Editing May Day (section)

===Scotland===
[[File:Beltane Festival 2019 Procession of the May Queen 02.jpg|thumb|[[Beltane Fire Festival]] in Edinburgh, Scotland, 2019]]
May Day has been celebrated in [[Scotland]] for centuries. It was previously closely associated with the [[Beltane]] festival.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/dost/beltane |title=Dictionary of the Scots Language :: DOST :: Beltane n. |website=dsl.ac.uk}}</ref> Reference to this earlier celebration is found in poem 'Peblis to the Play', contained in the [[Maitland Manuscripts]] of 15th- and 16th-century Scots poetry:

<poem style="margin-left: 2em;">At Beltane, quhen ilk bodie bownis
To Peblis to the Play,
To heir the singin and the soundis;
The solace, suth to say,
Be firth and forrest furth they found
Thay graythis tham full gay;
God wait that wald they do that stound,
For it was their feast day the day they celebrate May Day,
Thay said, [...]</poem>

The poem describes the celebration in the town of [[Peebles]] in the [[Scottish Borders]], which continues to stage a parade and pageant each year, including the annual 'Common Riding', which takes place in many towns throughout the Borders. As well as the crowning of a Beltane Queen each year, it is custom to sing 'The Beltane Song'.<ref name="tracscotland.org">{{Cite web |url=http://www.tracscotland.org/sites/default/files/May%20Songs%20and%20Rhymes_0.pdf |title=The Songs and Rhymes of May |website=Traditional Arts & Culture Scotland |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180215143738/http://www.tracscotland.org/sites/default/files/May%20Songs%20and%20Rhymes_0.pdf |archive-date=15 February 2018 |access-date=15 February 2018}}</ref>

[[John Jamieson]], in his ''Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish Language'' (1808) describes some of the May Day/Beltane customs which persisted in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in parts of Scotland, which he noted were beginning to die out.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.scotsdictionary.com/ |title=Jamieson's Dictionary Online |website=scotsdictionary.com}}</ref> In the nineteenth century, folklorist [[Alexander Carmichael]] (1832&ndash;1912), collected the song ''Am Beannachadh Bealltain'' (''The Beltane Blessing'') in his ''[[Carmina Gadelica]]'', which he heard from a [[Crofting|crofter]] in [[South Uist]].<ref name="tracscotland.org" />

Scottish May Day/Beltane celebrations have been somewhat revived since the late twentieth century. Both [[Edinburgh]] and [[Glasgow]] organise May Day festivals and rallies. In [[Edinburgh]], the [[Beltane Fire Festival]] is held on the evening of May eve and into the early hours of May Day on the city's [[Calton Hill]]. An older Edinburgh tradition has it that young women who climb [[Arthur's Seat]] and wash their faces in the morning dew will have lifelong beauty. At the [[University of St Andrews]], some of the students gather on the beach late on 30 April and run into the [[North Sea]] at sunrise on May Day, occasionally naked. This is accompanied by torchlit processions and much elated celebration.