Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1964, Qupperneq 160

168
Norn in Shetland
WiIIiam Archibald (1774) minister of Unst, says, “There
is one species of dance which seems peculiar to themselves,
in which they do not proceed from one end of the floor to
the other in a figure, nor is it after the manner of a Scotch
reel; but a dozen or so form themselves into a circle, and
taking each other by the hand, perform a sort of circular
dance, one of the company all the while singing a Norn
visick. This was formerly their only dance, but has now
almost given entire way to the reel«.
After the transfer of the Bishopric in 1472 most of the
clergy were Scots, and to their congregations the Catholic
Latin service and the Lowland Scottish service after the
Reformation in 1560 would have been equally incompre*
hensible Probably in Shetland the Roman service gradually
merged into the Protestant forms over a long period. The
native minister Magnus Manson of Unst earned his sur*
name of Norsk by going to Bergen to learn the Norwe»
gian order of service. His will is dated 1632. The act for
the establishment of parish schools, passed by the Scottish
parliament in 1696, remained a dead letter in Shetland,
which had no school at all until the second quarter of the
18th century, and then under the auspices of the Society
for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge (S. P. C. K.).
In 1789 there were only two parish schools in Shetland,
and it was the threat by the S. P. C. K. to withdraw all
money grants which led to the establishment of nine paroc*
hial schools by 1820. Lerwick had 700 people in 1701 and
903 in 1791, but no school. The ancient capital Scalloway
had then 31 inhabited houses, and its school in Tingwall
was vacant. But by the 18th century there were a number
of people in each parish who had acquired some ability
in reading the English Bible of 1611. There were travelling
teachers, lodged by their hosts and employers, infirm men
who taught in their own houses, and for the Scots inco<
mers, sisters and daughters of the ministry, and, in Lerwick,
tutors. In Yell in 1790, with no schools, we read, “Most