Published in Scotland Magazine Issue 8 on 17/5/2003.

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Scotland's fringe of gold (Fife)

GAVIN D. SMITH EXTOLS THE VIRTUES OF THE COUNTY OF FIFE, RENOWNED FOR ITS GOLF, ATTRACTIVE COAST AND RICH HISTORY

King James VI (1542 – 1625) wrote that his kingdom possessed “a fringe of gold on a beggar’s mantle”. The “fringe of gold” was a specific
reference to the coast of Fife. Indeed, the county has for centuries been known as ‘The Kingdom of Fife’, and its spirit of independence even
ensured its survival during local government reorganisation in the mid 1970s, when it was in danger of being submerged in neighbouring
Tayside. Today, the area is promoted by the Kingdom of Fife Tourist Board.

Even the most cursory glance at a map explains why Fife has for so long nurtured a spirit of independence. To the north it is bounded by the Firth of Tay, and to the south by the Firth of Forth. Before the creation of fixed links by rail and, later, road bridges, Fife was not too far from being an island.

The earliest physical connection between ‘the kingdom’ and the country to the north and south came with the construction of the Tay Bridge between Wormit and Dundee in 1878, and the Forth Bridge, which opened in 1890 between South and North Queensferry.

The first Tay Bridge famously collapsed one stormy night in December 1879. Seventy-five people perished when the train crossing it plunged into the waters below. The event was immortalised in the best-known of the poet William McGonagall’s spectacularly bad verses. The rail bridge was subsequently rebuilt, and in 1966 a road bridge, linking Newport with Dundee, came into operation.

In 1964 the Forth Road Bridge opened to traffic, removing th.....

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By Gavin D. Smith

Section : Regional Focus

Page number : 46