The world is watching Scotland this week. This is nothing new to those of us who know and hold our Alban ancestors in great respect. We have been keeping an affectionate eye on Scotland for hundreds of years. Like tens of millions of others across the globe, I am descended from those of Scotland’s children […]
Family history website ScotlandsPeople has uploaded a tranche of birth, marriage and death records from across the country, dating from 1913, 1938 and 1963 respectively. The records are available to view on the web for the very first time. The documents – which consist of over 220,000 separate scans – were released on New Year’s […]
People from across the world have been invited to join in a global ceilidh held over 24 hours next summer, as part of Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games celebrations. The Royal Scottish Country Dance Society (RSCDS), which has been commissioned by Get Scotland Dancing to create the Commonwealth Ceilidh, will work with dance organisations in Edinburgh, […]
We have just returned from two amazing weeks spent in Barcelona, Spain. We enjoyed the comfort of a family home during our stay and on our return were welcomed back to our home with a bottle of wine and a box of chocolates, our house all neat and tidy (not like we normally leave it […]
Recently I was reading an article on James VI of Scotland, Who became James I after the Union of the Crowns. I was reminded of a piece I had read some time ago by an Anglo Welsh historian called James Howell. Howell was possibly the first ever professional English language writer and grew up around […]
Until relatively recently rural Scotland was dominated by a narrow clique of aristocrats and landowners; some of whom with titles, deeds and rights stretching back centuries. Often living in castles and mansion houses, these men owned vast tracts of land, counted in the hundreds of thousands of acres; dominated the local political environment and controlled […]
Disney and Pixar are about to release a blockbuster animation that’s set in Scotland entitled ‘Brave’. But if a recent trailer that was released on Youtube is anything to go by it looks like they might need to do a wee bit more research or run the risk of having more than a few angry […]
On the 20th of September 1746 the French ship, L’Heureux, sailed into Loch nan Uamh on the west coast of Scotland; it’s intention to rescue the beleaguered Prince Charles Edward Stuart and take him home. We’re all familiar with the prince’s abortive rebellion of 1745, his attempt to put his father back on the throne […]
On the 19th of May Edinburgh’s two great footballing rivals, Hearts and Hibs will meet on the hallowed turf of Hampden Park in Glasgow to contest one of the oldest sporting competitions in the world – the Scottish Cup. England’s version of this top prize, the FA Cup founded in 1871, is the oldest soccer […]
With the plans underway for the next clan gathering in 2014 we are aware that lots of people will be preparing for their first ever trip to the ‘home land’ of course there are many useful visitor guides out there that will give you lots of practical advice but what about the things the guide […]
