Hogmanay
In Scotland, New Year's Eve once mattered more than Christmas, and it still involves flaming fireballs, a dip in the Forth and a stranger with coal at your door.
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Quick Facts
- What it is
- The Scottish celebration of New Year's Eve, with festivities often running into 1 and 2 January
- Date
- 31 December, with the climax at midnight, known as "the bells"
- Word origin
- First recorded in Scots in the early 1600s; its source is still argued over
- Signature custom
- First-footing: the first visitor over the threshold after midnight, ideally bringing gifts
- Famous song
- Auld Lang Syne, collected by Robert Burns and published in 1796
- Fiery ritual
- The Stonehaven Fireballs ceremony, where villagers swing blazing wire balls along the High Street
- Biggest party
- Edinburgh's Hogmanay, with its street party, torchlight procession and castle fireworks
- Cold-water tradition
- The Loony Dook, a New Year's Day plunge into the Firth of Forth at South Queensferry
The party that Christmas left behind
For centuries, Scotland barely did Christmas. After the Reformation the Church of Scotland frowned on the festival as a relic of Rome, and Christmas Day did not become a public holiday in Scotland until 1958. People worked on 25 December and saved their celebrating for the turn of the year. That left Hogmanay to carry the whole weight of midwinter merrymaking. It became the night for feasting, drinking, settling scores and starting afresh, and in many households it still outshines Christmas. Nobody can agree where the word itself comes from. Theories point to French, Norse and Gaelic roots, and none has won. All anyone can say is that "Hogmanay" was being written down in Scotland by the early 1600s, and that it has outlived every attempt to explain it.
Why a tall dark stranger is good news
The heart of a traditional Hogmanay is first-footing. Once the bells have rung, the first person to cross your threshold sets the luck for the year ahead. The ideal first-foot is a tall, dark-haired man, who arrives bearing gifts: coal for the fire, shortbread, a black bun (a dense fruit cake wrapped in pastry) and, of course, whisky. Fair-haired visitors were once viewed with suspicion, a prejudice often blamed on memories of Viking raiders. Arriving empty-handed is the real mistake. Before all that comes the "redding" of the house. Families cleaned from top to bottom and tried to clear their debts, so the new year could begin tidily. Then comes the song. Robert Burns sent Auld Lang Syne to James Johnson's Scots Musical Museum, saying he had taken it down from older singing, and it was published in 1796. At the last verse, everyone crosses their arms, links hands and surges forward, usually with more enthusiasm than accuracy.
Edinburgh turns the whole city into a party
Edinburgh's Hogmanay grew into one of the world's best-known New Year events. Since the early 1990s the city centre has hosted a huge street party, with stages, music and a fireworks display over the castle at midnight. The festivities also include a torchlight procession, held before New Year's Eve rather than on the night itself. It used to finish at Calton Hill, but moved to Holyrood Park in 2017 and has used other routes since. It is carefully organised pageantry, very different from the house-to-house visiting of older Hogmanays. The recovery plan comes next morning. At South Queensferry, hardy souls take part in the Loony Dook, running into the Firth of Forth near the Forth Bridge on 1 January. The tradition began in 1986, and many take the plunge in fancy dress.
Fireballs, tar barrels and bonfires
Beyond the capital, Hogmanay gets properly wild. In Stonehaven on the Aberdeenshire coast, around sixty swingers walk the High Street whirling fireballs, which are wire cages packed with flammable material on long wires. Crowds line the street, and at the end the remaining fireballs are flung into the harbour. Burghead on the Moray coast has a stranger tradition: the Burning of the Clavie. A blazing tar barrel is carried through the town and up to Doorie Hill. It takes place on 11 January because the village keeps the date of the old calendar, from before Britain dropped eleven days in 1752. Biggar in South Lanarkshire lights a big bonfire for the occasion, while in Kirkwall in Orkney the Ba' game, a mass struggle between the Uppies and the Doonies, is played on New Year's Day as well as Christmas Day.
Hogmanay in the living room
Away from the big events, most Scots mark Hogmanay at home or at a friend's house. There is food, drink, singing and a lot of waiting for midnight. Television played its part for decades. In the 1960s, Andy Stewart and The White Heather Club brought tartan-and-accordion Hogmanay into front rooms across Britain, and the Scottish Hogmanay TV special became its own tradition. The following day matters too. New Year's Day is a holiday, and 2 January is a second day off in Scotland, which gives people time to visit relatives, finish the black bun and recover. The English-speaking world now sings Auld Lang Syne on 31 December, but Hogmanay itself remains Scottish at heart: part party, part superstition and part stubborn survival of a time when New Year was the only midwinter festival anyone was allowed.
Notable people
- Robert Burns
- James Johnson
- Andy Stewart
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