Also called first foot, qualtagh, pódariko, mekvle
The first visitor to cross the threshold after midnight on New Year sets the household's luck for the year, so they arrive with gifts of coal, bread, salt and drink.
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Take care: Offer non-alcoholic drinks to drivers and children, and be careful handling coal near an open fire or carrying it around fabric.
On the Isle of Man the first person met on New Year's morning was called the qualtagh. As in Scotland, a dark-haired man was the luckiest, while a red-haired or fair visitor, or a woman, was feared to bring trouble in some districts.
Greek families choose a child or a lucky, kind person to be the first to enter on New Year's Day, stepping in with the right foot first. Sometimes a pomegranate is smashed at the threshold so its seeds scatter good fortune into the house.
In Georgia the mekvle is the first guest of the new year, chosen ahead of time for a warm character. They bring sweets and gifts and their luck is believed to colour the household's year.
Hogmanay grew into Scotland's main midwinter holiday after the Reformation discouraged Christmas, and first-footing became its central house custom. The first-foot ideally was a tall, dark-haired man who was not already in the house at midnight. People often explain the preference as a memory of fair-haired Viking raiders, but that story is a later guess. Some districts barred doctors, ministers or gravediggers from the role because of their links with sickness and death.
F. Marian McNeill recorded the custom across Scotland in the third volume of The Silver Bough, published in 1961, including the gifts and their meanings. The practice faded in cities in the late twentieth century as people went out to public celebrations, but it remains alive in many families. Similar first-visitor beliefs exist from the Isle of Man to Greece and Georgia.
A loaf and a little salt carried into a new home or offered at its door, so the household will never go hungry and life there will keep its savour.
A cross woven from fresh rushes on St Brigid's Eve and hung in the house and byre to guard against fire, hunger and harm for the year ahead.
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