It was customary in North Uist and other places to hunt seals towards the end of autumn, since they were put to use in many ways. The meat was eaten, and seal oil and skins were also used.
In the book Òrain Iain Mhic Fhearchair (Oliver and Boyd, Edinburgh, 1938), in which he writes about the poet Iain MacCodrum of North Uist, the distinguished scholar William Matheson states that there were many old stories in North Uist about seals, and especially about their relationship with the MacCodrum family. Clann Mhic Codrum nan Ròn (“the Seal MacCodrums”), for example, was what the people to whom the poet belonged were called.
It was said that seals were the children of the King of Norway under enchantment, and William Matheson relates how this came about according to oral tradition:
“According to the story, they had a wicked stepmother who was jealous of them because of their nobility and beauty, and she went away to study at the Black School for seven years and seven days. She then returned home and laid spells and curses upon them, that they would never again be fish nor beast, and that their desire for the sea would be when on land, and their desire for land when at sea, for as long as waves should strike the shore. Some versions of the story say that human form would come upon them three times each year, at the full moon.”
William Matheson also tells a story associated with this song:
“Once, a group of young men were hunting seals on Heisgeir. They killed many and spent the whole day rendering the blubber of the largest seals. When night came, they went into their bothy and began preparing seal meat for food. Then they heard a mournful voice singing outside on a skerry.”
And it was this song that the voice was singing.