SUPERSTITIONS IN SCOTLAND
The animals, birds and nature feature a lot in British superstitions. So, people mention " touch wood "or "knock on wood" for luck.
On the other hand, if you carry a rabbit's foot, around your neck, it will bring you good luck. It's
what people call "a lucky charm". A charm is an object that brings good luck. So a
rabbit's foot is a charm that brings good luck to the person carrying it.
Besides there are a few more British superstitions involving nature.
Dr Paul
Walton, from the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, spoke to the BBC
about some superstitions surrounding birds in Scotland. He is talking
about seagulls and the traditions associated with them.
So, according to Dr Walton, there are superstitions that are associated with gulls in
Scotland.
Partly it must be because Scotland's such a fantastic place for birds,
these superstitions have developed because these are the living things that have shared their
lives with. For example, there's a long tradition in Scotland among sailors and fishermen
of seeing the gulls that follow the boats as actually being the embodiment of dead sailors,
and to kill a gull is still in many places considered to be very back luck.
He says sailors and fishermen consider it very bad luck to kill a seagull
because gulls are the embodiment of dead sailors. So here it means that
the seagulls have given physical bodies to the spirits of dead sailors – they're
the embodiment of the dead sailors. So, it's bad luck to kill a seagull in Scotland because they're the embodiment of
dead sailors. Let's listen to another bird superstition from Scotland.
Paul
Walton again talks about another of his favourite superstitions. So, listening bird noises people can identify which bird he's talking
about. What people should do when hear its call. For example, if people hear a cuckoo calling and
then they start to run away from it as quickly as they can, the number of times they hear the
cuckoo calling before it fades into silence is the number of years they have got left to live.
http://wsdownload.bbc.co.uk/learningenglish/pdf/2011/08/110810111323_6min_english_superstitions.pdf
People can find cuckoo clocks in Switzerland, Germany and Austria, with the
cuckoo making a distinctive cry every hour, but in Scotland, if people hear the cuckoo calling then they should run away from
it as quickly as they can. The number of times they hear the cuckoo is the
number of years they have got left to live.
So surely they should walk away very slowly – then they'd hear more
calls and live longer.
