The Waverley Gazette

"Hansel Monday" - The first Monday after New Year, and Burns' Poem, 'An Old Farmer's New Year's Morning Salutation to his old Mare Maggie'

Happy New Year from Scotland! Gifts that are given at new year - 'the hansel'

We wish you and your family a very happy new year.

In this blog post we have taken a look at Robert Burns' poem that celebrated his horse, Maggie. In his poem Burns' celebrates his horse and the years of service Maggie has given him. He writes about giving Maggie a ripp of corn 'to hansel' in the new year.

Today people still 'first foot' a neighbour or family member or friend with a token gift of shortbread or coal. This tradition is centuries old but now symbolic of rural customs.

In various parts of Scotland, a sheaf of oats was a common first-footing present. On some occasions the sheaf of oats was the last sheaf of harvest. In other parts of Scotland, the last sheaf, with the grain, was mixed with the seeds for next year’s planting. Or it was fed to farm animals as a cure or charm, perhaps to ensure the animal’s fertility. It was the custom to give a token gift to mark the new year.

Burns' poem 'An Old Farmer's New Year's Morning Salutation to his old Mare Maggie' mentions the hansel, and confirms the custom of giving a hansel on new year's day, in Ayrshire in the eighteenth century.

Hansel – or Handsel - was a gift or token given at the beginning of the year or to mark an acquisition or the start of an enterprise, supposedly to bring good luck.

The first Monday after New Year was considered by many to be the first winter holiday of the year, and it was marked by the exhange of small gifts between family and friends, and from masters to servants. ('Hansel' is from an Old English word, and has roots also in Norse.)

“Whenever Burns has occasion,” says Hogg, our Ettrick Shepherd*, “to address or mention any subordinate being, however mean, even a mouse or a flower, then there is a gentle pathos in it that awakens the finest feelings of the heart.”

The Auld Farmer of Kyle has the spirit of knight-errant, and loves his mare according to the rules of chivalry; and well he might: she carried him safely home from markets, and triumphantly from wedding-brooses; she ploughed the stiffest land; faced the steepest brae, and, moreover, bore home his bonnie bride with a consciousness of the loveliness of the load.