan, but of course he never could.
Clark: So what is the essence of the Clan tradition?
MacLeod: Well, I don’t know what the essence is, but it always seems to me that I have great relationships with people who know what it is to live in a tribal environment.
A tribal environment, perhaps that helps explains the Kilt’s universal appeal.
Shop worker: Can I help at all?
Clark: Yes, I’d like to buy a kilt for a friend
Shop worker: Has he got a particular tartan?
Clark: No I don’t think so.
Worker: Well we do have tartans that aren’t clan affiliated, such as army, or football tartans even.
Clark: He’s mad on football
When choosing a tartan for someone it’s important to try to match the cloth to the character.
Worker: Well if your friend want to make a statement
Clark: He’s certainly bold personality.
Once outlawed by the English, these days the kilt is worn by wannabe Scots from Texas to Tokyo. There’s clearly more to Scottish identity than a pile of pleated tartan…but why independence?
Are the people who live on Scotland's run down housing estates going to notice a difference if Scotland goes it alone?
Brian: Everything that’s happened so far has been a failure, be it from whatever side of politics, Labour or Conservative, and I think that independence will in effect give people reason to think that their people will take more care of them than in the past.
Bill: This is very very far from London and the English don’t really care about the people who live here and the problems, and the problems they’re encountering.
MacLeod: We are an independent minded people and we do not like interference from government at all but if there’s going to be any government, we’d much rather be governed from Scotland than from Westminster, I do believe that’s so.
Next year, Scots will get their own Parliament with limited powers. Many believe that will kill off the independent movement – so far it’s simply sharpened the appetites for a complete break.
Bill: For me Scotland has always been and always will be a different country. A country that has a different language, different currency, different legal system, different educational system.
Brian: And different values. That’s the main thing about cultural identity. We have different values from England and the common links that unite the different viewpoints of, say, the Scottish working class, Scottish middle-class and Scottish upper class are actually quite strong links in terms of making us Scottish, there’s much more uniting us than dividing us.
Many Scots have prospered through the 3 centuries of union with England…now as Scottish identity reasserts itself, there’s a feeling that being tied to the English is holding the Scottish back.
MacLeod: Scotland has never had any problems with Europe. England on the other hand, have genuinely had a problem and still have a problem with people who are not themselves, who are Europeans.
MacLeod: If there is one reason why I would be keen on Scottish independence is because I don’t want to be represented in Europe by people who think like the English do.
Clark: Is the debate that’s going on in Scotland about its future a sensible level headed sort of debate?
MacLeod: In so far as Scots can be level headed then I would say yes. I think so.
But when all’s said and done, aren’t the Scots just like the rest of us?
Brian: The Scottish character can be summed up in its whisky. The Highland’s quite smooth, the Islay quite rough and textured and the lowland is quite refined. And that gives us the Scottish character.
Bill: Err, but what one of these is mine Brian?
Brian: No, No your missing the point BillThe Highland is smooth, the Islay quite rough and textured and the lowland is quite refined.
Bill: I don’t really give a damn, which one is mine?
Brian: I’m wasting my time here
Worker: So that’s Anderson tartan in modern colours, in the ehavy weight, eight yards. Who am I sending it to?
Clark: Mr George Nexus
As a national costume the kilt owes more to retailing than a respect for Cultural identity.
Now it seems, everyone from urban comedians to urban chieftains want the English off their backs