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 It’s hard not to walk around Dunnet Forest without thinking of J.R.R. Tolkien: the trees sway and creak as you pass as if they were sentient, and groan hollowly, like an elderly whale complaining about modern popular music. One day scientists will decode the language of trees and they will record the voice of the forest and play it back speeded up many times: and a ghostly, eldritch voice will emerge from the speaker, saying, “Windy, isn’t it?”
It was mostly to escape the wind that we went for a walk in the forest on Saturday, a wild, blustery day. The wind had clearly taken its toll, for many trees had been uprooted and were lying at a drunken angle, as though God had decided in an idle moment to see if He could lay a forest the same way people lay a hedge. I always get lost in Dunnet Forest. The paths are never quite as I remember, and I think the trees shift about when no one’s looking, like those in Tolkien’s Old Forest. There’s no Old Man Willow at the heart of Dunnet, radiating malice, but I do keep hoping I’ll run into Old Man Mountain Pine, or Old Man Lodgepole.
There are always people in Dunnet Forest, too, walking dogs or just walking; attracted, I suspect, by the singular novelty of finding trees growing in Caithness. I read once that the Monty Python team took a flight across the Atlantic, and Terry Gilliam looked out the window and cried excitedly, “Wow, a whole bunch of water!” That’s Dunnet Forest—a whole bunch of trees.
In gansey news I have started the pattern. In a late change, I’ve decided to add chevron panels, three per side. For a gansey this size I just felt it would look better, add contrast, and be more fun to knit, but it was really just a hunch. And by a very happy coincidence it fitted the number of stitches at my disposal almost exactly, without the need to play around with the widths (note to beginners: this never happens). In the course of the next week I should finish the gussets and divide for front and back, by which point the pattern should be clearer.
Finally this week, I wanted to mention two gansey books. The first, just published, is Sheringham Ganseys by Rita Taylor, Lesley Lougher, Jan Hillier and Lisa Little, from the Sheringham Museum Norfolk Trust Ltd. It’s a cracking little book, meticulously researched, with black and white and colour photographs, patterns and social history combined, and a pleasure to pick up, dip into and read (at a sitting, as I did).
The other book is River Ganseys by Penelope Lister Hemingway, published by Cooperative Press. This came out a few years ago, and I should of course have mentioned it before, for which I can only apologise. (I got hold of a copy round about the time I became ill last year, and it just sort of got caught up in the general tide of badness that washed me away.) Anyway, this too in its different way is an essential purchase. It’s a staggeringly well researched book on knitting and ganseys (and river ganseys) in Yorkshire. Like Sheringham Ganseys it’s both a social history and a knitting book, setting the scene historically before discussing techniques and offering a wide range of patterns—the last quarter of the book (it’s over 200 pages) consisting almost entirely of patterns. It’s a shame that some of the photographs aren’t clearer but that doesn’t detract from its value and importance, surely the last word on its subject.
Even if you already have the books by Thompson, Pearson or Compton these new ones deserve a place on your bookshelf, and the authors are to be congratulated for producing such valuable contributions to the literature.
 Did you know that there’s an Archangel in charge of weather? Uriel, his (or her, or its) name is. And this is jolly useful information, because it’s always good to know who to blame. We’ve had a week of snow and ice, temperatures at or below freezing, and lethal, ungritted roads; then, just when some normality would have been nice for a change, the thaw arrived in the shape of gale-force winds and driving rain. I can’t help feeling that somewhere in heaven an archangel is sniggering nastily, like a seraphic version of Muttley.
When I was ill last year—exactly a year ago, as it happens—I found salvation in knitting: it gave me a focus and a creative outlet and a chance to sweat the poison gradually out of my system. It was a habit that’s been hard to break. But I’m knitting a little less intently now and finding time for other activities: and one of these is exploring the history of Caithness.
For instance, the name Caithness comes from the Old Norse Katanes, and means the Ness (or headland) of the Cats (named after the Pictish tribe who lived here before the Vikings, the Catti or Cat People). The Gaelic name is Gallaibh, which means the People Who Wear Sunglasses and Listen to Freestyle Jazz. (No, not really: the truth is rather sadder. It means, “Among the strangers”, i.e., the Norse—a whole history of dispossession captured in a single wistful name.)
The name of Wick derives from the Norse word for a bay or inlet, vik—as in viking (“a frequenter of inlets”). This is why “Wick Bay” alway gives me such pleasure, as it’s what’s called a redundant place name. These are names, usually in two or more languages, where all parts mean the same thing. My favourite is probably Bredon Hill (“Hill hill Hill”); but there are hundreds around the world. Loch Watten, just up the road from us, means “Lake Lake” (vatn is Norse for a lake); and of course there’s the classic River Avon (“River River”). Place names seem to accrue like sedimentary layers of rock, each one rich in history, myth and misunderstanding; just like people, really.
Sky at Night: Sirius and Orion over Wick Anyway, as I said, I haven’t been knitting as much, and not just because my hands have been so cold. Still, I’m up to about 12.5 inches above the ribbing. Many thanks to everyone who suggested measurements last week: I think we reached something of a consensus between us, and who knows?—in another week it will be time to think about gussettination; possibly even patterns. Be still my beating heart!
Finally, here’s another quirky wee factette about Caithness, which is (honestly) allegedly true: the first cart (as in horse and cart) ever to be used in the county didn’t arrive till 1785, imported from Fife. Before that they just slung panniers on their horses, those hardy little Highland garrons. Then, within a few years, heavy horses were being used. (Typical Caithness—putting the cart before the horse…)
 Sinclair Bay from Reiss Beach
 Since last week I’ve been thinking about fountain pens—specifically, what they represent, what they tell us about us as a species. They were of course designed as a basic tool, a means to an end, but have gradually evolved into things of beauty and elegance. The next time God, dismayed by the moral turpitude of humanity, ever considers destroying the world—accidentally stumbling across the Twitter feed of the President of the United States, perhaps—I think I should, on the off chance I am asked for my opinion, propose the fountain pen as exhibit A in the case for the defence.
 Ye Pens I have a dozen fountain pens which I’ve accumulated down the years. Most were bought as new, though as time has passed they have, like my taste in popular music, acquired a distinctly vintage air (as Grandpa Simpson says, “I used to be with it, but then they changed what it was; now what I’m with isn’t it anymore and what’s it seems weird and scary. It’ll happen to you!”). I buy pens to write with, not to look at, and my favourites are a vintage Parker 51, a Parker Sonnet, and a Waterman Phileas, all with fine nibs to suit my spidery archivist’s handwriting.
Ye Book And this is the curious thing: although I’m no calligrapher it gives me real pleasure to write with them, beyond the satisfaction of the thing I am writing. Just as it gives me pleasure to check the time on the scuffed old pocket watch attached on a loop to my belt—and to knit ganseys. Others may take pleasure in driving an old car that has character and style, or cooking a meal with the best utensils, or making things out of pieces of wood with fine chisels—but it’s all one. Carlyle described man as a tool-using animal, and he was right; but we’re also animals that delight in our tools.
A breezy day at Sarclet Meanwhile in gansey news I’m still knitting my way up the body. Sometimes it’s hard to feel I’m making any progress, other than doing a time-lapse with the photos on the blog. But even with just a couple of rows a night it soon adds up: I’m probably a fortnight away from starting the pattern. I’ve never knit a pullover this size before, so I’m going to have to research armholes and sleeves—if anyone has any standard measurements for a drop-shoulder jumper that measures 56 inches in the round, please let me know!
Incidentally, I wonder if other animals get the same sense of pleasure in using well-made tools as we humans do? Probably not apes: I’ve seen film of them using stone tools, but they always seem a bit preoccupied and out of their depth, like I do when I’m parallel parking. Dolphins, maybe—if scientists ever get footage of them hastily screwing the top onto a Mont Blanc Meisterstück fountain pen and hiding it out of sight under a rock, then I think the writing may, quite literally, be on the wall…
I fell into conversation this week with one of the young persons at work, who’d noticed that I use a fountain pen and wondered why. I explained that fountains pens were easier to write with than ballpoints, and cheaper (after the initial outlay—the cost being all in the nib) than felt-tips; and that this was just a cheap pen for work. What, she then asked, was the most expensive fountain pen I owned? “About £350,” I told her. Seeing her stunned look of disbelief, I told her with a smile that I’d once owned a hifi that cost more than my car. She stared at me for a long moment, then said, “What’s a hifi?”
Sometimes I think there should be a law against young people.
 Castle Sinclair Girnigoe The gloom lifted on Sunday so we went for a walk round the castle of Sinclair Girnigoe on Noss Head, just north of Wick. Temperatures had dropped below freezing overnight, so all the puddles were glittering with ice and even the muddy track was rock-hard, as though Elsa from Frozen had thought, Oh, the hell with it, and just gone back to bed with a mug of hot chocolate and a trashy novel, leaving the kingdom half-frozen. (Speaking of Frozen, you know you’re not the target audience for a movie when you find yourself wondering about the kingdom’s lack of a proper regency council and system of government instead of joining in the songs. I know: I really should “let it go…”)
Into the castle Like all the best castles, Sinclair Girnigoe has a splendidly bloody history. The most famous story tells that George, the 4th Earl, had his son imprisoned there in 1577: after seven years he decided to have this son killed, which he managed by feeding him salt beef but not letting him have any water; after a few days, not surprisingly, he died of thirst. (I’m not aware that there is any actual evidence to support this story which, as an archivist, makes me a little suspicious. But it says something about the earls of Caithness that it was the 5th Earl, not the 4th, who managed to earn the title “Wicked Earl George”…)
In gansey news I’m advancing resolutely up the body, though returning to work after the Christmas break has slowed me down. (Abraham Lincoln once described one of his generals after a heavy defeat as being “confused and stunned, like a duck hit on the head”—a pretty exact description of me last week.) Still, even with just a few rows each night, it all adds up to tangible progress.
Finally just a word of sympathy to all our readers on the eastern seaboard of the United States, currently experiencing extremes of cold and snow and ice; and in Australia, at the other extreme of soaring temperatures. To all those affected by adverse weather conditions, we hope you can stay temperate; and, above all, stay safe.
 Local wildlife – a blackbird
 First of all, a very happy New Year to all our readers. 2018 is an anniversary year for us, as it’ll be a rather astonishing ten years since we started the blog in its present form. (Ten years: mon dieu! As the saying goes, we’ve all passed a lot of water under the bridge since then…)
Right now we’re back in Wick after an extended Christmas break at the ancestral home, and as ever a journey of 600 miles has left me wiped out with something suspiciously like jet lag. There’s a poem by the great Japanese poet Matsuo Basho which, allowing for the shift in seasons, pretty much sums up how I feel: “Journey’s end – / still alive, / this autumn evening“.
 Snow on the Hills I do love Christmas, if only because it’s the one time of year when just about everyone behaves as if they’ve read the good bits of the New Testament and think it’s worth giving it a try, even if only for a few days. What does Christmas mean to me? Open fires, snow on the hills, carols on the radio, decorations, tinsel and a tree; The Muppet Christmas Carol on TV and Vaughan Williams’s Hodie playing through the speakers; something hot and spiced from the oven diffusing a scent of cinnamon and nutmeg all through the house; and of course the chance to meet up with friends and family. Which, as it happens, is as good a summary of the last couple of weeks as I can think of.
Tree I’m starting 2018 with a new project: an extra-extra-large gansey in Wendy’s aran/ natural yarn. It’s going to be 56 inches in the round, so at a stitch gauge of 7.75 stitches to the inch this comes to 434 stitches. The light-coloured yarn is a more sensible choice than navy for the long winter evenings. It’s a big project in every sense—those of you with a short attention span are advised to check back in, oh, sometime around Easter. (The pattern is Mrs Edwards’s Pattern No. 2: you’ll find it on page 135 of Michael Pearson’s revised edition. No cables, but simple and very effective, and hopefully suitable for a broad chest; assuming I don’t change my mind—again—by the time I reach the yoke.)
In parish news, I owe Judit an apology: just after we left on our Christmas break she sent me a picture of a very splendid gansey she’s knitted, with Christmas greetings to all our readers; the pattern combinations are of her own devising, and very effective they are: we weren’t able to include it before, so I hope it will serve as a New Year greeting instead. Many congratulations once more to Judit.
 Decorations Finally, our statistics show that about 100 people a day visit the website. I’m not much of a lad for New Year’s resolutions, having next to no willpower (as Bender says to the Robot Devil in Futurama, “Oh wait—I forgot you could tempt me with things I want”); so no promises. But we would like to thank everyone who reads and comments and contributes and makes Gansey Nation the walled garden of niceness that it is.
And so, here we are. Still alive this winter evening; still blogging. Happy New Year!
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It’s hard not to walk around Dunnet Forest without thinking of J.R.R. Tolkien: the trees sway and creak as you pass as if they were sentient, and groan hollowly, like an elderly whale complaining about modern popular music. One day scientists will decode the language of trees and they will record the voice of the forest and play it back speeded up many times: and a ghostly, eldritch voice will emerge from the speaker, saying, “Windy, isn’t it?”
