History of Orkney

extinct Germanic language spoken in the Northern Isles of Scotland

attempted scuttling of the captured German fleet in 1919

Norwegian, then Scottish, noble title over the Northern Isles and northern Scotland

official status of the Orkney Islands

8th- to 15th-century historical period

Act of the UK Parliament governing land tenure in Scotland

Orcadians, also known as Orkneymen, are an ethnic group native to the Orkney Islands, who speak an Orcadian dialect of the Scots language, a West Germanic language, and share a common history, culture and ancestry. Speaking Norn, a native North Germanic language into the 19th or 20th century, Orcadians descend significantly from North Germanic peoples, with around a third of their ancestry derived from Scandinavia, including a majority of their patrilineal line. According to anthropological study, the Orcadian ethnic composition is similar to that of Icelandic people; a comparable islander eth