46 Fun Facts About Robert Burns

Robert Burns was born in which Ayrshire village, near the town of Ayr?

Alloway: Burns later set the witches' dance of 'Tam o' Shanter' in the village's ruined old kirk, where his father lies buried.

Which woman, a Kirkoswald tenant farmer's daughter, was Robert Burns's mother?

Agnes Broun's household included an old woman whose tales of ghosts, fairies and witches, Burns said, cultivated the seeds of his poetry.

The cottage where Burns was born was built by his father in 1757 from what materials?

Clay and thatch: after the family moved out, the cottage became an ale house, and it stayed one until trustees bought and restored it in 1881.

In 1780 Burns and his brother Gilbert founded a debating society in their local village known as what?

The Tarbolton Bachelors' Club made Burns its first president, and one early debate asked whether a poor farmer should marry a rich plain girl or a charming penniless one.

In July 1781, aged 22, Burns was initiated into which fraternal order?

The Freemasons of his lodge later received a farewell song from Burns, written in 1786 when he believed he was about to leave Scotland.

Jean Armour, whom Burns married in 1788, belonged to a group of local girls known as what?

The Belles of Mauchline were warned in a Burns song to beware of 'Rob Mossgiel', a warning Jean Armour ignored: she bore his twins in 1786.

In 1786 Burns accepted a plantation book-keeper's job in which colony before his poems kept him home?

Jamaica: he hoped the book would earn enough to pay his passage, and the post meant helping to oversee enslaved workers on sugar plantations.

Which woman, Burns's 'Highland Mary', may have exchanged Bibles with him in 1786?

Mary Campbell died at Greenock that October, and three years later Burns wrote the poem now called 'To Mary in Heaven' in her memory.

Burns's first book, Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, was published in 1786 in which town?

Kilmarnock: country readers and Edinburgh critics alike hailed the book, and that November Burns set out for the capital to be lionized.

In Burns's poem 'To a Louse', the poet spots the louse crawling on a lady's what, in church?

Bonnet: the sight moves the poet to wish we all had the gift 'to see oursels as ithers see us'.

In 'The Twa Dogs', from his first book, the dog Luath was modelled on Burns's own pet of what breed?

Border Collie: Burns took the name Luath from Cuchullin's dog in Ossian's Fingal, as his own footnote to the poem explains.

Which painter's 1787 portrait of Burns was engraved as the frontispiece for the Edinburgh edition of his poems?

Alexander Nasmyth painted it at his publisher's request, and decades after the poet's death he painted Burns again, full-length.

In his letters to Agnes 'Nancy' McLehose, Burns signed himself with which pen name?

Sylvander paired with her 'Clarinda', and their parting in 1791 inspired his song 'Ae Fond Kiss'.

Burns contributed enthusiastically to which song collection produced by Edinburgh engraver James Johnson?

The Scots Musical Museum soon had Burns as its virtual editor, yet he took no fee for the songs he gave it.

After Edinburgh, Burns took a 1788 lease on which Dumfriesshire farm beside the River Nith?

Ellisland's exhausted, stony soil made farming a struggle, yet it was there that Burns wrote 'Tam o' Shanter'.

Alongside farming, Burns trained for and in 1789 was appointed to which government job?

Exciseman: the post meant riding some 200 miles a week, on top of labouring in his own fields.

Burns wrote 'Tam o' Shanter' chiefly for which antiquarian's 'Antiquities of Scotland'?

Francis Grose, Gilbert Burns recalled, agreed to print a drawing of the local haunted kirk if Burns would give him something to go with it.

In 'Tam o' Shanter', what is the name of Tam's grey mare?

Meg outruns the witches, but the one leading the chase grabs her tail, and she escapes with barely a stump left.

In 'Tam o' Shanter', who is playing the bagpipes at the witches' dance in the haunted kirk?

The Devil, 'auld Nick' in the shape of a big black shaggy dog, pipes for the dancers, until Tam's shout of praise plunges the kirk into darkness.

Tam o' Shanter escapes the witches because, in the old belief, they cannot do what?

Cross running water: Burns called it a well-known fact that no evil power can pursue anyone beyond the middle of a running stream.

Which tea clipper is named after the short shirt worn by the witch Nannie in 'Tam o' Shanter'?

Cutty Sark is Scots for 'short shirt', and Tam gives himself away by shouting 'Weel done, Cutty-sark!' at the dancing witch.

Which John Steinbeck book takes its title from a line by Burns?

Of Mice and Men borrows from 'To a Mouse', where Burns counts the mouse luckier than himself, since only the present touches her.

According to his brother Gilbert, Burns composed 'To a Mouse' while doing what?

Still holding his plough, Gilbert said, and in the poem Burns apologises to the mouse that man's dominion has broken nature's social union.

Which J. D. Salinger novel's title comes from misreading Burns's 'Comin' Through the Rye'?

Holden Caulfield imagines himself catching children before they fall off a cliff.

Which singer-songwriter named Burns's 'A Red, Red Rose' in 2008 as the lyric that most affected his life?

Bob Dylan named it in HMV's 'My Inspiration' campaign; Burns had first given the words to Edinburgh composer Pietro Urbani, who printed them in 1794.

Burns's 'A Man's a Man for A' That', written in Dumfries, drew on the ideas of which political writer?

Thomas Paine's Rights of Man shaped its ideas of equality, and the song was sung at the opening of the devolved Scottish Parliament in 1999.

Burns's 'Scots Wha Hae' (1793) is a speech by which Scottish leader before Bannockburn?

Robert the Bruce is the speaker, but Burns told his publisher he was also stirred by freedom struggles 'not quite so ancient', seen as a nod to radicals of his day.

The music now sung to 'Auld Lang Syne', attached to the words in 1799, is best described as what?

A pentatonic folk melody: the English composer William Shield seems to have quoted a similar tune in his 1782 comic opera Rosina.

The tune of 'Auld Lang Syne' served as the national anthem of which country until 1972?

The Maldives: Mohamed Jameel Didi set his anthem's words to the tune after hearing it chime on his uncle's clock, and a new melody replaced it in 1972.

Burns's 'Address to a Haggis' favours the dish over the cuisine of which country?

France: the poem sneers at fashionable French ragouts and fricassees, and boasts that a haggis-fed rustic makes the earth tremble at his tread.

At a Burns supper the haggis is traditionally served with 'neeps and tatties', meaning what?

Swede and potatoes come later: first, whoever recites the address cuts the haggis open on cue from the poem.

The Scots-language thanksgiving usually said before the meal at a Burns supper is known by what name?

The Selkirk Grace is said to take its name from a dinner at St Mary's Isle, where the Earl of Selkirk asked Burns to say grace.

Burns's friends held the first Burns supper in July 1801 to mark what?

Five years since his death: nine close friends met at Burns Cottage, shared a meal and performed his work.

In his last weeks, Burns waded into which firth, hoping for a cure?

Solway: he stayed at Brow, a hamlet on its shore whose well was once believed to have healing powers.

What is thought to have been the underlying cause of Burns's early death?

A bacterial infection, possibly from a tooth abscess, may have made it worse; tales of heavy drinking are thought exaggerated.

In 1787 Burns sold the copyright of his poems for 100 guineas to which Edinburgh publisher?

William Creech was so slow to settle that Burns was kept hanging about Edinburgh for eight months waiting for an account of his money.

The real 'Holy Willie' of Burns's satire, William Fisher, held which church post?

Kirk elder: the satire followed the kirk's failed attempt to censure Burns's friend Gavin Hamilton, and in it Willie begs God to punish Hamilton.

In a 2009 STV poll for greatest Scot, Burns narrowly beat which historical figure?

William Wallace lost narrowly, though Burns once said the story of Wallace, read as a boy, poured a Scottish prejudice into his veins.

Which country was the first in the world to honour Burns with a commemorative postage stamp?

The Soviet Union issued it in 1956, where Samuil Marshak's Russian translations had made Burns a much-loved poet of the people.

The Bank of Scotland's 2007 £5 note shows which 'Tam o' Shanter' bridge?

Brig o' Doon also lent its name to Lerner and Loewe's Broadway musical Brigadoon.

In 1985 a crater named in Burns's honour was designated on which planet?

Mercury: the IAU names its craters after artists, musicians, painters and authors recognised as significant figures for more than 50 years.

Burns's use of Scots followed Allan Ramsay and which Edinburgh poet who died in 1774?

Robert Fergusson lay in an unmarked grave in Canongate Kirkyard until Burns won permission to put up a headstone and paid for it.

The Edinburgh literati patronisingly labelled Burns with what phrase, downplaying his education?

Heaven-taught ploughman came from Henry Mackenzie's 1786 review in The Lounger, and Burns had invited it by playing down his education in his own preface.

Which Dumfries tavern did Burns call his 'favourite howff'?

The Globe Inn was where Burns etched verse onto one of the windowpanes.

Burns's first child, a daughter, was born in 1785 to which woman?

Elizabeth Paton was a servant on the family farm, and when their daughter was born Burns greeted her with a poem of welcome.

Burns is generally classed as which kind of poet, an influence on Wordsworth, Coleridge and Shelley?

His themes ranged from republicanism and anticlericalism to poverty, sexuality and Scottish identity.