Long after Shetland was annexed to Scotland, trade and friendly intercourse continued to be carried on with Norway and other countries across the North Sea. Dutch and Flemish fishermen also frequented the islands, and established a considerable trade, exchanging foreign produce for fish and articles of native manufacture. There was regular communication with Bergen, Hamburg, Bremen and other Continental ports; and people from Shetland often travelled to Scotland and England by way of the Continent. As time went on, more direct communication was established with Scotland by means of sailing vessels. Trade was carried on by these till the advent of a steamship in 1836, when the paddle-boat Sovereign began to ply between Granton and Lerwick once a fortnight—afterwards once a week—calling at Aberdeen, Wick and Kirkwall. At the present time four steamers regularly arrive from Leith or Aberdeen each week during summer. One of these makes a weekly trip to Scalloway and ports on the west side. Lerwick is the port of call on the east. In addition to these, another of the North of Scotland Company’s steamers does the coast-wise trade on the east side and to the North Isles.
A Busy Day at Victoria Pier, Lerwick
All goods, mails and passengers to and from Scotland are carried by this company’s steamers. The imports consist of meal and flour; tea, sugar and butter; feeding-stuffs for cattle; and the miscellaneous articles that form the stock-in-trade of the draper, the grocer, the ironmonger, and the general merchant’s store in town and country. The exports include eggs, dried and fresh fish, wool, hosiery, sheep, ponies and cattle, and cured herrings. Timber is brought direct from Norway. Coal, salt and empty barrels are imported in specially chartered vessels.
14. History
Little is known for certain of Shetland in early times. If by Thule, visited and described by Pytheas of Massilia, the ancients meant Shetland, then the first mention of the islands in our era is when Tacitus, telling of Agricola’s fleet in 84 A.D. says “Dispecta est et Thule,” assuming that it was really part of Mainland that the sailors descried in the dim distance. Irish missionaries christianised the natives in the sixth and seventh centuries. The nearness of the islands to Norway naturally led to visits from the Viking raiders and finally to conquest and settlement by them in the ninth century. The Norsemen found two races of people—the Peti or Picts, and the Papae, descendants of the Irish missionaries. Whether these were exterminated or absorbed by the invaders is disputed; but Christianity disappeared before Odin, Thor and other Scandinavian deities.
For several centuries after this, the history of Shetland is hardly separable from the history of Orkney, and that has been already narrated.[3] Though both groups of islands formed one earldom, Orkney was the predominant partner. Shetland received scant attention except as a recruiting ground for fleets or armies. From 1195 to 1379 Shetland was disjoined from Orkney; and, while the latter came more and more under Scottish influence, the former remained under Norse. It was during the period of separation that Norse influence impressed itself most strongly on Shetland.
Norse Shetland had its Althing or Parliament, meeting on the holm in Tingwall Loch under the presidency of the Foud. Each district had its lesser Thing (as Aithsting, Nesting) and its under-Foud, who selected Raadmen or Councillors, and was assisted by the Lawmen or Legal Assessors. The Lawrightman superintended the weights and measures—an important office, since rents and duties were paid in kind. The Ranselman was a kind of parish constable.