Happy Hogmanay everyone!  I hope you’ve settled your debts, cleaned your fire out and you’re getting ready for the bells.  I’ll wish you well, health and happiness in the coming year and leave you with a wee history.

You may not know but Christmas was virually banned in Scotland for approx. 400 years until the 1950’s.  This has it’s roots in the Protestant reformation, when the Kirk portrayed Christmas as a Popish, Catholic feast.  Many Scots had to work over this time and it was New Year when families and friends gathered and exchanged gifts - Hogmanay.  (The word probably comes from the “auld alliance” with the French.)  

It is traditional to welcome friends and strangers.  The “first foot” in the house after midnight, for the sake of good luck, should be a dark haired male.  This is believed to be a throwback to Viking days when any stranger with blonde hair meant trouble.  This dark haired man should bring coal, shortbread, salt black bun and whisky - all symbolic.  Well, the whisky is not symbolic, that’s to offer your host a dram.  Thus, going around the homes of your friends and neighbours (after midnight)  became known as first footing.