Angus Folklore

Many know and still venerate the poet who was born as Christopher Murray Grieve in Langholm, Dumfriesshire, in 1892 and who died as the renowned Hugh MacDiarmid in Edinburgh in 1978.

I have not written enough about Glamis Castle and the family who have lived in it for over 600 years in this blog, which I hope to remedy.

The old traditions of illicit whisky making in the secret places in the glens has much the same romance attached to it as poaching or smuggling.

I have mentioned witchcraft in Glen Esk in some of my previous articles, but I have come back to the subject in an indirect way in my recently published book Scottish Warlocks, Wizards and Magicians: A Historical Quest.

There were many stirring and exciting stories associated with the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745-46, and not a few odd tales, and this is a strange one indeed.

The many fascinating cliffs, inlets and caves near Arbroath probably deserve a whole book to themselves.

The last Scottish stage coach apparently took to the roads as late as 1913, running between between Tarbet and Campbelltown.

Where do the fairies dwell and what do they want with us?

This is the fourth article I have written concerning fairs and markets in the county and concentrates on Kirriemuir.

The last post I wrote about fairs and markets in this blog largely focussed on those which happened in Brechin.

The Playfair family comes from the small, tucked away corner of Angus nestled between Dundee and the Carse of Gowrie region of Perthshire.

Too few people know about the life and work of Peter F.

It is surprising how stories of the same old ghosts are doomed to haunt the pages of anthologies about haunted places, and this seems to be one aspect of their eternal doom: being allowed no rest, but trudging endlessly through the plagirised (or highly d…

There are some subjects which I keep coming back to repeatedly, albeit with large gaps in time between each article.

There's an understandable mystery concerning many traditional folk songs.

This post, like many others, might be categorised as a provisional piece, based as it is on a limited amount of information in my possession.

I wrote not long ago about a ghost which haunted Newmanswalls House in Montrose.

Most people have heard of Burke and Hare and their nefarious way of ensuring that the best corpses were provided for the keen medical anatomists of Edinburgh.

This article details some information about the naval press gangs which were a real and feared feature of coastal communities for many generations in our part of the world and elsewhere.

There is a forlorness to lost places which lingers long after they have vanished, though traditions can be left behind.

As is the way with this blog, continuations of previous posts often take an extremely long time since the previous parts.

Like many other posts, this is a hotch-potch of information very loosely tied by a single theme (more often than not tied up with a shoogly knot).

The case of Mary Elder, tried for murder of her servant Margaret Warren, has been summerised in many places in the nearly two centuries since the event.

What connects Bob Dylan and the Ancient City, Brechin?

The old custom of perambulating - carefully walking - the boundaries of parishes, burghs and estates is no longer practised in Britain, except in a few places.