Errock Brae
Errock Brae - meaning Summary
Satire of Religious Zeal
This comic, ribald poem narrates a speaker’s encounter at Errock brae with a zealous Cameronian preacher. In rustic Scots dialect the preacher’s sanctimonious behaviour and physical aggressions are described with bawdy humor, mixing religious paraphernalia and sexualized violence. The speaker treats the episode as both an assault and a satire: the preacher’s moral posturing is undercut by coarse bodily detail and the poem’s amused, irreverent tone. Reading centers on local landscape, sectarian tensions, and Burns’s use of comic realism to mock extreme piety and expose religious hypocrisy in rural life.
Read Complete AnalysesO Errock stane, may never maid, A maiden by thee gae, Nor e'er a stane o'stanin' graith, Gae stanin o'er the brae. And tillin' Errock brae, young man, An' tillin' Errock brae, An open fur an 'stanin' graith, Maun till the Errock brae. As I sat by the Errock stane, Surveying far and near, Up cam a Cameronian, Wi' a' his preaching gear. He flang the Bible o'er the brae, Amang the rashy gerse; But the solemn league and covenant He laid below my arse. But on the edge of Errock brae, He gae me sic a sten, That o'er, and o'er and o'er we row'd, Till we cam to the glen. Yet still his pintle held the grip, And still his bollocks hang; That a Synod cou'd na tell the arse To whom they did belang. A Prelate he loups on before, A Catholic behin', But gie me a Cameronian, He'll mow a body blin'.
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