In the vast expanse of sea between Scotland and Norway lies the archipelago of Shetland, a 70-mile-long tangle of rock and cliff which provides home and livelihood for some 17,000 British citizens. Shetland is the northernmost part of Britain.
Though politically British, these people are first and foremost Shetlanders, who have never forgotten that Shetland once belonged to the Norsemen of Scandinavia until it was pawned to the Kingdom of Scotland as part of a thoroughly dubious marriage settlement 501 years ago.
This is the story of one midwinter month in the life of these unique islands – January 1970; a month which began with snow, continued with storm and ended in a strange almost miraculous calm; a month which culminated in the great Viking fire festival of Up Helly Aa, when 700 torchmen marched through the streets of Lerwick and the great longship Ormrinn Langi perished heroically in a gigantic funeral pyre.
Clip taken from Tuesday Documentary: Shetland – Britain’s Farthest North, originally broadcast on BBC One, 19 May, 1970.
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