Every Day Is Special: September 29 - Michaelmas Day in the Orkney Islands

Posted on September 29, 2019

Today is a holiday that is called, in some places in the world, St. Michael's Feast or St. Michael's Day. In the United Kingdom / British Isles, it's Michael's Mass, or Michaelmas.

(Notice the likeness of this name to Christ's Mass, better known as Christmas.)

The British Isles includes not just Ireland and the main British island that can be divvied up into England, Scotland, and Wales; it also includes the Isle of Man, the Hebrides, the Orkney and Shetland Islands, Anglesey, and the Channel Islands. Oh! And the one Scottish island I've been to, Arran! All together, there are more than 6,000 British Isles!

(Of course, many of them are small.)

I have already written about Michaelmas Day on the Isle of Skye, which is one of the Inner Hebrides islands; today I'm going to explore a more northern group of islands, the Orkneys.

Eating goose was so popular on Michaelmas Day - after Queen Elizabeth I proclaimed she would eat goose on that holiday, to celebrate England's defeat of the Spanish Armada - that some people call it Goose Day! Another favorite Michaelmas treat was a special scone-like cake called St. Michael's Bannock.

Basically, Michaelmas is a recognition of the turn of the seasons. Harvest is done or nearly done. Blackberries have all been picked. Most flowers are gone - just the late-blooming Michaelmas Daisy still brightens slopes. A chill is setting in - especially in the northernmost parts of Britain, including the Orkneys. The days are getting shorter and shorter - again, the difference is way more noticeable farther north, in the Orkneys, than it is in, say, London. Also, the clearer-skies part of the year will be soon ending, and mostly cloudy skies are about to set in.

By the way, there is so much wind in the Orkneys, plus such wild wind-driven waves, that 103% of electric power needed by the population is from wind- and wave-power!