Burryman

b. The Burryman. A custom has been observed, from time immemorial, the evening before the fair (annual, in August): the boys dress one of their number with a covering of burrs, from head to foot, adorning him with ribbons and flowers, and conducting him, led by his companions, through the town and neighborhood. They receive small donations from the inhabitants. The origin of this practice cannot be ascertained. [Rev. Th. Dimma, in N.S.A. Linlithgow.]

Every year, on the first Friday in August, the town of South Queensferry, Westlothian, Scotland, hosts the ritual of the Burryman. Accounts vary as to its origins.

Popular opinion now is divided between explaining Burry as meaning covered with burrs, or as a corruption of ‘burgh’. The whole festival, Burry-man and Fair together, is supposed to commemorate the great event in the history of the burgh, which is also recorded on the town seal, namely the crossing of the Firth of Forth and landing at South Queensferry by Margaret, wife of Malcolm Canmore. It is once clear that whatever may be true of the Fair, the Burryman procession belongs to a stage of belief much older than Queen Margaret (11th century). The derivation from ‘burgh’ may certainly be dismissed as arising out of the connection with Queen Margaret . . . I would . . . therefore suggest that the ceremony of the Burryman is a relic of an early propitiatory harvest rite. [Isabel A. Dickson, F.-L., XIX. (1908), pp. 379-387.]

Legends aside, there is nothing about the Burryman that puts one in the mind of imperial homage. No, to look into the face of the Burryman is to look back deep into time, to stare into the eyes of the harvest god herself. Anyone with doubts need only to be reminded of the particular attention paid to traditions surrounding the creation of the Burryman's yearly costume.

A later account says: ‘The annual perambulations of the “burgh man” or “burryman” over the burgh’s marches took place at Queensferry in excellent weather . . . The burryman is a man or a lad loosely clad in flannels, stuck all over with the well-known adhesive burrs of the Artinus Bardana (the Burr Thistle of Burns, but in reality not a thistle but a burdock). These burrs are found in considerable profusion at Blackness Point . . . A few plants grow in the neighborhood of New Halls Point, and beyond the rocks of the opposite shore on North Queensferry . . . and from all these, and even more remote places are they gathered . . . so essential are they deemed for the maintenance of this unique ceremony. [Allex Porteous, The Town Council Seals of Scot. (1906), p. 254]

To some, the Burryman of Queensferry conjures up spooky, Wicker Man-like images of pagan townspeople who were somehow able to keep the Old Ways alive, through 1000s of years of Christian onslaught and destruction.

The custom in 1938, at date Aug. 11: Shortly after seven o’clock in the morning, the ‘Burry Man’, helped by his two assistants . . . began the laborious process of dressing. Clad in flannels, he had hundreds of burrs or burdocks stuck into his dress, and the final effect was that of a man in chain armour. Two sacks of burrs were required to cover his legs, arms, and body, and a mask also covered with burrs obscured his face. On his head he wore a helmet covered with all sorts of summer flowers, such as roses, sweet peas, and marigolds. Thus arrayed, the ‘Burry Man’ and his assistants paraded every part of the burgh, and visited every home with a message of greeting. According to tradition good luck follows the visit of the ‘Burry Man’ . . . He was led through the streets by his assistants, and accompanied by hundreds of children singing the traditional rhyme, ‘Hip, hip, hooray; the “Burry Man’s” Day.’ This custom is a prelude to the annual Ferry Fair, which is to be held today. It is said to be a survival of ancient nature worship, the ‘Burry Man’ . . . a representation . . . of the god of the harvest, and the name an expression of hope for a bountiful harvest. [The Scotsman, Aug. 12tth, 1938, cutting by David Rorie, M.D.]

But the reality is, in some ways, even more unsettling.

There is some difference of opinion amongst the local children as to how scary the Burry Man is. To some he is a comic figure, whereas to others (including a girl now in her twenties) the first sight of the Burry Man is enough to "scar you for life". Yet more of the town's children dole out the sage advice not to look into his eyes - presumably it brings bad luck. [http://rbg-web2.rbge.org.uk/celtica/Burry.htm]

Like Christmas and Easter before it, the ritual of the Burryman has long been stripped of its pagan context and, true to colonial patterns, it has been turned back in on itself to devour the meanings it once stood for. A ritual once clearly tied with the perpetuity of life cycle is freely remade to mock the very principles it once stood for.

It is difficult to pinpoint what is most unnerving about the ritual of the Burryman. Is it his bizarre, Frankensteinian appearance? The black-green furry moonsuit, the flowers growing ball-like out of his waist and eyesockets, and the silly floral tophat. If only he looked a little more like us. Perhaps it is his demeanor: weighed down by the heavy, scratchy burrs, he can only move at a zombie-slow pace, bearing his strange burden in eerie silence. Or maybe, it’s his fate of having to pass doorto-door and stoically accept whatever libations (water? whiskey? Isopropyl rubbing alcohol?) are offered/foisted upon him. Trusting the local villagers will respect and honor his responsibility.

After describing the burrs adhering to the flannel covering, Miss E. J. Guthrie reports that the man’s head as well as the tops of two staves grasped with extended arms were beautifully decked with flowers: ‘while the victim . . . is led from door to door by two attendants who . . . assist in upholding his arms by grasping the staves. At every door a shout is raised and the inhabitants come forth and bestow kindly greetings and donations of money . . . It is, or used to be a popular belief that the giving up of this custom would be productive of misfortune on the town. [Old Scot. Customs (1885), pp. 34f.]

Yet many folks see him as a green fuddy-duddy, a remnant of a who-cares-what-past, a curious heirloom passed down through the generations like your dead Great-grandpa’s glass eye. Those who see him as a quiant relic, a boogey man to scare children, miss the complexity of this troubling figure. The Burryman's uncanny presence reminds us of how much we have lost, and how far removed we are from those forces which sustain our lives. All around us, there are loud, clear signs that we are already living in an apocalypse: icecap-melt floods the low countries, wetlands are redesignated as parking lots, and genetically-engineered corn wreck genetic havoc-- but somehow we can’t fathom the importance of honoring a bountiful harvest. Or the outcast.

More information about South Queensferry and the Burryman can be found at the homepage of the Queensferry History Group.

Michael Row

A Burdock-Covered Outcast