Ulster Scots people
In music, there is a distinguishable line between the cultures of the native Irish and the Ulster-Scots living in Ireland. In Ireland the traditional music is focused around the 'pub-session'. This is a regular meeting, often weekly, and is marked by informal arrangement of both musicians and audience, although, Irish traditional music is one of the most influential types of music known to the modern world, and can be heard in some of the Ulster Scots music. Protestant Scottish traditional music is usually informal and close-knit. The most obvious example of this type of cultural event is the marching bands. Here a formal and organised structure is more obvious. Although they play less frequently, these bands meet regularly in community halls to tune their skills. The strong Scottish roots of the Ulster Scots musical scene is evidenced by the continuing popularity during the Marching Season.
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Lambeg Drum
One of the real icons of Protestant marching bands in Ireland is the Lambeg drum. While most of the other musical instruments are shared between the Ulster-Scots and the native Irish, the Lambeg offers the chance of distinguishing the Protestant marching bands.
The drum has a distinctive sound, with the 'tunes' played on it based on Irish hornpipes style. Although its precise origins are unknown one popular myth is that it is named after the town of Lambeg in County Antrim.
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Intermingling and intermarriage in Ulster
A question that has been raised by many historians[who?] about the Ulster-Scots is the question of intermingling and more importantly, intermarriage between the native Irish and the incoming Scots.
However others contest such claims. Pádraig Ó Snodaigh, author of the book Hidden Ulster, Protestants and the Irish language, states that many of the settlers came from Gaelic speaking areas in Scotland and thus would have culturally meshed well with their new neighbours. Also he states that church records show that by 1716 close to ten percent of ministers in Ulster preached in Irish. He claims that such cultural and geographic affinity would have produced numerous conversions and also marriages. In addition James G. Leyburn, author of The Scotch-Irish: A social history, quotes James Reid, a historian of the Irish Presbyterian Church in 1853, that when the marriage ban was lifted in 1610 that it was a "great joy to all parties". James Woodburn, in his book, The Ulster-Scot: His history and Religion, states that the Scots and Irish "commonly intermarried". The Handbook to the Ulster Question states how the English politicians were quite perturbed how the Scots were ready enough to intermarry with the Irish. Each of these authors have shown sufficient evidence in their claims.
There is a growing ethnic consciousness of Ulster Scot or Scotch-Irish ancestry in Australia, the Falklands Islands, New Zealand and South Africa, where both Scottish and Irish settlement took place in the expansion of British rule in these areas. Despite their descendants, if they knew their Ulster-Scot ancestry, were somewhat incorrectly identified simply as "Irish", "Scottish" or "British" for a long period of time, although it should be noted that in America the Ulster emigrants usually called themselves "Irish" or "Scotch-Irish".
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See also
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References
"Hidden Ulster, Protestants and the Irish language" by Padraigh O'Snodaigh, Lagan Press, Belfast (1995) "The Scotch-Irish, A social history" by James G. Leyburn, University of North Carolina Press, (1962)
- ^ Jane Kenyon, Jane Ohlmeyer, The Civil Wars, A military History of England, Scotland and Ireland 1638-1660, p.74
- ^ Nicholas Canny, Making Ireland British, p. 562
- ^ [1][2]
- ^ Why You Need To Know The Scotch-Irish
- ^ Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America
- ^ Scots-Irish By Alister McReynolds, writer and lecturer in Ulster-Scots studies
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External links
- BBC Ulster-Scots Voices
- The Scot in Ulster: Sketch of the History of the Scottish Population in Ulster (by John Harrison, 1888)
- Immigrant Servants Database
- ElectricScotland.com Ulster-Scots
- Ulster-Scots Online
- The Institute of Ulster-Scots Studies
- The Ulster-Scots Society of America
- Ulster-Scots Agency
- Inconvenient Peripheries Ethnic Identity and the United Kingdom Estate The cases of “Protestant Ulster” and Cornwall’ by prof Philip Payton
- Hidden Ulster, Protestants and the Irish language.
- Ulster History timeline, Siege of Londonderry Database, Scotch Irish Migration and surname lists
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