First girls join Lerwick’s Up Helly Aa jarl squad after male-only rule axed

Jenna Moar and three cousins will be first female full members of Viking-dressed squad that will lead annual fire festival

Jenna Moar will win a small place in history next week, marked by the sizzling sound and heat of her flare being lit in the darkness of a January night in Lerwick, Shetland. Moar, 16, wearing her handmade Viking warrior's uniform, will be among the first female participants, alongside three cousins, at the heart of one of Scotland's most famous cultural events, Lerwick's Up Helly Aa fire festival.

After decades of quiet complaints, covert attempts at subversion and then open rebellion from feminist Shetlanders, she and her cousins are full members of the jarl squad, the axe-wielding Viking-dressed celebrants who will lead Up Helly Aa on Tuesday.