The Celtic Viking Islands | Shetland Language, Culture & Norse History
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- Опубліковано 31 тра 2024
- Shetland is the most remote part of the UK, and the unique Shetland dialect, the islands' norse history, and cultural mix of Scottish and Scandinavian influence make it stand out against other parts of Scotland or the UK. In this video, we examine Shetland history, the Shetland language & dialect, and Shetland culture.
The Shetland dialect is so different from other UK dialects that some view it as a Shetland language, called Shetlandic, Broad Shetland, or Auld Shetland. It’s heavily influenced by an old norse language called Norn, and previous Scandinavian rulers left an indelible mark on Shetland's identity. The traditional Up Helly Aa festival, in which a viking longboat is burned, Shetland’s flag, which follows the nordic cross design with the blue and white of the Scottish flag, and the old Norse signs dotted around Shetland are clear reminders of the island’s Norse heritage. Norn was spoken in Shetland until the late 1800s, and today, the Shetland dialect is a mix of Scots and Norn.
Shetland’s fortunes have always been close the sea, through, traditionally through fishing and whaling, and more recently through North Sea Oil. That, combined with the infamously stormy weather and long, dark winters, means you have to be hardy to live in Shetland. We spoke to local Shetlanders in Lerwick and Vidlin to learn Shetland’s culure.
From sweeping coastlines to windswept cliffs, Shetland is stunning, and is the closest you can get to wilderness in the UK. Seals, whales, and sea otters swim in its often stormy waters, and the nature here made the freezing weather worthwhile.
00:00-01:38 - Welcome to Shetland
01:39-03:27 - Arriving in Shetland for the Storm of the Decade
03:28-05:08 - How Shetland Became part of Scotland
05:09-05:54 - Shetland's Scandinavian Heritage
05:55-06:42 - Norn: Shetland's Old Norse Language
06:43-07:29 - The Shetland Dialect
07:30-07:58 - Knapping: Shetlanders Changing how they Speak
07:59-08:59 - Norn, Scots, Gaelic, & the Decline of Shetland Dialect
09:00-09:55 - How the Sea has Shaped Shetland Culture
09:56-10:22 - Soothmoothers & Shetland's Attitude to Outsiders
10:23-11:30 - Shetland's Box on the Map
11:31-12:57 - Do Shetlanders Feel Scottish, British, or Shetland?
12:58-13:50 - Hardiness in Shetland - Some People Can't Handle the Weather
13:51-16:10 - Shetland's Scandinavian Influence & Community Spirit
What a cool documentary about a beautiful place. I'm really impressed by the quality that this guy produces
Thanks so much, glad you're enjoying the videos! Shetland was absolutely stunning, totally blew us away. Would love to see it in the Spring/Summer.
We've just moved to Shetland and are still discovering it, so this video was very interesting. Thank you.
They are a very proud people and from my experience, I would say their dialect is alive and well, particularly in the South Mainland.
I'm from Unst. Came to America in 1963 when I was 13. To this day I can sleep with every light in the house on. People would ask me how I can sleep with all the lights on. I just tell them if I couldn't I'd never be able to sleep at home, in Shetland during the summer months. Even all these years later I still leave all the lights on in my house. It's actually COMFORTING.
great video, you covered its uniqueness very well!!
Thank you, glad you enjoyed it!
Wow. This is the first of your vids that I've watched, came here looking for coverage on Shetland, and you did that for me brilliantly. I'm assuming you are not a professional documentary maker (correct me if I'm wrong!) but you are one of the best 'amateur' doc makers I have ever come across. Your film editing and your narrative are both excellent, very smooth and natural. I get none of the sense of ick that I often get with amateur docos, especially the very naif narratives that some have. Very very well done, and thank you for an interesting and insightful coverage of what I was seeking!
Thanks for the kind words! I didn't have professional training or a background in filming when I started, I just sort of picked up a camera and started making these. But since then it has become my full-time job so I suppose you could say I'm a professional amateur 😅
Thanks again for the feedback, so glad you enjoyed the video, many more to come!
I’m from Shetland and I thoroughly enjoyed watching this. Thank you for creating this. Excited to share with my soothmoother pals!
So glad you enjoyed the video! Great to hear that coming from someone who's from there 😁
AwsomE
Really looking forward to the next one guys...
The big finale! Hope you enjoy it 😁
Have you considered visiting st kilda? You might like it@TieranFreedman
I used go to Shetland on my school trip when I used to live in orkney and it is beautiful place
This has been an amazing series. Really enjoy your documentary episodes and your interviews. They are so well done.
Thanks so much, glad you've enjoyed it (and there's another series on the way...👀)
great video, well done
Thank you, glad you enjoyed it!
Another brilliant documentary Tieran - so well written and very informative. Great interviews. Fantastic work 😊
Thanks so much Julie, glad you enjoyed it! 😊
u deserve so much more recognition for the work u put out fr
Thanks so much! 😊
This was really relaxing & informative! Thank you!
Thank you, glad you enjoyed it!
I've visited Orkney and Norway so time to visit Shetland this summer. 👍🏻
Wish I'd had the chance to visit Orkney, hope to make it back up there some day
Wow, was not expecting to see my shopper bag in your video 😊
Are you referring to 07:37? It's fab! 😊
Yes just before the knapping, lol 😂
Thanks. My grandfather was born on Shetland in the late C19th, before he went to sea. I've visited Shetland in 2010. My other grandfather came from Paisley. Distance is a strange think, living in Australia with our western capital of Perth some 4,000kms from the Australian national capital Canberra, certainly puts distance and travel into another perspective.
When the Shetland person was talking in a way others can understand her, she sounded just like people from Fraserburgh
Great films. On a par with any Prime time TV production. So informative, entertaining and educational. Ace.
Fantastic as always! Thanks very much!
Thank you, glad you enjoyed it!
ive followed you 2 for the last year and as someone who lives in oban i cannot wait to see the finale
you have opened my eyes to irish and shetand culture and i love you both form it!
Thanks for the kind words, so glad you've enjoyed the series! Due to illness and some personal issues there's been a delay on the finale but I'm working on getting it out there 😁
Great video, great series!
Thanks so much, glad you've enjoyed the videos! 😁
Fascinating...Great vid; thanks.
Thanks, glad you liked it!
Another excellent piece about your epic journey, thanks!
Thank you, glad you enjoyed it! 😁
Excellent footage! Learnt so much. Thank you.
Thank you, glad you enjoyed it!
thank you for this documentary and i love the quality of your content so much
Thanks so much, really glad to hear that! 😁
What a great wee documentary!
Is this Rory per chance?? How's life up there?
Thanks so much, glad you enjoyed it 😊
@@TieranFreedman Indeed it is! Great to meet you guys, hopefully you'll be up again sometime :)
Brilliant, long wanted to visit the Shetland islands. Nice work,
Thank you! It's definitely worth visiting (but maybe try summer instead 😅)
I m falling in love.Thank you.
So so amazing
Nice! I hope you made it to the cinema.
Thanks! You'll find out in the next video 😜
beautiful
Superb! What a beautiful programme! As a relative late-comer joining around the Isle of Mann episode, I'm enjoying looking back through the catalogue. Perhaps you'll also do a reflections and summary video and maybe one covering technical aspects. I hope you make it to the last destination.
Thanks so much, so glad you're enjoying the videos! That's a good idea, maybe between series (I'm currently editing together the next series from the Middle East which will be up on here soon 😁)
@@TieranFreedman that's amazing, ambitious and a lot drier probably than the North of UK in autumn! - I can't wait to watch it!
Lovely! Any chance you can tour the Channel Islands?
Good potential future video idea! 👀
There's so much to see in Shetland it's almost laughable. I've been here all my life (31 years) and still have so much more to explore
Yeah we only really scratched the surface! Would love to go back in summer one day to see more of the islands
I know you didn't time it like this, but the 8th season of the TV show Shetland just started airing. Seems very good timing!
That's a lucky accident! I haven't seen it yet actually but I believe there's a few spots in this video that feature quite a bit in the show. Is it worth a watch?
@@TieranFreedman It's definitely worth a watch. They're good stories. The house/old warehouse in the harbour you feature a lot in the video was used as the exterior of the main character's (Jimmy Perez) home. I was sure you'd seen the show and that's why you showed that house so much! Good luck and my household cannot wait to see where you cycle to next. All the best from the Netherlands!
Interesting but a shame that the huge 103 turbine windfarm industrialising the central mainland wasn't shown. The pristine landscape is no more.
Another excellent film!! Your narration is spot on and so informative.
I'm surprised that you don't have a job in mainstream TV like Ben Fogle who found fame after the reality series Castaway.
Can't wait to see if you made it to your date night cinema ❤
Wow, thanks for the kind words, glad you enjoyed it 😁
There's still time for the career change haha, maybe one day
Where is the spot at 11:30? That is Isle of Skye stuff! I want to go there =)
It's on a footpath around the edge of Lerwick!
Hello Tieran, I have enjoyed trips around the world. I would like to know when your adventures will take place in Saudi Arabia
Hey Thieran… am I missing something? Is there not a “final” video about your movie destination? I love your stuff mate!
Soulmate Cyclists
Hey Chris! Due to some personal issues and illness, there was a big delay to the finale. But I'm hoping to get it out this weekend or the next one, so keep an eye out 😁
Hey again Chris, in case you missed it it's out now!
Watching your videos, i appreciate more and more that the Faroese language managed to survive
I actually didn't know about that! Maybe a potential video down the line 👀 Are you from the Faroe islands?
@@TieranFreedman I am! Haven’t lived there since i was a kid, but i visit family often. For a long time Denmark was very strict about Faroese not being used in public/official/religious/educational settings, everything had to be in Danish, Faroese was almost only spoken at home. This didn’t change before around the time my grandparents started school, where they were finally allowed to be taught in their own language (my grandma just turned 85)
The Second World War and the British occupation of the islands had a big impact on the growing autonomy here, and why we now can use our own language and flag!
Excellent video. And what a beauty that Amanda is. There's a woman worth the long nights and cold weather
Norway was once a very big country, with the islands in the west as well as parts of Sweden, but than we came under Danish rule all those areas were lost.
Ahhh Isle of Man by bike, Shetland by bike ... all things i've been waiting years to do. Did you stay in Lerwick the whole time?
Hope you manage to pedal to those places eventually! We stayed in Lerwick for the first few days and then were on our way to the most remote cinema in the UK, which is on Out Skerries... but revealing whether we actually made it would be a spoiler 😜
Nice. But not for me in winter thanks. Back in the 80s, I went Arranmore island of the coast of Donegal for a few days in winter - the winds came up and I was stuck there for over a month.
Oh wow, that must have been a crazy storm! Was it easy to figure out a place to stay while you were stuck therew? I initially wanted to visit Arranmore to make a video about a Gaeltacht, but we ran out of time. Will hopefully make it back one day.
Yeah Shetland in Winter was pretty brutal, we should have cycled a bit faster to get there sooner haha
If you want to feel absolutely cut off from humanity, go to Shitland where the weather is always shetty. Great content. Voted and Sub'd.
Nice video of Shetland, just one thing about languages, in Scotland Gaelic is pronounced Gaa-lick whereas in Ireland it is Gay-lick. Gaelic speakers don’t usually say do you speak Gaelic they say “do you have the Gaelic.” I know that’s probably a bit pointless, enjoyed the video though and will look at some others👍
Damn, just when I thought the video was error-free 😅 Glad you enjoyed it though!
Love this place, however i think isle of lewis/harris is better in terms of hiking and cycling.
The initial plan was to head to the Outer Hebrides en route, but we decided to stick to the mainland because of the weather in the end. Hope to make it back up there some day to visit
I think it’s a bit of a stretch to say you are on the edge of the world with the Faroe Islands, Iceland and Greenland north of that
Did you fish when you was up here in Shetland
Have you been to the Orkney islands??
I haven't yet! We were supposed to on this trip but ended up heading straight for Shetland since we lost the race against winter. Would love to visit some day
Nut to push thee too far seein as tha's soa far up North but tha shud come daan to Yorkshire an larn a two-or-thry things abaat aar loacal dialects an all! Ther's a fairish few things to talk abaat an as a member o t'Yorkshire Dialect Ciety Aw'd be reight fain to fill thee in!
Not to push you too far seeing as you're so far up North but you should come down to Yorkshire and learn a few things about our local dialects too! There's a fair few things to talk about and as a member of the Yorkshire Dialect Society I'd quite happy to fill you in!
Oh wow that sounds great! These videos were shot in 2021 and I'm not currently on the road, but that's a great future video idea 😊 If and when I'm in the area I would love that and will definitely get in touch, thank you!
@@TieranFreedman Yes we shall have to see! I could perhaps get in touch with members of the society council if and when needed and we can organise something. The chairman of the society's in Brighouse and has had people over for interviews before so that could potentially be a good place for a look at the place. All things to be hashed out of course if and when but I'm sure it'd be doable. Taa for gettin i touch
it is lovley up here in shetland but there isnt mcdonalds
Shetland might not have been always Scottish.
But it was Pictish, long before the arrival of Norse. Shetland was originally Caledonian.
Kings so sad 😭 ….
I still wonder why he was painted with that expression 😂
islands cannot Vike.
Get your facts straight ffs. Viking is a noun, it's the past participle of the Verb to Vike. Viking means to go raiding. the Vikings were a series of sea-bourn raids carried out by various Northern Europeans against the rest of Europe, it IS NOT a culture, a nationality, or a job, it's an action carried out by any number of professions from 3 or 4 cultures. the term is Nordo-Gaelic Islands. not 'celtic viking islands'
Viking [noun]: a person belonging to a race of Scandinavian people who travelled by sea and attacked parts of northern and southern Europe between the 8th and the 11th centuries, often staying to live in places they travelled to.
- Cambridge Dictionary
Wank:- Noun. a peasant who accepts ENGLISH idiocy over it's own language as authority over historical facts
@@TieranFreedman Scandanavian :- A native of Norway, Sweden Finland and/OR the western Steppe. (note.... NOT EVEN ''and Danish'' a culture who had members who also _WENT_ Viking.)
Try to filter journalese and propaganda from Data mate eh?
@@ThomasMuirAudionaut This definition is incorrect. Scandinavia refers to Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. While Finland is a Nordic country, it is not part of Scandinavia.
@@TieranFreedman yeah you're right.. NOW it is. but go back far enough and you'll find plenty of erroneous data claiming Fins are also Scandinavian. - like before the snobs began listening TO the Finns. - however, - my point still stands. - Viking isn't a culture.