THE baking of sour cakes on St. Luke’s Eve is an
ancient custom peculiar to the burgh, and is supposed to have had an
origin anterior to Christianity itself, but if so, it must have borne
some other name, as the present one is decidedly post-Christian. Mr.
Hugh Macdonald, author of Rambles Round Glasgow, who witnessed
this curious spectacle fully forty years ago in the Thistle Inn of
Ruthergien, describes it as follows:-
"This mystic baking requires for its proper execution
the services of some six or eight elderly ladies. These, with each a
small bake-board on her knee, are seated in a semicircle on the floor of
the apartment devoted to the purpose, and pass the cakes, which are
formed of a kind of fermented dough, in succession from one to the
other, until the requisite degree of tenacity is attained, when they are
dexterously transferred to an individual called the queen, who with
certain ceremonies performs the operation of toasting. These cakes,
which we have often tasted, are generally given to strangers visiting St
Luke’s Fair. They are somewhat like a wafer in thickness, of an
agreeable, acidulous taste, and lend an additional relish to the drams
usually in extra demand at such times—the more’s the pity. The lover of
old customs would regret the discontinuance of this curious ceremony,
the observance of which forms an interesting link between the present
age and an impenetrable antiquity."
St.. Luke’s Fair in November, and the Beltane in May,
are the two principal of the seven fairs which are held on the main
street of the burgh annually, and which generally attract considerable
crowds of buyers and sellers from all parts of the country. They are
famed for the display of horse and cattle. The Clydesdale breed of
horses, which has attained such a well-deserved celebrity for its
excellent qualities, may be seen exposed in greater numbers and in
greater perfection at the Rutherglen fairs than at any other market.
