each object and every gallery has to tell.
At the heart of the museum is the Kingdom of the Scots. This is the
story of Scotland’s emergence as a distinctive nation able to take its
place on the European stage. Here are the icons of Scotland’s past –
objects connected with some of the most famous events and best-known
figures in Scottish history, from the Declaration of Arbroath[14] to Mary,
Queen of Scots.
Described as “the noisiest museum in the world”, the Museum of
Childhood is a favourite with adults and children alike. It is a treasure
house, full of objects telling of childhood, past and present. The museum
has five public galleries. A list of their contents makes it sound like a
magical department store. There are riding toys, push and pull toys, doll’s
prams, yachts and boats, slot machines, a punch and judy, a nickelodeon, a
carousel horse, dolls’ houses, toy animals, zoos, farms and circuses,
trains, soldiers, optical toys, marionettes, soft toys, games and much,
much more.
In addition, the museum features a time tunnel (with reconstructions
of a school room, street scene, fancy dress party and nursery from the days
of our grandparents) an activity area, and video presentations. The museum
opened in 1955 was the first museum in the world to specialize in the
history of childhood. It also helps to find out how children have been
brought up, dressed and educated in decades gone by.
“The People’s Story” is a museum with a difference. As the name
implies, it uses oral history, reminiscence, and written sources to tell
the story of the lives, work and leisure of te ordinary people of
Edinburgh, from the late 18th century to the present day. The museum is
filled with the sounds, sights and smells of the past – a prison cell, town
crier, reform parade, cooper’s workshop, fishwife, servant at work,
dressmaker, 1940s kitchen, a wash-house, pub and tea-room.
These reconstructions are complimented by displays of photographs,
everyday objects and rare artifacts, such as the museum’s outstanding
collections of trade union banners and friendly society regalia.
6. Where life is one long festival.
Edinburgh may be called the Athens of the North, but from mid-August
to early September that’s probably because it’s hot, noisy and overpriced –
and crawling with foreign students.
Over the next three weeks the population will double as half a
million visitors invade Britain’s most majestic city.
If you are a theatre buff or a comedy fan, Edinburgh at Festival
time[15] will be your idea of heaven. But the city is a centre for culture
all year round.
In the run-up to Christmas there are hundreds of shows, including
Noel Coward’s Relative Values at the King’s Theatre and the Anatomy
Performance Company’s dance theatre at the Traverse. Romeo and Juliet is at
the Traverse, Les Miserables at the Playhouse and The Recruiting Officer at
the Lyceum. And outside Festival time, you’ll find it a lot easier to get
tickets.
As for the visual arts, Edinburgh’s museums more than match any of
the special exhibitions mounted during the Festival.
Most attractive is the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, in a
stately home on the outskirts of the city. Here you can find unbeatable
masterpieces created by Picasso, Matisse and Hockney.
If shopping is more your stile, Jenners[16], on Princes Street, is
Edinburgh’s answer to Harrods. And the Scottish Gallery on George Street is
a happy hunting ground for collectors of fine art. Edinburgh is full of
good hotels but its dramatic sky-line is dominated by two enormous
hostelries at either end of Princes Street. The Caledonian and the Balmoral
(formerly the North British) were built by rival railway companies in the
days when competing steam trains raced from London.
You can also have a look at the Gothic monument to Sir Walter Scott,
which stands in East Princes Street Gardens and was begun in 1840. It is
rather high, and narrow staircase (a total of 287 steps in several stages)
offers spectacular views of the city. Not far from the monument in Princes
Street Gardens one can find the oldest Floral Clock in the world, built in
1903, consisting of about 25,000 flowers and plants.
Like all the best capitals, Edinburgh boasts cosmopolitan influences.
Asian shopkeepers sell Samosas and Scotch (mutton) pies in the same thick
Scots brogue, and the city is littered with Italian restaurants.
The city has three universities: the University of Edinburgh (1583),
Herriot-Watt[17] (established in 1885; received university status in 1966)
and Napier[18] University.
Edinburgh is also an industrial centre. Its industries include
printing, publishing, banking, insurance, chemical manufacture,
electronics, distilling, brewing.
Conclusion.
I.“Scottishness”.
Oh Scotia! My dear, my native soil!
Robert Burns
Scotland is a country of great variety with its own unique character
and strong tradition. Its cities offer a mixture of designer lifestyle and
age old tradition, while the countryside ranges from Britain’s highest
mountains and waterfalls to the most stunning gorges and glens.
Scotland’s national tradition is rather intense and much alive even
now and is rather rare in the modern world. Scotland is part of Britain.
But it is not England. The Scottishness is a real thing, not an imaginary
feeling, kind of picturesque survival of the past. It is based on Scot’s
law which is different from the English. Scotland has its own national
heroes fought in endless battles against the English ( William Wallace, Sir
John the Grahame , Robert Bruce and others).
1.'A wee dram'
Scots have their own national drink, and you need only ask for
Scotch, and that’s quite enough, you get what you wanted. More than half of
Scotland's malt whisky distilleries are in the Grampian Highlands, and thus
a third of the world's malt whisky is distilled here. A combination of
fertile agricultural land, a sheltered, wet climate and the unpolluted
waters of the River Spey and its tributaries, combined with the obvious
enthusiasm of the locals for the work (and the product!) mean it is an
ideal place to produce malt whisky. Many distilleries are open to visitors,
and often offer samples!
The Scots are fond of the following joke about scotch:
A young man arrives in a small village situated near Loch Ness. There he
meets an old man and asks him:
- When does the Loch Ness Monster usually appear?
- Usually it appears after the third glass of Scotch, - answered the
man.
2.Scottish national dress.
There is also a distinctive national dress, the kilt. Strictly
speaking it should be warn only by men; it is made of wool and looks like a
pleated skirt. The kilt is a relic of the time when the clan system existed
in the Highlands. But its origin is very ancient. The Celtic tribes who
fought Ceasar wore kilts. When the Celts moved north up through Cornwall,
and Wales, and Ireland, and eventually to Scotland, they brought the kilt
with them. A thousand years ago, there was nothing specially Scottish about
it. Now it has become the Highland’s national dress and is worn in many
parts of Scotland. It is probably the best walking-dress yet invented by
man: there is up to 5 metres of material in it; it is thickly pleated st
the back and sides; it is warm, it is airly, leaves the legs free for
climbing; it stands the rain for hours before it gets wet through; it hangs
well above the mud and the wet grass; briefly it is warm for a cold day,
and cool for a warm one. And, what is more, if a Highlander is caught in
the mountains by the night, he has but to unfasten his kilt and wrap it
around him – 5 metres of warm wool – he’ll sleep comfortably enough the
night through.
3.A few words about tartan.
Every Scottish clan had its own tartan.[19] People in Highlands were
very good weavers. They died their wool before weaving it; the dyes were
made from various roots and plants which grew in this or that bit of land.
Therefore one clan dyed its wool in reddish colours, another in green, and
so on. And they decorated them differently so as to distinguish the
clansmen in battle (especially between neighboring clans which happened
rather often).
On the subject of shopping for tartan, the choice is wide. Some
designs are associated with particular clans and retailers will be happy to
help you find “your” own pattern. By no means all tartans belong to
specific clans – several are “district” tartans, representing particular
areas. The fascinating story of the tartan itself is told at the Museum of
Scottish Tartans.
The museum possesses lots of rare exhibits. One of them is the
remarkable woman’s Plaid or Arisaid, the oldest dated in the world: 1726.
The Arisaid, worn only by women, reached from head to heels, belted at the
waist and pinned at the breast.
The oldest piece of Tartan found in Scotland dates back from about 325
AD. The cloth was found in a pot near Falkirk[20], a simple check in two
shades of brown, a long way from the checked and coloured tartans that came
to be worn in the Highlands of Scotland in the 1550s. There are now over
2,500 tartan designs, many of them are no more than 20 years old.
4.The national musical instrument of the Scots.
Scotland has its own typical musical instrument, the pipes (sometimes
called the bagpipes). The bagpipe was known to the ancient civilizations of
the Near East. It was probably introduced into Britain by the Romans.
Carvings of bagpipe players on churches and a few words about them in the
works of Chaucer and other writers show that it was popular all over the
