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Anita Hunt of Nita Joy Craft Design has very kindly written us a guest post about the plants and flowers associated with some of the counties and countries of the UK.

Flowers and plants are used in so many ways throughout our lives.

They mark a variety of occasions such as the celebration of births and weddings, and the remembrance of someone’s life. And many of us love adding plants to our gardens, and protecting our wildflowers.

Many flowers have a meaning, and the language of flowers is also known as floriography. The significance of flowers doesn’t stop there, as they are also associated with country and county emblems.

England

The Tudor Rose has always represented England.

The Tudor Rose signifies the coming together of the red rose emblem for Lancashire and the white rose of Yorkshire after the War of the Roses ended in 1495, and Henry VII from Lancashire married Elizabeth, daughter of Edward IV of Yorkshire.

Scotland

Scotland’s flower emblem is the thistle as it is common throughout the country.

There are many stories about why the thistle was chosen for their emblem, one being that it dates from the 1263 Battle of the Largs. The story says that when the Norwegians took off their shoes, so as not to wake their Scottish enemies, they did not realise that beneath their feet was the painfully sharp thistle. Their cries of pain woke the Scottish army who won the battle.

Ireland

Northern Ireland (part of the UK) and the Republic of Ireland are represented by the shamrock, which is a three leaved plant similar to the clover. The shamrock is also known as Wood Sorrel.

This plant’s story is that St Patrick used it to explain the Trinity from the Christian religion – the three leaves represent the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit.

St Patrick’s Day is celebrated on the 17^th March each year and it is common to wear a shamrock in honour of this day.

In the USA, in towns and cities with a large Irish population, St Patrick’s Day is widely celebrated and many places have parades.

The phrase ‘In clover’, which has been previously mentioned by Angela in her series on English idioms, is also associated with the shamrock’s meaning.

The shamrock is also associated with many mystical stories and often linked with the Irish Leprechaun.

 Wales

Wales’ emblems are the leek and the daffodil. These represent St David’s Day which is celebrated on the 1^st March each year, in honour of the Welsh patron saint St David.

The leek was seen as a vegetable that would promote health and happiness and so became an important symbol for Wales.

The importance of the daffodil is relatively recent compared to the leek: it was introduced as an emblem after being a part of ceremonies in the 1900’s.

County flower emblems

Some counties in the UK are historically linked with their chosen flower; for example the red rose, whose historical significance to the county of Lancashire dates back to the middle ages.

This particular flower emblem was also chosen quite recently, in 2002, to unofficially represent the United Kingdom.

To gain an insight into various flowers representing particular counties and countries the international wild plant conservation charity Plantlife ran a competition for members of the public to nominate a wildflower for their county flower emblem.

The Plantlife competition is a fascinating read. The results of the competition highlight areas of special interest, with flowers and plants particularly associated with a given area. Dorset and Cornwall, for example, are famous for their heath so this was chosen as their counties' wildflower emblems.

To see a further list of the chosen wildflowers for various counties in the UK, please visit Plantlife’s website.

What flower or plant emblems do you have for your county or country?

Guest post by Anita Hunt from Nita Joy Craft Design – specialising in personalised cards and floral gifts

 You can follow Anita on Twitter @NitaJoy

 Read Anita’s blog: Handmade greeting cards

 Images © Anita Hunt

The phrase nineteen to the dozen refers to something that is happening very fast, or moving very quickly.

If someone is talking nineteen to the dozen they are talking very quickly, so quickly that they say 19 words where normally only 12 would be spoken.

Examples of use:

1. She was so excited about passing her exam. She was talking nineteen to the dozen and I could hardly understand a word!

2. The car accident gave me such a shock. My heart was going nineteen to the dozen.

Some people believe that this phrase has its origins in eighteenth century Cornish tin mining. (Cornwall is a county in the south-west of England)

Cornish beam engines were introduced to reduce flooding in the mines, and they pumped out 19,000 gallons of water for every 12 bushels of coal needed to operate the engines – a much faster and more efficient way of pumping water than the hand pumps they replaced.

If you would like to learn more about Cornish tin mining, the BBC Nation on Film site has some clips of archive film about Cornish tin mines, including interviews with Cornish tin miners.

In the UK on the 14th February, many people will be showing their love for each other by sending Valentine cards, chocolates and flowers, or maybe by writing a poem or a love letter.

The British Library holds the oldest known Valentine’s message written in English. It was written in 1477 by Margery Brews to her fiancé John Paston.

It's believed that the first recorded Valentine card was sent by the Duke of Orleans in 1415. He is said to have written messages of love to his wife from his prison cell.

The tradition of exchanging Valentine gifts is said to have started in the later Middle Ages (the period of European history from approximately AD1000 to 1500), when it was believed that the 14th of February marks the beginning of the mating season for birds, and so the day became associated with love and romance.

It is not certain who the Saint Valentine associated with Valentine's Day was. He might have been a Roman priest and Christian martyr executed during the rule of Claudius II the Goth; or he might have been Valentine, Bishop of Turni, who was martyred in Rome.

Phrasal verbs, idioms and sayings for Valentine's Day

Chat up To chat up somebody (or chat somebody up) is to talk to them in a flirtatious way to show you are attracted to them, and to try and make them interested in you.

Get together If people get together they meet so they can spend time together and do something together.

Eat out To eat out is to eat away from home, at a cafe or restaurant. Many people eat out at a restaurant on Valentine's Day.

Hit it off If you hit it off with someone you quickly get on very well with them.

Pair off To pair off is to start a romantic relationship.

Go out with To go out with someone is to have a romantic relationship with them.

Fall for If you fall for someone you fall in love with them.

Fall head over heels in love To fall head over heels in love with someone is to fall in love with them very suddenly, and with great intensity.

Pour out If you pour out your feelings to someone you tell them everything about how you are feeling.

Settle down When two people settle down together they set up a life together and perhaps get married, buy a house and start a family.

Move in together To move in together is to start living with someone else – usually someone you are having a romantic relationship with.

Live for If you live for somebody they are the most important thing in your life.

Wear your heart on your sleeve If you wear your heart on your sleeve you are very open about your feelings for someone, and show everyone how you are feeling.

Lovebirds If two people are clearly very much in love with each other they are often called 'the lovebirds'. Lovebirds are small parrots that are well known for showing great affection to their mates.

How do people celebrate Valentine's Day around the world? I would love to hear about Valentine's Day traditions in your country.

Image of flamingoes by Kjunstorm

Image of couple in love by Candida.Performa

Burns’ Night is celebrated on the 25th January every year and is a celebration of the birth date of Scottish national poet Robert Burns (1759 – 1796).

Robert Burns was the son of a farmer. He is said to have had a ‘fondness for the ladies’, and he was an enthusiastic promoter of human welfare and social reform.

The Robert Burns Humanitarian Award is presented annually to a group or individual who has “saved, improved or enriched the lives of others or society as a whole, through personal self-sacrifice, selfless service, ‘hands on’ charitable/volunteer work, or other acts.” The winner receives 1759 guineas – 1759 being the year of Burns’ birth, and guineas being the currency then in circulation.

Robert Burns wrote much of his greatest poetry and songs in his native Scots language and his works have had a significant influence on keeping the Scots language alive. For example, there are people all over the world who sing Burns’ Auld Lang Syne (1788) on New Year’s Eve:

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And auld lang syne?

For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne.
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

Did you know that after Queen Victoria and Christopher Columbus, Robert Burns has more statues dedicated to him around the world than any other non-religious figure?

Burns Supper
Burns’ Night is traditionally celebrated with a Burns Supper. This tradition is said to have been started by a few close friends of Robert Burns, who met for dinner on the fifth anniversary of Burns’ death to celebrate his life and works. The evening was such a success that they agreed to meet again the next year, and so the tradition of holding a Burns Supper to celebrate Robert Burns’ life was born.

Burns Supper food
Typical menus for a Burns Supper include cock-a-leekie soup (chicken and leek), haggis with neeps (turnip or swede) and tatties (mashed potatoes), and, for desert, Typsy Laird (sherry trifle).

A haggis is like a large sausage and is sheep’s stomach filled with minced sheep’s heart, liver and lungs, and onion and oatmeal. If you would like to try making one for yourself, here is a traditional haggis recipe

A haggis:

At a traditional Burns Supper the Haggis is brought in on a silver platter, in a procession of people which includes the chef and a piper. Guests stand to welcome the Haggis and clap to the music. A reader reads out Address to a Haggis in an entertaining way, then cuts the Haggis and holds it up high, and the guests applaud enthusiastically!

Address to a Haggis:

Address to a Haggis (1786)
Here’s part of Robert Burns’ poem about the haggis, in Scots dialect:

Address to a Haggis
Fair fa’ your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o the puddin’-race!
Aboon them a’ ye tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye wordy of a grace
As lang’s my arm.

This is the standard English translation

Fair is your honest cheerful face,
Great chieftain of the pudding race!
Above them all you take your place,
Stomach, tripe or intestines:
Well are you worthy of a grace
As long as my arm

And here is a translation into Czech:

Tvá oblá tvář je čarovná.
je tváří vůdce, chuti tvé
se maso, drůbky nerovná
a co jich jest!
Ty králem jsi všem pokrmům
na věky čest!

(Translated by Stanslav Kostiha)

You can read the whole poem in Czech on the Burns Night Prague web site. Do you know of any translations into other languages?

Listen to Address to a Haggis, read by actor John Gordon Sinclair.

Try our Burns’ Night word search
Use your mouse cursor to highlight the words you find.

Homecoming Year
2009 was Scotland’s first Homecoming Year, and the year consisted of a calendar of events marking the 250th anniversary of Robert Burns’ birth and celebrating all things Scottish.

Image of a thistle (the national emblem of Scotland) by foxypar4
Image of a haggis by roland
Image of Address to a Haggis by madmack66

Today, 30th November, is St. Andrews’ Day in Scotland in the UK.

St. Andrews' Day is the official National Day in Scotland, and in 2006 was designated an official bank holiday by the Scottish Parliament.

St Andrew is the patron saint of Scotland, and also Greece, Russia and Romania. He was one of Jesus Christ’s Twelve Apostles, and is thought to have been a fisherman like his brother Simon Peter (Saint Peter).

St. Andrews’ Day is an opportunity for people around the world to celebrate Scotland’s culture and heritage. The 2009 celebrations are intended to be the biggest and best yet, with a spectacular programme of activity because this year St. Andrews Day is also a key part of the finale weekend of the Homecoming Scotland year.

2009 is Scotland’s first Homecoming Year, and the year has consisted of a calendar of events marking the 250^th anniversary of Scottish poet Robert Burns’ birth and celebrating all things Scottish.

Homecoming Scotland 2009 and the Scots Language

There is some disagreement over whether Scots is a language in its own right, rather than one of the ancient dialects of English. Some believe that it is the ‘English of Scotland’, a part of General English; others that it is a Germanic language as distinct from English as Swedish is distinct from Danish.

Its relationship with the English of England has been compared to Frisian in the Netherlands, which is dominated by Dutch, and Norwegian which was once dominated by Danish.

Scots vocabulary overlaps with English, but Scots has words that are absent from Standard English. Some words are shared with dialects of Northern England, others are unique to Scotland.

Distinctive Scots vocabulary comes from a variety of sources, including Old English, Old Norse, French, Dutch and Gaelic. * Here is some text written in Scots (from the Homecoming Scotland web site), with the partial English translation below it:

Scots

“Hamecomin Scotland 2009 is a year-lang leet o events tae celebrate aw that’s guid aboot Scotland. 2009 is the anniversary o the birth o Scotland’s maist kenspeckle makar, Robert Burns. Jine us tae merk Burns’ birthday, Scottish contributions tae gowf, whisky and Scotland’s muckle minds and innovations forby. Whither ye bide faur awa or doon the road, come hame tae oor ain unique cultur and heritage. In 2009, come hame tae Scotland.”

English

“Homecoming Scotland 2009 celebrates the 250th anniversary of Robert Burns’ birth. We’re also celebrating some of Scotland’s great contributions to the world: golf, whisky, great minds and innovations and Scotland’s rich ancestry and culture.” **

Try their Think You Know Scots? quiz with words like fankle, ramgunshoch and genty

Find out more about the Scots language from the Scots Language Centre or listen to Scots language on the Scots Language Centre’s channel on YouTube.

St. Andrews Day fans are invited to join the online World Wide Ceilidh, where you and a partner can upload your photos, put on a kilt and a sporran, and dance a Scottish reel! The kilt and sporran are part of Scottish national dress – see the photo above.

St. Andrews’ Day Traditions

Across Europe, in parts of Germany, Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, and Romania, there are superstitious beliefs that a woman’s future husband can be revealed on the night before St. Andrews’ Day.

From the Homecoming Scotland site: “In some parts of the Czech Republic and Slovakia, young women would write down the names of potential husbands on little pieces of paper, and stick these into little pieces of dough, called Halusky. When cooked, the first one to float to the surface of the water would reveal the name of their future husband.

In Poland, it is popular for women to put pieces of paper (on which they have written of potential husbands) under the pillow and first thing in the morning they take one out, which reveals the name of the future husband.” **

Do you have any St. Andrews' Day traditions in your country? I'd love to hear about them.

Photo of Scottish piper by SteveWagner / Hyun Hee Jeong

* Oxford Companion to the English Language

**© 2008 EventScotland

A soap opera is a television or radio programme about the lives of a group of people that is shown every week, or sometimes several times a week. Soap operas are usually quite sentimental and melodramatic accounts of a permanent cast of characters’ daily and personal lives.

They are also known as ‘soaps‘.

The term was first used around 1935 and they are referred to as soap operas because the original sponsors were soap manufacturers.

sponsor (noun) an organization or person that pays towards the cost of an event or activity.

Two very popular English television soap operas are Eastenders and Coronation Street

Image by dailyinvention

Everyone who applies to become a British citizen, or who applies for indefinite leave to remain in the United Kingdom, must demonstrate their knowledge of English language and of life in the UK, in one of two ways:

• they can take a special English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) course which includes learning about citizenship;
• or they can take the Life in the UK test.

The test is written at ESOL Entry Level 3, and proves your understanding of English at Entry Level 3, as well as your knowledge of life in the UK. If you pass the citizenship test there is no need to take a separate test to prove your understanding of English.

The Life in the UK test is normally taken in English but if you take your test in Wales or Scotland it’s also possible to take it in Welsh or Scottish Gaelic.

The test covers topics such as:

• migration to Britain
• the changing role of women
• religion
• customs and traditions
• British constitution
• The UK in Europe and the World
• housing
• money
• health
• education
• leisure
• and employment.

There are 24 randomly selected questions. You have 45 minutes to take the test, and the pass mark is 75%.

Example questions / things you need to show knowledge of:

• What are the differences between the Council of Europe, the European Union, the European Commission and the European Parliament?
• In the European Parliament, how many seats are available for representatives from the UK?
• How many people in the UK belong to an ethnic minority and which are the largest minority groups?
• How many people say they have a religion and how many attend religious services? What are the largest religious groups?
• What and when are the Patron Saints’ Days of the four countries of the UK?
• What are the ages of compulsory education? How does this differ in Northern Ireland?
• At what age do children go to secondary school? How does this differ in Scotland?
• How long can overseas driving licences be used for in the UK?
• What types of jobs can children NOT do? What are the limits on working hours and times for children?

How many could you answer correctly?

The free official practice citizenship test closely resembles the sort of questions you could expect in the actual test, and at the end of the practice test you’re awarded a Pass or Fail grade.

The official test handbook from the Home Office, Life in the United Kingdom: A Journey to Citizenship, contains all the information you need to know for the test and also has a useful glossary of keywords and phrases. There’s also an accompanying study guide, and question and answer book.

For more information on how to apply for naturalisation, or on how to apply for indefinite leave to remain, visit the Home Office UK Border Agency web site.

Image of Houses of Parliament and Big Ben, London by **Maurice**

Remembrance Day is held every year on the 11th November.

The Great War, or World War One, came to an end on the Western Front on the 11th November 1918 when the Armistice (a suspension of hostilities or truce) was signed between Germany and the allies of WW1; although fighting continued in other areas.

At 11am on the 11th day of the 11th month a two minute silence is held as a sign of respect. People remember and think about the people who died during WW1 and all the wars since.

This mark of respect was started by King George V, and the first two minute silence was held in November 1919.

Ceremonies of remembrance are held across the UK, with the national ceremony held at The Cenotaph war memorial in London. The national ceremony is attended by the Queen, and other members of the Royal Family, with representatives from the Royal Air Force (RAF), Army, Royal Navy and Merchant Navy, and politicians.

War veterans parade past the Cenotaph and wreaths of poppies are laid on the memorial.

A poem by Laurence Binyon, For the Fallen, is often read out during remembrance ceremonies. The fourth stanza is the most famous:

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.

Remembrance Day is sometimes called Poppy Day. In the days leading up to Remembrance Day people wear poppies to commemorate those who died in war. Fields of poppies were the only thing to grow on the devastation of the battle fields of the Western Front during WW1. The sight of them blooming in abundance at Flanders, Belgium, inspired Canadian soldier John McCrae to write his poem In Flanders Fields:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below. We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields. Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields.

In response to McCrae's poem, American Moira Michael started the tradition of wearing and selling poppies as a sign of remembrance. The first Poppy Day in the UK was held on November 11th 1921.

The poppies are sold to raise money for the Royal British Legion's charitable work to provide care and support for service and ex-service people, and their families.

See this BBC News article for the Dos and don'ts of poppy etiquette; including when to start wearing one, what colour to wear, and where to pin it.

Try this Remembrance Day word search

Image of poppies by david.nikonvscanon

Image of Cenotaph by Matt From London

English is spoken in more than 60 countries in the world and, according to some figures, is used by more than 1 billion people.

Many varieties, accents and dialects of English exist worldwide.

English accents in the UK

The UK is a relatively small country, but we have a surprising variety of English accents and dialects.

Visitors and immigrants who have learned to speak English abroad can find the range of dialects and accents in the UK confusing, and some accents difficult to understand.

Areas of the UK with distinct accents include Scotland, Wales and Ireland; the counties of Cornwall, Yorkshire and Norfolk; and the cities of Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Newcastle, Birmingham, Belfast and Dublin. And these are just a few examples, so you begin to get an idea of the wide variation in English pronunciation across the UK.

Immigrants to the UK, or students residing here temporarily to learn English, are very likely to learn to speak English with a specific accent, depending on their location in the UK.

Many students tell me they want to learn to speak ‘English English’ (as opposed to American English, for instance) – they are often surprised to learn just how many variations of English accent exist here in the UK.

You can hear how pronunciation varies across the UK with recordings of modern and old dialects, received pronunciation and minority ethnic English pronunciation, on the British Library Sounds Familiar? web site.

English dialects in the UK

Generally speaking, English accents are varieties that differ only in terms of pronunciation: for instance, Standard English can be spoken with a regional accent, whereas English dialects differ in terms of pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary.

However, the distinction is not always clear-cut and there is much debate about how many non-pronunciation features (grammar, vocabulary, idiom) it takes before an accent becomes a dialect.

Regional dialects of the UK include those of Orkney, Shetland, Glasgow and Edinburgh, Wales (where the dialect is strongly influenced by the Welsh language), and Ireland where we have:

• Anglo-Irish used by the descendants of English settlers;
• Ulster Scots – the speech of the descendants of 17c Protestant Scots settlers;
• and Hiberno-Irish spoken by usually Catholic people whose ancestral tongue was Gaelic.

These are just a few of the many English dialects in the UK.

Listen to English dialects

You can listen to 288 extracts of English dialect from the Survey of English Dialects, a nationwide survey of the vernacular speech of England, undertaken by researchers at the University of Leeds. You can search for dialects by county or date.

English accents and dialects are discussed on the BBC's Radio 4 radio programmes Routes of English. You can also hear examples of the accents and dialects on these shows.

How much does accent and dialect vary in your country and in your language?

Image by psd

The Gunpowder Plot

In London, England, on the 5th November 1605, a group of Catholic extremists planned to kill the Protestant King James I and his Protestant government by blowing up the Houses of Parliament.

However, a search of the cellars below Parliament found Guy Fawkes ready to set light to 36 barrels of gunpowder, smuggled in by Fawkes and his co-conspirators.

Guy Fawkes was arrested and then tortured for four days in the Tower of London. He and his co-conspirators were all sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered (the penalty for treason). Guy Fawkes escaped this gruesome punishment by leaping to his death from the gallows.

King James declared that bonfires should be lit every 5th November to celebrate the failure of the Gunpowder Plot.

Bonfire Night

Bonfire night is celebrated on the 5th November in the UK, and in some former British colonies such as South Africa and New Zealand, and parts of the Caribbean.

In the UK, people light huge bonfires and set off fireworks. The fireworks represent the blowing up of the Houses of Parliament planned by Guy Fawkes.

Effigies of Guy Fawkes (the Guy) are burned on top of the bonfires. The Guy is a model of a man made out of old clothes stuffed with straw (or more old clothes). Traditionally, children would walk the streets with their Guy, asking for a “penny for the guy” for buying fireworks. This tradition is not as common as it used to be: perhaps because it’s no longer legal for children to buy fireworks in the UK.

Traditional Bonfire Night foods in the UK

Traditional Bonfire Night foods include potatoes wrapped in foil and baked in the fire, roast chestnuts, sausages and marshmallows cooked over the flames, and Parkin cake – a lovely sticky mixture of oatmeal, syrup and ginger.

Bonfire Night word search (highlight the words with your mouse cursor)

Image by drew_anywhere