Still in Edinburgh

Up on top of the National Museum in the Terrace GardenWe spent much of the day in the National Museum of Scotland looking at the history of the Scotsand then went to a local museum called the People’s Story.

Some thoughts about the Scottish People:

When we drove through the Highlands we saw miles of hillsides with only grass, bracken fern and sheep and population only in the small towns. There are a lot of reasons for this. First the ancient people had cut down all the trees, and animals had kept forests from regenerating. So you had a bare land. There was a clan system with the chief as the head of the clan and land held in common. The English were firmly in charge of Scotland after the covenant of 1707 was signed. By the mid 1700’s the clans were outlawed and the chiefs were encouraged to think of themselves as landed gentry and owners of the land. As owners they were encouraged to develop the land to its best use and so the clansmen (now reduced to poor tenants) were moved off the land to the shore to work in various enterprises such as kelp harvesting for the chief or were encouraged to emigrate while the land was turned over to sheep. Many moved to the cities to live in horrid crowded rooms and work in the new industries of the Industrial Revolution. Today only about 5 million people of Scottish descent live in Scotland and over 25 million people who claim Scottish ancestry live around the world.

One of my ancestors.