I WAS intrigued by Alison Rowat’s opinion piece on "Scottishness" ("Listen here in Scotland: just who do you think you are?", The Herald, August 9). I too, wonder what this term might mean. Scotland only became a country when unified by force, by a king, I can’t remember which one. In those days though, there was a north-south divide which, arguably, still exists. There are many divides, in fact, both geographical and social, though mostly we see ourselves as "Scottish".

When I attempted to support the England football team, in my Inverness local, the other week, I found myself in a minority of one, as Belgium’s goals were cheered in a "get it up you" kind of a way. Good- natured banter? I just saw it as the bigotry of "little Scotlanders". So I don’t want to belong to your country; the one that hates the English, hates Catholics, Protestants, Muslims, Poles, or anyone else who doesn’t look, or sound, like "us"

My Scottishness, for what it is worth, is cultural. I have a large Scots vocabulary and can write in broad Scots, and speak Scots words, although I’m not sure I can talk fluently in the "mither tongue". It has taken me most of my life, however, to realise what a gift these words are to me.

I have an English friend who has decided he is Scottish, because he now lives here. To me, if you grew up in England, of English parents, you are English, even if your uncle did play for Partick Thistle. He doesn’t understand my Scots, and he watches the football on BBC Alba, with the sound turned down. He doesn’t even read a Scottish newspaper. But, if we become independent, he will be a Scot.

Lastly, I don’t think "Scottishness" has anything to do with class. One of the most influential people in my life was a female Scottish academic at St Andrews University, who spoke with a clipped English upper-class accent. I would never have dared to suggest to Kay MacIver that she wasn’t a Scot.

Martin Russell,

22 Assynt Road, Inverness.

RODDY MacDonald's letter about Scottishness made me think of my definition of being a female 60-plus Scot. Mine is the memory of having one of those ruched elastic swimsuits which I got when I was about four and was still expected to wear it at 14. The embarrassment at Pencil Point Beach still lives with me.

My friend from Shetland remembers as a child sporting her Shetland wool home-knitted swimsuit in the Northern Isles' sub-Arctic waters. She said it grew every time she came out of the water and weighed a ton. To this day she doesn’t have any leg hair as removing the swimsuit was an agony in itself. Aye, no wonder we are made of tough stuff.

Linda FitzGerald,

Dalerb, Killin.