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Originally Posted by
Rhyfhylwyr
But here's the thing. You presume that Gaelic is the historic national language of Scotland, and that English was imposed by the forerunners of the modern region of England. But that's wrong.
Gaelic was introduced to Scotland by the Kings of Dalriada, a Gaelic Irish ruling class that ruled over the natives, none of which spoke a Q-Celtic language (speaking instead either P-Celtic or Germanic languages). Hence why Scotland was called "Hibernia Minor" up until the 13th Century.
Something of an oversimplification. It's rather like saying that Offa introduced Saxon into Southern Britain, the point is that by the time Willian the Bastard arrived even the Dumonii had spoken only English for several centuries.
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The English language on the other hand is no more a product of the ancient English than the ancient Scots (not that there were such peoples back then, I mean their geographic contemporaries). And people in Scotland have always taken pride in their role in the English language. You know a few centuries ago they used to argue that due to French influence on the language in England, a Scotsman could better understand Shakespeare than an Englishman. The Scots dialect (which actually emerged in Northumbria) was regarded as the purest Anglo-Saxon form of English.
Broad Scots preserves many English words that have fallen out of favour here, but it is still a mongrel dialect in the end, "bairn" as in baby is a Midlands word, not a Celtic or even Northumbrian one. As to Shakespeare, the Scots dialect is not exactly close to the South Midlands or London dialect he wrote in and in terms of antiquity it is the men of Belfast who can claim that crown.
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The idea of Britishness was born when the Protestant Clan Campbell petitioned the King to change the terminology of official documents to refer to the settlers in Ulster as 'British'. Although even that was really just symbolic of what was already the reality.
I think you confuse a lot of things with what British means. The culture surrounding the nobility in the days of the Empire is not a national culture. Likewise in the first bit I quoted you refer to English culture permeating Scotland from the days when the English language became dominant. But the so-called "Anglicisation" carried out from the 12th century was really just representative of a takeover by a Norman elite. It is an example of a shared experience with England, not something imposed by England.
The culture surrounding the nobility? Oh no, I mean the culture surrounding the Civil Servants.
In any case, you are quite wrong about Protestants creating "Britishness", the idea was most definately invented by the English when Bede said, "This Island is called Britainia", he then went on to invent Englishness out of the fractious quarelsome tribes then in the Southern part of the Island.
Politically, however, the current order was first realised by Athelstan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Æthelstan and since that time the objective of all English kings has been the rule of the whole Island, from England
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What really matters is who we are. The ordinary person. I am, in the words of what anyone across the Highland line would tell you up until a century ago, a "Saxon". I am part of a British nation. British history, British culture, British state.
And I see the dismantling of those things to be very destructive.
I suspect if you asked a modern Highlander you would get a nasty surprise, if the Welsh and Anglo-Welsh are anything to go by. Disowned by the Highlands and not accepted by the English, that puts people in Southern Scotland in an awkward cultural position.
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Originally Posted by
Rhyfhylwyr
I do not believe there has been a changing identity here for thousands of years.
Eh? Picts, then Gaels, then Scots?
That's a pretty big change.
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The English language was forged in Scotland (and simultaneously elsewhere), Gaelic was not.
Scots Gaelic is different from Irish Gaelic, but modern RP has more in common with Shakespeare and Milton than Middle Scots.
[/quote]I don't think that any ruling elite changed the fundamental character of the peoples here. As I said Scotland was effectively an Irish colony. It was assimilated to some degree but Gaelic never crossed the Highland line. And like I said the term 'Anglicisation' is not appropriate really for the establishment of Norman customs at the kings court.[/quote]
Gaelic never crossed the Highland line? Oh come ON, Pict was completely wiped out and until the High Middle Ages the Scots outside ancient Bernica spoke Galic, as did the King. If a ruling elite could not influence a people then the English would not speak English, but instead dialects of Brythonic Celtic like the Welsh and Bretons.
Christianity, brought by Irish Monks.
