Freuchie
Encyclopedia
Village
A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet with the population ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand , Though often located in rural areas, the term urban village is also applied to certain urban neighbourhoods, such as the West Village in Manhattan, New...
in Fife
Fife
Fife is a council area and former county of Scotland. It is situated between the Firth of Tay and the Firth of Forth, with inland boundaries to Perth and Kinross and Clackmannanshire...
, Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
, at the foot of the Lomond Hills
Lomond Hills
The Lomond Hills , also known as the Paps of Fife lie in the centre of Fife, Scotland. At 522m West Lomond is the highest point in the county of Fife.-Natural geography:...
, and near Falkland
Falkland, Fife
Falkland is a town and former royal burgh, formerly known as the Parish of Kilgour c1300AD in Fife, Scotland at the foot of the Lomond Hills.According to the 2008 population estimate, the village has a population of 1,180.- History :...
. The nearest major town is Glenrothes located 4 miles to the south.
The name derives from the Scottish Gaelic, fraoch, meaning heather
Heather (name)
Heather is a popular English and Scottish given name for girls. It simply means "heather" from the English word for the variety of small shrubs with pink or white flowers which commonly grow in rocky areas. It is derived from Middle English hather. Heath can be used as a male given name...
.
This Fife village is not to be confused with the old location of the same name in Morayshire (now in the Highland Council Area) upon which the new town of Grantown was built in the 18th century.
Freuchie was once used by the Royal family as a place of banishment from the Court when it was in nearby Falkland Palace
Falkland Palace
Falkland Palace in Falkland, Fife, Scotland, is a former royal palace of the Scottish Kings. Today it is in the care of the National Trust for Scotland, and serves as a tourist attraction.-Early years:...
. The Scots
Scots language
Scots is the Germanic language variety spoken in Lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster . It is sometimes called Lowland Scots to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language variety spoken in most of the western Highlands and in the Hebrides.Since there are no universally accepted...
saying "awa tae Freuchie an eat mice" was thought to come from this time.
Freuchie Cricket Club
Freuchie Cricket Club
-Brief History:Situated in the Fife village of Freuchie , Scotland, the Club was formed in 1908, and with some disruption in the war years, has been going strong ever since...
is best known for having won the village cricket
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
championships at Lord's
Lord's Cricket Ground
Lord's Cricket Ground is a cricket venue in St John's Wood, London. Named after its founder, Thomas Lord, it is owned by Marylebone Cricket Club and is the home of Middlesex County Cricket Club, the England and Wales Cricket Board , the European Cricket Council and, until August 2005, the...
in 1985. This is considered particularly unusual as Scottish teams are not generally prominent in the game.
On 13 August 2008, a number of locations throughout the village were affected by flooding, resulting in damage to homes and cars being written off by insurance companies. Many of the affected residents came together to form Freuchie Flood Action Group, a single action group dedicated to improving flood protection and prevention in Freuchie.