ahhhh...
It's rugged. It's remote. And the colours and textures of the landscape here are unlike anything I've ever seen. Shetland lies 600 miles (960km) north of London, comprises more than a hundred islands, (only 15 of which are inhabited) that span the hundred miles (145km) between Fair Isle and Out Stack, the northernmost point of Britain.
This bustling archipelago of 22,500 people boasts abundant wildlife, a spectacular coastline and dozens of major archaeological sites, (over 6000 in total). We have ponies and we have Vikings, there's simply no where else where that kind of Scottish/Norwegian dual culture fusion exists. (P.S My friend Ashley once told that Shetland ponies were foul and ill-tempered creatures with the short fuse of a bull and the propensity to spit of an Alpaca. Well Ashley, you're a filthy liar! They are among the most docile and personable animals I've ever met).
History 101
Shetland's earliest mention may be a Latin text about Agricola's circumnavigation of the British Isles, which reads: 'Dispecta est et Thule' ('and even Thule was sighted'). But scholars still argue about whether Thule was Fair Isle or Foula, or Faroe or Iceland, so the first written records of Shetland are really the Norse sagas.
The Norse
For over 600 years after the Viking invasions in the late 8th and early 9th centuries AD, the islands' trade, language and social life were thoroughly Norwegian.
Shetland became the northern third of the great earldom based on Orkney during the golden age of the Vikings, chronicled in the Orkneyinga Saga - which contains numerous references to the islands.
In 1263 King Harald of Norway's fleet rendezvoused at 'Breideyarsund' (probably Bressay Sound, the 'broad islands' in the place-name being Bressay and Noss, then joined by a shallow beach at low tide) en route to the Battle of Largs, which marked the end of Norwegian domination on the west coast of Scotland.
Scandinavian Heritage
But in Shetland the Norse held sway for another 200 years, leaving thousands of place-names and dialect words which still testify to the Scandinavian influence.
On land now occupied by the BP oil terminal at Sullom Voe, a 15th century dispute about grazing and foreshore rights left us a record in Old Norse, describing land management customs which survived well into the 18th century. Traces of the ancient method of strip cultivation can be found in many places, notably at Rerwick, Dunrossness, and at Petester ("the Picts' farm") in Unst.
Politics
The Hansa survived the transfer of political power from Scandinavia to Scotland in 1469, when a Danish king pawned his lands and taxes in Shetland to complete his daughter's dowry to the royal house of Scotland. The Privy Council in Edinburgh ignored repeated Danish attempts to redeem the pledge but Shetland became Scottish only very slowly, despite the depredations of Scots earls such as the Stewart family. Their roofless Scalloway Castle (last occupied by Government troops at the time of William of Orange's 'Glorious Revolution' in 1689) houses an informative display on this turbulent period.
After the 1707 Treaty of Union the new British government ousted the Hansa, causing an economic slump because Scots and local merchants were less skilled in the salt fish trade. During the 18th century these merchant-lairds reduced Shetland's independent small farmers to tenants to a state of near-serfdom.
Grand houses such as Busta, near Brae, speak of the power of the hated lairds. To hold enough land to scrape a living, Shetlanders were obliged to fish for their landlords. The lairds were loyal agents of crown, supplying their quota of seamen to the fleet which defeated Napoleon.
Military Conflicts and War
About 3,000 Shetland men served in the Royal Navy at one time or another during the Napoleonic wars. Folklore and historical documents record the barbarity of Press Gangs on the Shetland coast. One who narrowly escaped them, by promising to volunteer when he was old enough, was Arthur Anderson, a Shetland boy who went on to become a co-founder of the P&O shipping line. His birthplace at the Bod of Gremista, on the outskirts of Lerwick, is preserved as a museum.
The First World War destroyed the markets for the extraordinary boom in the herring fisheries which, at the turn of the century, had lifted many islanders out of subsistence poverty. Emigration increased during the 1920s and 30s, to the extent that there are now many more people with Shetland connections living in Canada, Australia and New Zealand than there are on 'The Auld Rock' itself.
The Second World War brought a temporary economic boom, amid all the disruption, destruction and grief, but after 1945 emigration resumed, despite state-sponsored programmes of house-building and subsidies for agriculture and fishing.
Shetland's earliest mention may be a Latin text about Agricola's circumnavigation of the British Isles, which reads: 'Dispecta est et Thule' ('and even Thule was sighted'). But scholars still argue about whether Thule was Fair Isle or Foula, or Faroe or Iceland, so the first written records of Shetland are really the Norse sagas.
The Norse
For over 600 years after the Viking invasions in the late 8th and early 9th centuries AD, the islands' trade, language and social life were thoroughly Norwegian.
Shetland became the northern third of the great earldom based on Orkney during the golden age of the Vikings, chronicled in the Orkneyinga Saga - which contains numerous references to the islands.
In 1263 King Harald of Norway's fleet rendezvoused at 'Breideyarsund' (probably Bressay Sound, the 'broad islands' in the place-name being Bressay and Noss, then joined by a shallow beach at low tide) en route to the Battle of Largs, which marked the end of Norwegian domination on the west coast of Scotland.
Scandinavian Heritage
But in Shetland the Norse held sway for another 200 years, leaving thousands of place-names and dialect words which still testify to the Scandinavian influence.
On land now occupied by the BP oil terminal at Sullom Voe, a 15th century dispute about grazing and foreshore rights left us a record in Old Norse, describing land management customs which survived well into the 18th century. Traces of the ancient method of strip cultivation can be found in many places, notably at Rerwick, Dunrossness, and at Petester ("the Picts' farm") in Unst.
Politics
The Hansa survived the transfer of political power from Scandinavia to Scotland in 1469, when a Danish king pawned his lands and taxes in Shetland to complete his daughter's dowry to the royal house of Scotland. The Privy Council in Edinburgh ignored repeated Danish attempts to redeem the pledge but Shetland became Scottish only very slowly, despite the depredations of Scots earls such as the Stewart family. Their roofless Scalloway Castle (last occupied by Government troops at the time of William of Orange's 'Glorious Revolution' in 1689) houses an informative display on this turbulent period.
After the 1707 Treaty of Union the new British government ousted the Hansa, causing an economic slump because Scots and local merchants were less skilled in the salt fish trade. During the 18th century these merchant-lairds reduced Shetland's independent small farmers to tenants to a state of near-serfdom.
Grand houses such as Busta, near Brae, speak of the power of the hated lairds. To hold enough land to scrape a living, Shetlanders were obliged to fish for their landlords. The lairds were loyal agents of crown, supplying their quota of seamen to the fleet which defeated Napoleon.
Military Conflicts and War
About 3,000 Shetland men served in the Royal Navy at one time or another during the Napoleonic wars. Folklore and historical documents record the barbarity of Press Gangs on the Shetland coast. One who narrowly escaped them, by promising to volunteer when he was old enough, was Arthur Anderson, a Shetland boy who went on to become a co-founder of the P&O shipping line. His birthplace at the Bod of Gremista, on the outskirts of Lerwick, is preserved as a museum.
The First World War destroyed the markets for the extraordinary boom in the herring fisheries which, at the turn of the century, had lifted many islanders out of subsistence poverty. Emigration increased during the 1920s and 30s, to the extent that there are now many more people with Shetland connections living in Canada, Australia and New Zealand than there are on 'The Auld Rock' itself.
The Second World War brought a temporary economic boom, amid all the disruption, destruction and grief, but after 1945 emigration resumed, despite state-sponsored programmes of house-building and subsidies for agriculture and fishing.
