Wednesday 20 November 2013

Another interesting jewellery destination - Isle of Man


I just sold a happy pair of earrings to another interesting place!  Last week it was Iqaluit, Canada, in the Great White North, and this week it's the Isle of Man!

I don't know much about the Isle of Man... except that I had a co-worker that was from there.  And living there involves ferries.  It's also where Manx cats are from... and the Manx language, which I believe no longer has any native speakers.

So off I go to learn a bit and share about this latest interesting place...

[as an aside, what should I call these posts about  interesting places I sell to?  I need a catchy name - any suggestions would be appreciated!]

So in case you didn't know, the Isle of Man is an island between Britain and Ireland in the Irish Sea.  It's a 'British Crown Dependency' which means it's sort of governed by the UK, but mostly does it's own thing.  It's not considered part of the UK though.  It was so confusing when I was studying for my life in the UK test about which countries made up the UK, and that this was different than Great Britain, and this was different from The British Isles, etc etc... and the crown dependencies like Jersey and Guernsey. And the Isle of Man. It's all very confusing, I don't know if British people get it either.

The Isle of Man has a very long history and a good chunk of prehistory - it seems to have been inhabited since 6500 BC, back in the good ol Bronze age, which makes it nice and interesting.  I like the Bronze age, they had some nice mounds and things :)  Apparently it was never part of the Roman empire either, which is interesting.

The Isle of Man's capital is Douglas, and is home to under 100,000 people.

The Isle of Man's capital, Douglas

My research shows I was right and the last native speaker of the Manx language died in 1974 - but luckily, it was well recorded, there even being a Bible written in Manx, and it is being revived in the media and in communities.  Hooray!  Manx is a Celtic language so it is closly related to Irish and Scottish Gaelic.

...Oh my gosh, have you seen the Manx Loaghtan Sheep??  They have four, or sometimes SIX horns!!  That's amazing!  Six horns!  It's like something out of a fantasy novel! There's some crazy things I learn when learning about these different places.  I have to go just to see these sheep!

Crazy Isle of Man sheep

I went to look if any famous people come from the Isle of Man, and whaddya know!  The BeeGees are from there!  Who knew.

Know we all know a fair bit about the Isle of Man.  I hope you enjoyed this post!


1 comment:

  1. Great post! I went there on a school biology trip in the 70s..all I can recall was a very cold and windy beach where we learnt about lichens! Lizzie

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