Coracle

Welcome to my 21st April post on something to do with the writing of Before Beltane. 

In Before Beltane, there is a scene where Nara is engaged in teaching younger acolytes the skills of tracking and hunting. To reach the particular woods where they might encounter a suitable deer to kill for their Imbolc Festival, they have to go to the far end of the Lochan of the Priestesses. I haven’t indicated exactly how large the lochan is, but it's sizeable enough for them to use a coracle to return to the Islet of the Priestesses. Though I haven't mentioned it in the text, the implication is that to return by boat is a shorter duration than them walking along the shoreline, or cutting a way through the fringing woods. I write this blog post after my final Before Beltane publishing files are meant to be done and dusted, but now realise that my concept of them returning in a single coracle together, along with a small deer carcass, would need a coracle big enough for three people plus the deer. Alternatively, I still have the opportunity to change the eBook files to indicate 3 coracles are waiting for them for their return journey. 

Today, I’ve looked at the possibility of there being a larger coracle used in southern Scotland 2000 years ago. From previous research, I knew that coracles were not always constructed for just one person. The challenge was to find evidence of larger ones. A secondary challenge was, what changes in design might require to have been made to the woven willow structure, with a ‘waterproofed’ hide covering, to enable more people to be floated in it?

There’s sufficient archaeological evidence for the historical use of a coracle type-boat in Southern Scotland. The word coracle is an English spelling of the Scottish currach, or the early Welsh cwrwgl. It was originally a small rounded boat, with a very lightweight framework of interwoven willow. Animal skins would originally have been used as a covering, with a waterproof coating of some sort of fatty substance like a natural resin from sheep wool. In more recent centuries, and I mean well-beyond the year 71 AD that I write about, the use of coracles for small scale fishing in Scotland was still quite common.

Coracle design is adaptable but does need to conform to the circumstances the vessel might be used in. Whether circular or more oval in shape, the flat bottom is necessary to spread the load, so if a coracle needed to ferry three people plus a cargo of some sort then the diameter or oval would need to reflect the required composite weight balance on the water. Also, the depth of the water the vessel is plied on was an important factor for the builder of the coracle to take account of.

Indian coracle

Unlike a rowing boat, a coracle was designed to move through the water by arm power alone, to minimise disruption to the water below so that the movement created was a float, rather than a more disruptive displacement of water.

In Before Beltane, just imagine that the coracle was made big enough for around four priestesses to be transported over the water...or alternatively three one-person coracles. 

Happy Reading.

Slàinte!

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Britons_with_coracles_-_from_Cassell%27s_History_of_England,_Vol._I_-_anonymous_author_and_artists.jpg

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Indian_coracle.jpg