Rembrandt in Gaelic

The five National Galleries of Scotland are in talks to promote multilingual appreciation of their famous works. No bad thing, one might assume. Isn’t it about time that British galleries boasting works by Canaletto, Koons and Rembrandt started printing signs that reach out to people from beyond our Anglophone shores?

Unfortunately, it isn’t the French or Italians to whom the doyens of Edinburgh’s finest artistic establishments are hoping to make friendly overtures. No, the tens of thousands of global visitors that flock to the fair city for its wonderful festivals may be greeted by an altogether more perplexing text: that of Scots Gaelic.

The only people likely to be more puzzled by this than the international art crowd are Scots themselves. The last census found that fewer than 2 per cent of the 5m people who live in Scotland speak Gaelic. A Scottish government survey of languages spoken by schoolchildren found Gaelic ranked eighth, with 626 speakers, behind Punjabi, Urdu and Polish.

Meanwhile, according to reports, a survey of the galleries’ staff concluded there was “no evidence for demand from members of the public for services and information to be provided in Gaelic.” No doubt those attempting to stoke patriotic sentiment will view the hundreds of thousands that the initiative could cost as money well spent. Others, though, might be puzzled to see a whole series of logos and texts rolled out across Edinburgh in a tongue that has no historic roots in the city.

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