Sark Community

First impressions count for much.  For many visitors to Sark this is a sense of pride and the rich heritage of the island. The island community spirit is legendary.

As befits a small and isolated community, Sark is renowned for hosting a variety of unique events throughout the year.

In addition to the traditional religious holidays, Sark commemorates the liberation of the island from the German occupying forces on 10th May every year. This often attracts special guests and visiting dignitaries to Sark including Her Majesty the Queen and HRH Prince Charles.  Members of The Royal British Legion and the Chelsea Pensioners are also annual visitors.

Rustic French names sit alongside the one single solitary blue, British post box; granite farm houses with tiny front doors are often guarded by overgrown, second World War relics combined in an intriguing jumble of European influences. The islands’ strategic position has certainly stamped them with the indelible mark of history.

The islands became part of the Duchy of Normandy in 933 AD and records reveal some Channel Island names in the Norman invasion of England in 1066. Islanders still joke that it is one of their oldest possessions, but the British monarch continues to hold the title of the Duke of Normandy in the islands: a living legacy of William the Conqueror.

When King John lost Normandy in 1204, Sark suddenly found itself in the front line against France. The island may have made the momentous decision to side with the English Crown but, until three generations ago, English was a minority language in Sark. Variations of Norman French were still the lingua franca even during the inter war years of the twentieth century and Sark’s own tongue – Serquiaise – was only recently committed to the page. Like most regional languages, it was used and shaped by generations that could neither read nor write. In an age of rudimentary education and without mass communication, the people of Guernsey, Jersey, Alderney, Herm and Sark all spoke quite different forms of the language. If that was not enough, local variations of Serquiaise were spoken within the island itself, with residents of Little Sark easily identifying with the residents of the main island, whenever they needed to communicate.

Don’t be surprised if the people of Sark seem different but strangely familiar. Even French speakers struggle with islanders’ illogical pronunciation of place names, whilst UK visitors savour their blend of traditional Britishness mixed with the steadfast independence of a Norman fisherman.  A true Sarkee is neither English nor French, but fiercely proud of his little island and delighted to welcome everyone to what Victor Hugo described as:

“…that corner of the Norman land where live the noble people of the sea, the petit isle de Sercq”.

Community events occur on Sark throughout the year. These all serve to emphasis our proud and independent sense of community. Please see the monthly events calendar on the Visit Sark website via the link on this page.