Flailing in Argyll and From the Archivist's Desk
FLAILING IN ARGYLL
Eric R Cregeen
The flail appears to have been generally abandoned in many mainland parts of south and central Argyll as long as fifty years ago. Elderly people speak of having threshed with the flail regularly in their youth. An account given some years ago to me by Duncan McKeith, a man in his seventies living near Carradale in Kintyre, is typical of many. As boys he and his brother [John] were given the job of threshing oats after school. They laid the sheaf on wooden planks in the barn, and struck alternately, working down the sheaf from the ears towards the butt twice, then turning the sheaf over and repeating the process. There were perforations in the planks to allow the grain to run out, and the chaff was blown away by the draught created by the opposed doors of the barn being open. Sometimes, instead of a second door, there was an aperture facing the door, known as a sorn, with a removable shutter.
Although the flail is a museum specimen in these mainland districts, it is none-the-less still employed in some crofting areas in Argyll when oats are required for the cattle during the winter. Older crofters and small farmers in the island of Tiree continue to use the flail. In the winter of both 1959 and 1960 I watched John MacKinnon threshing oats with the flail in his barn at Balephetrish. He is a small farmer and aged about seventy. He placed the sheaf on the hard earth floor, then keeping his arms fairly close to the body dealt rapid, forceful blows with the flail, wielding it over his right shoulder. Sometimes he would change direction without changing his grip and swing the flail with a deft backhand twist to the left across his body. The fast short blows of the flail in Tiree contrast strongly with the long, unhurried strokes of Tuscan peasants which fall vertically down from high above the head.
Mr MacKinnon's flail was a rough affair, made of two stout sticks joined by a thick string. The handle was forty-six inches long, the striker thirty-three inches, and both were about one and a quarter inches in diameter. The striker, I was told, is often made of hazel root or oak. Whatever the timber, it would have to be imported into this completely tree-less island. The binding of string did duty for the usual sheepskin thong, which was either bound round the knobbed ends of the sticks (a groove was cut near the ends of the sticks at Balephetrish) or fastened through holes in the ends.
Terms for the flail and its parts appear to vary from one district of Argyll to another. Informants in Kintyre and in the Islands of Tiree and Islay call the flail sứist, as they do also in Man. In the Inveraray district of mid-Argyll and in the Crinan area on the coast of central Argyll, the term sứist seems to be unknown, and instead Gaelic-speakers use buailtein, a word which elsewhere is restricted to the striker (the shorter stick). In Tiree the handle of the flail is called lamh-chrann and the leather thong iall-shuiste. In Kintyre the thong is iallach, on Lochfyneside whang and in Man, where the hide of a cow's knee was considered the best leather for this purpose, cab-hoost. 'Co righinn ri iall-shuiste', 'as tough as the flail thong', is a familiar Gaelic proverb.
Reproduced, courtesy of Mrs Lily Cregeen, from Folk Life, the Journal the Society for Folk Life Studies, issue no 3, where the article first appeared in 1965.
No 47 Spring 2000
FROM THE ARCHIVIST'S DESK
LETTER-RECEIVING BOX AT DALINTOBER We have to congratulate the inhabitants of Dalintober, on the erection of a letter-receiving box at the head of the Broombrae, opposite Miss Lucy Campbell's Schools. Letters can now be deposited there till 9.30 P.M., when they will be transferred to the Post-Office, for despatch by the mail between 11 and 12 P.M. Time will thus be afforded the inhabitants of that district, after receiving their letters, to answer them conveniently the same evening. They will be saved the necessity of enduring the angry blasts of Lochend on winter nights ... Much praise is due to A. McCorkindale Esq., through whose energy this desirable convenience has been secured for the district, and also to the Post-Office authorities for the readiness with which they recognised the necessity for it. The box is somewhat cylindrical in shape, made of cast metal, of a granite tint, and surmounted by a crown. Although not designed to be ornamental, there is nothing ungraceful in its appearance. Such conveniences are likely soon to be more common, and the erection of this serves to show that, though considerably removed from the great world, we are not out of the reach of its improvements. The Argylishire Herald, 28 November 1856
Wee Drams - E-mails, comments, queries and enlightenment from around the world.
Page 2: A History of the Gilchrists...............continued
Page 3: Innes Scot Wight - A series of Emails
Page 4: Flailing in Kintyre and From the Archivist's Desk
Page 6: James MacMurchy - Part 2
Page 7: By Hill and Shore - Part 1 - Angus Martin