Questions about Scotland: The Definitive Guide
An Antipodean travel company serving world travellers since 1983
Questions about Scotland for senior travellers.
Odyssey Traveller specialises in crafting unforgettable experiences for senior and mature-aged travellers interested in learning whether travelling as a couple or as a solo traveller. Providing adventure and educational programs to escorted small group tours since 1983. Odyssey has built up a reasonable knowledge bank to answer questions about Scotland that travellers are likely to ask, as they make their plans to tour independently, or with us as part of a small group tour. We hope that this list of frequently asked questions and the answers we provide will help you with planning your next holiday.
Read on, but please do not hesitate to contact us via the website, or through email or chat if you have more questions about Scotland or our other tours.
Modern-day Scotland had its roots in the Celtic settlements during the Iron Age, and was formed by the subsequent waves of invasions and established kingdoms.
According to Andrew Fisher in his book Scotland (The Windrush Press and Cassell, 2002), while cave art was flourishing in other parts of Europe such as France and Spain, Scotland was still covered in ice and virtually uninhabitable (p. 2). The retreat of the ice and the warmer intervals between the Ice Ages (p. 3) led to migration and settlement in this region.
The Celts arrived in Scotland during the Iron Age (circa 500 BC). Our knowledge of this group of tribes come to us filtered through Roman eyes, as it was the Romans who first chronicled their lifestyles and fighting prowess.
The Romans invaded Britain in 43 AD, but they were unsuccessful in fighting the Celtic tribes in the north. Julius Agricola, a Roman governor, marched into what is now Scotland around 80 AD and spent four years trying to subdue the tribes. Emperor Hadrian decided fighting the Celts was futile and pulled back, building Hadrian’s Wall around 122 AD in England to mark the northern limit of Roman Britain.
In 140 AD, Hadrian’s successor, Emperor Antoninus Pius, ordered the building of the Antonine Wall to move the Roman frontier northwards. However, after his death, his successor Marcus Aurelius moved the frontier back to Hadrian’s Wall as it was easier to defend.
The Romans abandoned Britain around 410 AD, and the region was settled by other invading parties, such as the Vikings and the Germanic Anglo-Saxons. The Vikings would have a long and lasting presence in certain parts of Scotland: Norse earls would rule the Hebrides until 1266, and the islands of Shetland and Orkney would remain with the Vikings until it was annexed to Scotland as part of a dowry in 1472. (Read more in our article on the Shetland Islands.)
Before the Vikings, Scotland was settled by the Picts, which the Romans referred to as the Picti, or “painted ones” perhaps due to their habit of painting dye on their bodies (though this claim is contested by modern historians). They were said to have migrated from Scythia (Scandinavia) before settling and forming powerful kingdoms in what is now northern Scotland.
The Viking invasions may have weakened the Picts’ forces. While the Picts were able to thwart the Romans for many centuries, in 843 AD, Kenneth MacAlpin, crowned King Kenneth I of the Kingdom of Dál Riada (or Dalriada) crushed their resistance and also became king of the Picts.
Dalriada was composed of parts of northeastern Ireland and western Scotland. The union of Dalriada and Pictish lands in northern Scotland formed the Kingdom of Alba, which became the starting point of the Scots’ expansion of their territory.
The Kingdoms of Scotland and England were united in the 1707 Act of Union after years of unrest. The single kingdom was named the United Kingdom of Great Britain, formally formed on the 1st of May 1707. The UK Parliament met for the first time in Westminster, England in October of that year.
The seeds of union began with the death in 1603 of Elizabeth I, who was unmarried and childless. The English crown passed to her next available heir, her cousin and the King of Scotland, James VI. With the two formerly separate kingdoms now sharing the same monarch, James VI (known as James I in England) worked toward achieving “a complete or perfect union“. The UK’s national flag, nicknamed Union Jack, was a shortened form of his Latin name (Jacobus).
Securing the “perfect union” would not be an easy task. James VI’s son and successor, Charles I, was raised in England and knew little of his Scottish subjects. The Scottish Parliament went through a long process of negotiation and debate with the English Parliament at Westminster, and the union was unpopular among ordinary Scots who harboured anti-English sentiments.
More than a century after the Union of the Crowns under James, the Act of Union finally passed, dissolving the Scottish Parliament. The Parliament at Westminster added 45 commoners and 16 peers representing Scotland, and Scotland gained free trade with England and its colonies.
Yes! Though a creature that appears only in myth, the unicorn actually is Scotland’s national animal.
The unicorn is a mythological creature appearing in other cultures; in Celtic mythology, the unicorn is a symbol “of purity and innocence, as well as masculinity and power.” The unicorn was first used by William I in the 12th century as part of the Scottish royal coat of arms, and had appeared in gold coins (15th century), and next to England’s national animal, the lion, when the English crown passed to James VI (17th century).
You can spot the unicorn all over Scotland, especially in front of historic landmarks such as the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the official residence in Scotland of the Queen, and the National War Museum and St Margaret’s Chapel at Edinburgh Castle.
As Fisher discusses in his book Scotland, “[a]mong the instantly recognisable symbols of Scotland are bagpipes, Scotch whisky, the tartan bonnet, the haggis, the claymore and, of course, the kilt” (p. ix).
Whisky
The Scottish whisky industry directly employs 10,000 people, supporting 40,000 jobs across the United Kingdom, 7,000 of which are in rural areas where other jobs may be hard to find. This makes whisky the third biggest industry in Scotland, behind energy and financial services. As of December 2017, there are 126 distilleries licensed to produce Scotland’s national drink. You can read more in our article here.
According to ScotchWhisky.com, whisky distilleries hit a record of 1.7M visits in 2017, with an average spend of £31 per person (US$40 or AU$55), versus £27 (US$35 or AU$48) in 2016. More than half of Scotland’s distilleries now have visitor centres dedicated to tourists and curious visitors who want to tour their facilities.
Odyssey Traveller organises a fully-escorted tour where we visit the whisky distilleries of Cardhu, Speyside Cooperage, and Glenfiddich to learn about the whisky process and its importance to Scottish culture and economy. See the complete itinerary here.
The tartan, kilt, claymore (two-handed sword), and bagpipe had their origins in the Highlands.
Beyond the physical division of the Highland Boundary Fault, the Highlands and the Lowlands also diverged culturally following the Battle of Hastings that marked Norman ascendancy in England. The Anglo-Norman feudal system was introduced to the Lowlands, but the Dalriadan clan system persisted in the Highlands. Gaelic would be spoken in the region until the 19th century, and to this day Highland English displays strong influence of Gaelic in its grammar and pronunciation.
Haggis
Historically, when hunters made their kill, they would use up the offal, which went off first, using the cleaned animal’s stomach as a cooking bag. Minced heart, liver and lungs are bulked out with oatmeal, onions, suet, seasoning and spices before cooking.
If you want to learn more, you may read our country spotlight on Scotland and the following articles:
We also have a short feature on Glasgow and Nelson Mandela Place and an article on Scotland & Scotch whisky which you may find interesting.
The rest of our Scotland-related articles can be found here.
You may also join one of Odyssey Traveller’s tours to Scotland. Our many tours include the 20-day Scottish Isles small group tour which journeys from Glasgow, to the Isles of Mull and Skye, to the Orkney and Shetland Islands, and finally to Edinburgh, with plenty of other stops along the way. Just click through to sign up.
This program is quite popular among our participants: as of June 2019, three departures are guaranteed (with one sold out!), which means the tours have reached the minimum number of participants required to operate the tour and will proceed this year and in 2020 (terms and conditions apply). Happy travelling!