How the Scots Invented the Modern World
“So many misconceptions surround the terrible “clearing,” or eviction of tens of thousands of Highland residents from their ancestral lands by their landlords, that it is worth taking time to get the story straight.
The most outrageous misconception is the charge that somehow the English were really to blame. In fact, the principal instigators of these mass evictions were the Highland chieftains themselves, and their Scottish farm managers or “factors.” In fact, some of the aristocrats who were ...most sentimentally attached to the traditions of Highland culture, such as the Chisholms of Strathglass and Alistair MacDonnell of Glengarry, were the most remorseless evictors. In their minds, they had little choice. Faced by an increasingly competitive agricultural market, and the need to liquidate enormous debts (Glengarry’s alone amounted to more than eighty thousand pounds, with yearly rents of less than six thousand pounds), chieftains looked for ways to make the land pay. This meant rewarding farmers who could afford higher rents, for example, or specialists in cost-effective agriculture, such as sheep and cattle farming.MoreLess
The most outrageous misconception is the charge that somehow the English were really to blame. In fact, the principal instigators of these mass evictions were the Highland chieftains themselves, and their Scottish farm managers or “factors.” In fact, some of the aristocrats who were ...most sentimentally attached to the traditions of Highland culture, such as the Chisholms of Strathglass and Alistair MacDonnell of Glengarry, were the most remorseless evictors. In their minds, they had little choice. Faced by an increasingly competitive agricultural market, and the need to liquidate enormous debts (Glengarry’s alone amounted to more than eighty thousand pounds, with yearly rents of less than six thousand pounds), chieftains looked for ways to make the land pay. This meant rewarding farmers who could afford higher rents, for example, or specialists in cost-effective agriculture, such as sheep and cattle farming.MoreLess
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