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Sunday 25 July 2010

Even More Fascinating Facts about the Ploughman Poet

Robert Burns (25 January 1759 – 21 July 1796) - known in Scotland simply as 'The Bard' - was a poet and lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated right around the world.

But did ye ken...?

Tarbolton Bachelors' Club was founded by Robert Burns on 11th November 1780 with seven companions. The rules, drawn up by Burns, stipulated that "Every man proper for a member of this Society, must have a frank, honest, open heart; above anything dirty or mean; and must be a professed lover of one or more of the female sex".

At a time when men of the peasantry cut their hair short, and the upper classes wore wigs or styled their hair as if they did, Burns "wore the only tied hair in the parish" according to David Sillar.

On 4 July 1781 Burns was initiated as a freemason, in St David's Lodge, Tarbolton, No. 174, and passed and raised on 1 October the same year. He was elected Depute Master of St James's Lodge on 27 July 1784, a position he held till 1788 when he removed to Dumfriesshire.

You can find out much more about the Ploughman Poet in Scottish Miscellany - Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Scotland the Brave, coming soon from Skyhorse Publishing.

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