The Night Of Hogmanay

New Year’s Eve is a more important festival in Scotland then it is in England, and it even has a special name - ‘Hogmanay’*. Nowhere else in Britain is the arrival of the New Year celebrated so wholeheartedly as in Scotland.

There is a Scottish song that is sung all over the world at midnight on New Year’s Eve – ‘Auld Lang Syne’. It was written by Robert Burns, the famous Scottish poet, and you may find some of the traditional words a bit difficult to understand, but that’s the way it’s always sung – even by English people!

It was believed that the first person to visit one’s house on New Year’s Day could bring good or bad luck. Therefore, people tried to arrange for the person of their own choice to be standing outside their houses ready to be let in the moment midnight had come. Usually a dark-complexioned man was chosen, and never a woman, for she would bring bad luck. The first footer was required to carry three articles: a piece of coal to wish warmth, a piece of bread to wish food, and a silver coin to wish wealth. In some parts of northern England this pleasing custom is still observed. This interesting tradition called “First Footing”.

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*Hogmanay – ‘Хогманай’ (31 декабря), Новогодний сочельник в Шотландии