I’ve been thinking a lot about borders recently: frontiers, marches, edges and liminal spaces. Partly this was inspired by a visit to Ousdale broch, which lies on the coast near the Caithness-Sutherland border. You park in a lay-by off the main road, and then follow a path which winds lazily down towards the sea for about a mile and a quarter. This gentle slope lulls you into a false sense of security, as the only hazards you have to face are the numerous fewmets left by the sheep that graze there, and you enjoy the solitude and the scenery, relishing the unspoiled landscape. Coming back, however, is another matter: before you’re halfway up the return slope you’re damning the unspoiled scenery to blazes and wondering why no one has installed a funicular railway.
The path to the brochThe location of the broch is pretty special, on tree-shrouded cliffs just above the point where the Allt a’ Bhurg burn joins the the Ousdale burn as it flows into the sea. Ousdale is Old Norse for Oystein’s Valley, suggesting that it was originally settled by a Yiddish-speaking Viking, while Allt a’ Bhurg is Gaelic for “stream of the fort”. Archaeologists used to think that brochs were Iron Age forts (they date from more or less Roman times), though no one really knows. Maybe they just liked the view. Archaeologists get around the problem by calling them “complex Atlantic roundhouses”, and then wonder why they never get invited to parties. Originally they were imposing stone towers a couple of stories high, bulging at the base like a clay pot on the potter’s wheel; nowadays they’re mostly just 16-metre wide stone-lined holes in the ground, like at Ousdale.
The main entry to the brochBut the location! Like so many brochs it seems to mark a border—of a valley, a loch, an inlet, a river, of the land and the sea, even of time. And just now feels like one of those transition points in history, with the passing of the old Queen and accession of a new King, a new, untried prime minister, a war in Europe, energy no longer something to be taken for granted, and winter coming. The old certainties suddenly don’t seem so certain any more. There’s a great song by Al Stewart called “On The Border” which captures this feeling perfectly:
Late last night the rain was knocking on my window,
I moved across the darkened room and in the lamp glow
I thought I saw down in the street
The spirit of the century
Telling us that we’re all standing
On the border…
Panorama of the interior===========================
TECHNICAL STUFF
I’ve completed the first sleeve, six inches of cuff and all (sigh), and am now well embarked on the second. By the time I reached the cuff I had 84 stitches on my needles, i.e., just enough for 21 ribs of k2/p2. Now the end’s in sight, even if may not quite finish it this week: the nights are drawing in fast now, so my narrow window of summer light to knit using navy yarn is closing; time to start planning a gansey in pastel shades…
An interesting scenario you word; a Yiddish speaking Norseman on Vikingr defending his wee bit of turf and burn.
Yes, sadly, the nights are fair drawing in, so damson gansey to be finished and next in pewter or moonlight. Keep smiling,we have ganseys to keep warm.
Hi Kevin, I admire your taste: those look like good choices to me – pewter might be my favourite shade in the (wide) Frangipani range, with moonlight definitely in the top few.
Oh, and the Vikings are said to have travelled as far as America, so I like to think of them dropping into a Jewish bakery in New York for a bagel…
Yellow, why not? Or pink, or red, or light blue?
Hi Tamar, my next – I was going to say victim, but on reflection perhaps “recipient” would be a better word – has chosen Frangipani amethyst as their colour of choice. A sort of deep lavender, or a cross between lavender and heather, which is a good colour for a Scottish pattern. (And while I don’t have yellow as such in my stash, I do have “Cornish gold”, for when someone wants camouflage for the gorse season…)