Living on an island is different. In The Apprentice Tattoo, Col, and Albyn are part of the Hill Clan of the Tribe of the West. The clan that is responsible for the stone circle at Classac (Callanish).
They are insular people, interacting with their neighbours, but mostly self-reliant.
Growing their own food is a must, for who knows what would be available to trade if they ran out. They’d have reared their own meat and grown grain for bread, but what of the things that weren’t available?
Leather would come from the hides of cattle and wild prey, but what about stone tools? The stone on Lewis is largely Lewisian Gneiss, a stone that would not lend itself to making blades. So you need that paragon of stone-age life, flint.
Looking at the map, we only find flint in certain parts of Britain. The Sussex and Surrey Downs, Chiltern Hills, and Yorkshire Wolds are flint rich areas, but they could hardly be further from the Western Isles for people who travelled by foot or boat. So trade routes existed, but how reliable were they?
In today’s worldwide economy, goods come from all over the globe but are still limited by transport. We see it every year, here on the Isle of Lewis; the weather is bad, the freight ferry does not sail, and people rush to the supermarkets to buy up essentials.
Two or three stormy days, two or three failed sailings, and there is no bread, no milk, no meat or vegetables. People won’t starve, but it’s inconvenient.
They did transport flint, for pieces have been found on the islands. Big lumps of flint are heavy to carry or to transport. So did they trade the smaller finished tools instead? A good knife is essential to anyone living the lives our ancestors knew. An axe for felling trees, tools for working wood, scrapers for leather making, all came from off the island.
Crossing the Minch, the stretch of water between Lewis and the mainland, would have been a daunting task to all but the most experienced of sailors. Modern ferries are capable of carrying massive payloads. The MV Loch Seaforth boasts it can carry 143 cars and 700 passengers. Neolithic people had wooden dugout vessels, or perhaps skin boats. They’d have used the winds to travel, no doubt, but the winds here are fickle, liable to change in a moment.
A person making that journey might be back in a few days or may disappear for months until another sailing was possible.
With a simple diet, the islands were reasonably self-sufficient right until the 1940s, perhaps even into the 50s. There would have been mutton and fish, potatoes, oats, and kale. Milk from the cow gave crowdie, a traditional soft cheese, and there’d have been home-made butter for the oatcakes.
Could we live like that now? I doubt it. We’re too fond of imported foods and, especially, sweet things, which would have been a rarity years ago.
I’d be quite happy with the diet from 1940s Lewis. Would you?
D J Eastwood
The Apprentice Tattoo 