buat

he muttered a Gaelic curse upon the unseasonable splendour of Mac-Farlane' s buat

1814 July 7, [Walter Scott], Waverley; or, ’Tis Sixty Years Since. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC:


timorsome

en-adj

timorsome (comparative more timorsome, superlative most timorsome)

more timorsome (comparative)
most timorsome (superlative)
timbersome (alternative)
timersome (alternative)
timmersome (alternative)

Maister Mordaunt , is as tender as ony man's in my degree ; but she is something of a timorsome nature , cannot abide angry folk

1822, [Walter Scott], The Pirate. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC:

(Scotland, dated) Easily frightened; timorous.


nainsell

From nain (from reanalysis of an own, mine own etc. as a nain, my nain) + sell, alternative form of self.

"Gin ye hae your appetite wi' you we'll eat, Mr. Montagu, for I'm a wee thingie hungry my nainsell (myself).

1902, William MacLeod Raine, A Daughter of Raasay:

Forsooth her nainsell lives by thift.

1806, Walter Scott, Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3):


parrock

From Middle English parrok, from Old English pearruc, pearroc (“clatrum, fence by which a space is enclosed, enclosure, enclosed land”), perhaps from post-classic Latin parricus (compare park). Cognate with Dutch perk (“flowerbed”), German Pferch (“pen, fold”).

James Broadbent did not wonder what Isaac Hartley was doing in the sodden parrock that lay behind Elphaborough Hall in the fading light of day […].

2017, Benjamin Myers, The Gallows Pole, Bloomsbury, published 2019, page 231:

(now chiefly Scotland, England regional) An enclosed area of land; a small field or a paddock.


runch

en-verb

runch (third-person singular simple present runches, present participle runching, simple past and past participle runched)

runches (present singular third-person)
runching (participle present)
runched (participle past)
runched (past)

(Scotland, transitive) To grind, as with the teeth; to crunch.


stanchel

(obsolete, Scotland, Northern England) A stanchion.


burian

burians (plural)
burien (alternative)
berien (alternative)

From Middle English bürȝen, from Old English byrġen, burġen (“burying-place, grave, sepulchre, tomb, burial”), from Proto-West Germanic *burginnju, from Proto-Germanic *burginjō (“burial”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰergʰ- (“to shelter, protect, save, preserve”). Related to Old English beorg (modern English barrow) and Old English byrġan (“to raise a mound, hide, bury, inter”). More at bury.

cog

(Now chiefly dialectal, Scotland) A tomb; sepulchre.

(Now chiefly dialectal, Scotland) A burial mound.

(Now chiefly dialectal, Scotland) A camp; hill-fort.


feeze

feezes (plural)
fease (alternative)
feaze (alternative)
feese (alternative)
pheese (alternative)
pheeze (alternative)
phese (alternative)
vease (alternative West-Country)
veeze (alternative West-Country)

From Middle English fese, from the verb (see below).

setting up the most expedient agricolary instruments of wains, carts, slades, with their several devices of wheels and axle-trees, plows and harrows of divers sorts, feezes, winders, pullies, and all other manner of engines fit for easing the toyl and furthering the work;

1653, Sir Thomas Urquhart, Logopandecteision:

The Dean and assessors —unanimoslie condishended and agreied upon that ane compitent number of feezes be made for packing of pleding.

1674, Proceedings: The Guildry Incorporation of Dundee:

(obsolete, Scotland) A device for wedging items into a tight space.


graith

en-verb

graith (third-person singular simple present graiths, present participle graithing, simple past and past participle graithed)

graiths (present singular third-person)
graithing (participle present)
graithed (participle past)
graithed (past)

From Middle English graithen, greithen, graiden, grathen, from Old Norse greiða (“to make ready, prepare, arrange, disentangle”), from Proto-Germanic *garaidijaną (“to prepare, put in order”). Cognate with Old English ġerǣdan (“to arrange, dispose, order, provide for, harness”), Gothic 𐌲𐌰𐍂𐌰𐌹𐌳𐌾𐌰𐌽 (garaidjan, “to enjoin”).

cog

Gowden graith'd his horse before, and siller shod behind […]

1776, David Herd, Collected Songs (reprinted in 1870 as Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs)

And graith my horse!

1802, Walter Scott, The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border:

(obsolete outside Scotland) To make ready; prepare; put in order; make fit for use.


seck

[…] barn-fans, an' flails, an' fleers, / An' canasses, an' secks; / An' cheeks o' doors, an' doors themsel's, / Wi' broken ban's an' snecks; […]

1884, David Grant, Lays and Legends of the North: And Other Poems and Songs, Humorous and Grave, Original and Translated, page 3:

The kittlings ligging on the secks […]

1884, Streatfeild, Lin. and Danes, 264, 357

... a rough seck undher him, a bit o' flannel hardly coverin' him above, an' he looked like dyeath.

1894, John Trafford Clegg, David's Loom: A Story of Rochdale's Life in the Early Years of the Nineteenth Century, page 30:

This seck is elding to keep us fra starving!

1912 [????], Walter William Skeat, English dialects from the eighth century to the present day. Repr, page 117:

(chiefly Scotland, obsolete) Alternative form of sack.


obtemper

en-verb

obtemper (third-person singular simple present obtempers, present participle obtempering, simple past and past participle obtempered)

obtempers (present singular third-person)
obtempering (participle present)
obtempered (participle past)
obtempered (past)

and after reading thereof, enquir'd at him, if he would obtemper the famin; to which he answer'd, That he could not comply with, or would he obtemper the said Sentence

1712, Charles Nice Davies, The Present State of the Parties in Great Britain:

(Scotland, law, transitive) To obey (a judgement, rule, decree etx.).


rokelay

rokelays (plural)
rockelay (alternative)
rocklay (alternative)

(Scotland, historical) A short cloak worn mostly by ladies in the 18th century.


stewartry

en-noun

stewartry (countable and uncountable, plural stewartries)

(Scotland) The jurisdiction of a steward, or the lands under such jurisdiction.


afterling

en-adj

afterling (comparative more afterling, superlative most afterling)

more afterling (comparative)
most afterling (superlative)

From Middle English afterling, equivalent to after + -ling. Cognate with Scots afterling, efterling (“afterling”, adjective).

"That Heresie, whose afterling entry falling out in the dreg of all tymes doth render it suspect."

(Scotland, rare) Coming after; later; subsequent; of later date; late in order of time or succession.


tirma

(obsolete, Scotland, dialect, Hebrides) A bird, the oystercatcher.


poinder

So Caius Gracchus defends the treasury from others' violence, whiles himself robbed it; so the poinder chafes and swears to see beasts in the corn, yet will pull up a stake, or cut a tether, to find supply for his pin-fold

(Scotland) The keeper of a cattle pound; a pinder.

The poinder no doubt is preferable at common law, because the assignment not being completed by intimation, the debtor continues still proprietor

1767, Lord Henry Home Kames, Principles of Equity:


fouthy

fouthy (comparative fouthier or more fouthy, superlative fouthiest or most fouthy)

fouthier (comparative)
more fouthy (comparative)
fouthiest (superlative)
most fouthy (superlative)
southy (alternative)

From fouth (“abundance, fullness, plenty”) + -y.

suffix

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Ample; plentiful; free in giving; generous; hospitable.

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Having the appearance of fulness; full-looking.


timmer

en-noun

timmer (countable and uncountable, plural timmers)

Though no a bird can now be heard
Upon the leafless timmer;
Whate'er betide, the ingle side
Can mak' the winter simmer!

1811-1813, Captain Charles Gray, Though Boreas bauld (song):

"Forbye," said the Butler, most irreverently raising his voice to a pitch which drowned his master's, "the fire made fast on us, owing to the store of tapestry and carved timmer in the banqueting ha', and the loons ran like scauded rats so soon as they heard of the gunpouther."

1819, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter XI, in Tales of My Landlord, Third Series. […], volume I (The Bride of Lammermoor), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC:


improbation

improbation (countable and uncountable, plural improbations)

the best expedient which Improbation occurred to the lawyers of those days , was afforded by the action of reduction - improbation

1826, George Joseph Bell, Commentaries on the Law of Scotland and on the principles of Mercantile Jurisprudence:

(law, Scotland) The act by which falsehood and forgery are proved; an action brought for the purpose of having some instrument declared false or forged.


beild

beilds (plural)
beeld (alternative)
bield (alternative)

This is our beild, the blust'ring winds to shun.

1600, Edward Fairfax, The Jerusalem Delivered of Tasso, Book II, lxxxiv

The random beild o' clod or stane.

1786, Robert Burns, To a Mountain Daisy:

(Scotland, archaic) A place of shelter; protection; refuge.


glaum

en-verb

glaum (third-person singular simple present glaums, present participle glauming, simple past and past participle glaumed)

glaums (present singular third-person)
glauming (participle present)
glaumed (participle past)
glaumed (past)

Alteration of dialectal clam, claum (“to grope or grasp ineffectually, snatch”), from Middle English *clammen, *clemmen, from Old English clæmman, clemman, from Proto-West Germanic *klammjan, from Proto-Germanic *klamjaną. In some senses, likely influenced by clamber. Compare dialectal glaump, glamp (“to grasp, snatch at, clutch, grope", also "gulp”), Scots clam, claum (“to grope or grasp ineffectually, snatch”), Norwegian klemme (“to seize with claws”), Middle High German klemmen (“to squeeze”). Doublet of glom. Related also to English clamp.

cog

My heart, for fear, gaed sough for sough, / To hear the thuds, and see the cluds / O' clans frae woods, in tartan duds, / Wha glaum'd at kingdoms three.

1789, “The Battle of Sherramuir”, Burns, Robert (lyrics):

"Few get what they glaum at."

1895, The Chautauquan: Organ of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle, page 194:

She plays a game of blind-man's bute, / Glaums at the first she touches; / Even if the coof has coin enough, / She multiplies his riches.

"Katty, Katty Regan, for God's sake" he cried, all in a breath, his voice wild and high with surprise and despair, his hand glauming at nothing. Only with her last word had her own voice broken from her, letting him know whose[…]

1914, Joseph Mary Plunkett, The Irish Review, page 246:

... used to be always embracing me Josie whenever he was there meaning him of course glauming me over and when I said I washed up and down as sar as possible asking me did you wash[…]

2008 April 17, James Joyce, Ulysses, Oxford Paperbacks, →ISBN, page 695:

w:Webster's Dictionary#Webster's New International Dictionary 1909

(Scotland, Ireland) To grasp or snatch (at), usually feebly or ineffectually; to grope (at) with the hands, as in the dark.


glaum

glaums (present singular third-person)
glauming (participle present)
glaumed (participle past)
glaumed (past)
glawm (alternative)
gloom (alternative)
glom (alternative)

From Middle English gloumen, glomen (“to look glum or sullen, scowl, frown at, lower”), from Old Norse glám- (in compounds), cognate with Norwegian Nynorsk glåma (“to stare”).

I drop my bantering side, glauming a hard frown. “Why would your clients not want you to execute on these in full? Obviously you have a skilled eye for dramatic impact. And I know naught of intricate fashion construction,[…]

2022 January 25, Angel Payne, Misadventures with a Duke, Waterhouse Press, →ISBN:

(Northern England, Scotland) To look sullen or sad; scowl, frown.


motty

en-adj

motty (comparative more motty, superlative most motty)

more motty (comparative)
most motty (superlative)
mottie (alternative)

the motty dust reek raised by the workmen

1847, Hugh Miller, First Impressions of England and Its People:

Where the motty sunbeam from the pane with its great knob of bottle-green struck him.

1865, Alexander Smuth, A Summer in Skye:

(Scotland, dated) Full of, or consisting of, motes.


bieldy

bieldy (comparative more bieldy, superlative most bieldy)

more bieldy (comparative)
most bieldy (superlative)

From bield + -y. Cognate with Scots beildy.

His Honour, ye see, being under hiding in thae sair times--the mair's the pity--he lies a' day, and whiles a' night, in the cove in the dern hag; but though it's a bieldy eneugh bit, and the auld gudeman o' Corse-Cleugh has panged it wi' a kemple o' strae amaist, yet when the country's quiet, and the night very cauld, his Honour whiles creeps doun here to get a warm at the ingle and a sleep amang the blankets, and gangs awa in the morning.

1814, Sir Walter Scott, Waverley, Or 'Tis Sixty Years Hence, Complete:

Then it was that they were wont to come over our seven hills and seven waters to help themselves to our cattle when the same were at their fattest and best It would be a skurry of bare knees down pass and brae, a ring of the robbers round the herd sheltering on the bieldy side of the hill or in the hollows among the ripe grass, a brisk change of shot and blow if alarm rose, and then hie! over the moor by Macfarlane's lantern.

Even the grass nodding in the wind lent a thin voice to the chorus, a voice such as only the sharp and sea-trained ear may comprehend, that beasts hear long before the wind itself is apparent, so that they remove themselves to the bieldy sides of the hills before tumult breaks.

The old Cameronian kirk sits on a hill, and is surrounded by trees, a place both bieldy and heartsome.

c. 1900, S. R. Crockett, Bog-Myrtle and Peat:

(Scotland) Sheltered from the weather; affording shelter.


bauchle

en-verb

bauchle (third-person singular simple present bauchles, present participle bauchling, simple past and past participle bauchled)

bauchles (present singular third-person)
bauchling (participle present)
bauchled (participle past)
bauchled (past)

From Scots, probably related to Old French bafouer (“to hoodwink”).

Our enemies were disputing not far off upon the deck, and that so loudly that I could hear a word or two above the washing of the seas. “It was Shuan bauchled it,” I heard one say.

1886, Robert Louis Stephenson, Kidnapped:

Maybe that shot that ye think ye bauchled was the most providential shot ye ever fired...

An echo of "bauchling" lingered on, it seemed to me, in Cumbrian rural police courts until a few years ago. Nowhere else, as a court reporter, have I heard so much abusive interruption and blasphemous invocation from the public benches during the hearing of cases. Cumbrian magistrates dealt with it most tolerantly.

1972, George MacDonald Fraser, The Steel Bonnets, page 152:

(Scotland) To insult, to upbraid, to make a fool of someone.


bauchle

1842, Laird of Logan, Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, issue 481, page 104.
We a' ken that there's tongues in heads, but I ne'er heard o' ony in hats or bauchles afore.

(Scotland, chiefly in the plural) An old shoe.

He adds, probably his letter would be propaled and made a bauchle of, and assures them he was never loved at Court as a minister.

1843, Robert Woodrow, The life of Mister Robert Bruce, Minister at Edinburgh, page 92:

(Scotland) A bungled or muddled situation; a mess.


bauchled

A beetle-browed chamber, long, narrow, stifling with the heat of a great fire, its flagged floor at intervals would slap with bare or bauchled feet dancing to a short reel.

[…] as he cowered in the half-lit hall the woman came in bauchled feet up the stair, and looking him full in the face laid her hand, roughened red through much scrubbing, on his shoulder.

1928, St. Andrew Society, The Scots, volume 10, DC Thompson, page 407


weakiness

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Moisture.


camstairy

en-adj

camstairy (comparative more camstairy, superlative most camstairy)

more camstairy (comparative)
most camstairy (superlative)

From cam (“crooked”) and uncertain second component.

"Ah!" he said again, with a reproving wag of the head, for he knew now what was coming,--"idols are perverse, camstairy things at best, you know, and a bit out of date too.

1908, John Oxenham, Pearl of Pearl Island:

My faither was on a strong mare, and I was on a bit powney; and amang the cattle there was a camstairy three-year-auld bull, that wad neither hup nor drive.

1884, various, Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, XXII:

(archaic, Scotland) unruly; unmanageable


my certie

Weel, lassie, walk ye by the burn, And walk ye slow and sly; My certie! weel ye ken the gate That Geordie Young comes by!

1857, Various, The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volume VI:

Englishmen, for instance, will say that I am a bad speller, and that my language is kittle; and such of the Irishers as can read, will be threaping that I have abused their precious country; but, my certie, instead of blaming me for letting out what I could not deny, they must just learn to behave themselves better when they come to see us, or bide at home.

1828, David Macbeth Moir, The Life of Mansie Wauch:


alloo

en-verb

alloo (third-person singular simple present alloos, present participle allooing, simple past and past participle allooed)

alloos (present singular third-person)
allooing (participle present)
allooed (participle past)
allooed (past)

Pronunciation spelling
pronunciation spelling

(Scotland) Pronunciation spelling of allow.


sorner

It is our old friend the poet, but with a new face; he is now a soldier, a sailor, a king, and, in case of necessity, a very fair boxer, or "fistic artist," for the abatement of masterful beggars, "sorners," and other nuisances.

1841 October, Thomas De Quincey, “Homer and the Homeridæ”, in Sketches: Critical and Biographic (De Quincey’s Works; VI), London: James Hogg & Sons, →OCLC, page 303:

(Scotland) One who obtrudes themselves on another for bed and board.


daddie

"No," said Pauline sadly, "they've gone to New Zealand,--mamma got quite ill with nursing us, and daddie got it too, and he wouldn't come up here."

1908, Ethel Turner, In the Mist of the Mountains:

"Come to your ould daddie, you lil sandpiper.

Says--"Carterhaugh it is mine ain; "My daddie gave it me; "I'll come and gang to Carterhaugh, "And ask nae leave o' thee."

1806, Walter Scott, Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. II (of 3):

(often Scotland) Alternative spelling of daddy.


prieve

prieve (third-person singular simple present prieves, present participle prieving, simple past and past participle prieved)

prieves (present singular third-person)
prieving (participle present)
prieved (participle past)
prieved (past)

(obsolete or archaic in Scotland) To prove.


bewill

bewill (third-person singular simple present bewills, present participle bewilling, simple past and past participle bewilled)

bewills (present singular third-person)
bewilling (participle present)
bewilled (participle past)
bewilled (past)

From be- + will (“wandering, stray, lost in error”). Cognate with Scots bewild (“to bewill”).

prefix

(UK dialectal, Scotland) To cause to go astray.


bewave

en-verb

bewave (third-person singular simple present bewaves, present participle bewaving, simple past and past participle bewaved)

bewaves (present singular third-person)
bewaving (participle present)
bewaved (participle past)
bewaved (past)

From Middle English biweven, biwǣven, from Old English bewǣfan (“to enfold, wrap round, cover over, clothe”).

inh

(transitive, Scotland) To lay wait for; overpower by means of some base stratagem.


bewave

(intransitive, Scotland) To wander or waver.


cruive

Borrowed from Scots cruive, from Middle Scots cruve, crove, from Old Irish cró, from Proto-Celtic *kruwos, *kruwyos, from Proto-Indo-European *krewh₁-.

(archaic, Scotland) A kind of weir or dam for trapping salmon.


galopin

(Scotland, obsolete) A boy employed in a kitchen.


gaintaking

ganetaking (alternative)
gane taking (alternative)

Deforcing of the officiare in execution of his office in the gane taking of ane caldrown poundit be the said officiare; [...]

(Now chiefly dialectal, Scotland) A taking back again; recovery.


begowk

en-verb

begowk (third-person singular simple present begowks, present participle begowking, simple past and past participle begowked)

begowks (present singular third-person)
begowking (participle present)
begowked (participle past)
begowked (past)

But I'll begowk them there, Mr. David.

Is she trying to begowk a donnert old man next?

1921, William Darling Lyell, The house in Queen Anne square:

Dewing, you sought to begowk me by setting me up against Zurich — or perhaps you really thought to use me against him.

1917, Eugene Manlove Rhodes, Copper Streak Trail:

(archaic, Scotland) To play a trick on, make a fool of.


sweight

sweights (plural)
swecht (alternative Northern-England Scotland)
sweicht (alternative Scotland)
swelch (alternative Scotland)
swelth (alternative Scotland)

From Middle English sweyght, derivative of Middle English sweiȝen (“to sway”), equivalent to sway + -th (abstract nominal suffix).

main sweight

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) A portion or amount; the greatest amount or the greater part of anything; a multitude; a great number or quantity.

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) The force of a moving object or body in motion; violence.

(UK dialectal, Scotland) A rush; an impetus; a burden, weight, or force.


hiddle

hiddles (plural)
hidel (alternative)
hidle (alternative)
hiddil (alternative)
heddle (alternative)
hydle (alternative)
hidels (alternative)
hydles (alternative)

From Middle English hidel, hydel, an alteration, due to final s mistaken for the plural ending, of Middle English hidils, hudels (“hiding-place, concealment”), from Old English hȳdels (“a place of concealment, hiding-place, cavern, cave”), equivalent to hide + -le. For loss of final s compare burial, riddle. More at hide, huddle.

inh

(now chiefly dialectal, Scotland) A cluster, small group of buildings, etc. set close together; a huddle.


hiddle

en-verb

hiddle (third-person singular simple present hiddles, present participle hiddling, simple past and past participle hiddled)

hiddles (present singular third-person)
hiddling (participle present)
hiddled (participle past)
hiddled (past)
hidel (alternative)
hidle (alternative)
hiddil (alternative)
heddle (alternative)
hydle (alternative)
hidels (alternative)
hydles (alternative)

(transitive, UK dialectal, Scotland) To hide; conceal.

(intransitive, UK dialectal, Scotland) To nestle closely; take shelter.

(transitive, UK dialectal, Scotland) To shelter (in one's arms).


hidness

From Middle English hidnes, hudnesse, from Old English ġehȳdnes (“comfort, security”), equivalent to hide + -ness.

inh

(UK dialectal Scotland) Secrecy; hiddenness.


lurt

Of North Germanic origin, related to Danish lort (“excrement”) and Norwegian lort (“filth, dirt, excrement”).

cog

(UK dialectal, Scotland) A lump of dirt or excrement; a turd.


thingmy

en-adj

thingmy (comparative more thingmy, superlative most thingmy)

more thingmy (comparative)
most thingmy (superlative)

If a guy it^([sic]) going to get thingmy when he sees a women^([sic]) pull her breast out then he is not much a guy is he.

2005, Samantha, quotee, edited by Immy Holloway, Qualitative Research in Health Care, Open University Press, →ISBN, page 68:

(informal, chiefly Scotland) Agitated, flustered, in a lather.


thingmy

It was a huge, massive great place, with loads of people dragging lights around, and tiers of seating, and a big blonde woman wearing earmuff thingmies, […]

2000, Susie Maguire, The Short Hello, Polygon, →ISBN:

(informal, chiefly Scotland) A thingy; a non-specific object or gadget.


tath

en-noun

tath (countable and uncountable, plural taths)

taths (plural)
teathe (alternative)
tathe (alternative)

From Middle English tath, from Old Norse tað (“manure”), from Proto-Germanic *tadą (“manure”), from Proto-Indo-European *dāy- (“to divide, split, part, section”). Cognate with Icelandic tað (“manure, dung”), dialectal Swedish tad (“manure, dung”).

der

after the sheep have trod out a great quantity of stones, in feeding off turnips, to have them raked up clean, which I have known some farmers do, nor can the rake be used without taking some of the tathe, or dung, with them .

1804, Arthur Young, The Farmer's Calendar:

(UK, dialectal, agriculture, historical or archaic, Scotland) The dung of livestock left on a field to serve as manure or fertiliser.

(UK, dialectal, agriculture, histortical or archaic, Scotland) A piece of ground dunged by livestock.

(UK, dialectal, agriculture, historical or archaic, Scotland) Strong grass growing around the dung of kine.


tath

en-verb

tath (third-person singular simple present taths, present participle tathing, simple past and past participle tathed)

taths (present singular third-person)
tathing (participle present)
tathed (participle past)
tathed (past)
teathe (alternative)
tathe (alternative)

From Middle English tathen, from Old Norse teðja (“to manure”), from Proto-Germanic *tadjaną (“to strew, scatter”), from Proto-Indo-European *dāy- (“to divide, split, part, section”). Cognate with Icelandic teðja (“to dung, manure”), Norwegian tedja (“to dung”), German zetten (“to let fall in small pieces, let crumble”).

cog

I would have no more ploughed than has been tathed the preceding year

(UK, dialectal, agriculture, historical or archaic, Scotland) To manure (land) by pasturing cattle on it, or causing them to lie upon it.


schelly

(Scotland) A fish, the powan (Coregonus clupeoides).


peenge

en-verb

peenge (third-person singular simple present peenges, present participle peenging, simple past and past participle peenged)

peenges (present singular third-person)
peenging (participle present)
peenged (participle past)
peenged (past)

(obsolete, Scotland) To complain childishly; to whinge.


prestable

From Middle or early Modern French prestable, compare Modern French prêtable. By surface analysis, prest + -able.


swartback

Thy foot had been on the Maiden-skerrie of Northmaven, known before but to the webbed sole of the swartback.

1822, [Walter Scott], The Pirate. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC:

great black-backed gull
great black-backed gull

Larus marinus
Larus marinus#Translingual

(obsolete, Scotland) The great black-backed gull (Larus marinus).


mullar

(obsolete, Scotland) A die, cut in intaglio, for stamping an ornament in relief, as upon metal.


nidder

nidder (third-person singular simple present nidders, present participle niddering, simple past and past participle niddered)

nidders (present singular third-person)
niddering (participle present)
niddered (participle past)
niddered (past)

From a dialectal variant of nither, nether.

(transitive, Scotland) To keep down or under.

(transitive, Scotland) To press hard upon; straiten (applied to bounds).

(transitive, Scotland) To pinch or starve with cold or hunger; stunt in growth.

(transitive, Scotland) To harass; grill; plague; annoy.


dunter

"Here an old woman, thinking to help her pastor out of a dead lift, cried out, 'Aiblins, Sir, it was a dunter.' (The vulgar name of a species of whale common to the Scotch coast.)

1845, Thomas Ingoldsby [pseudonym; Richard Barham], The Ingoldsby Legends, New York, N.Y.: W. J. Widdleton, published 1865, page 80:

Porpoises, it is true, and "dunters" may be seen gambolling along the coast of Durham, but even that royal fish, the sturgeon, often caught in the last century, as the files of the Newcastle Courant prove, is a rarity on the coast.

1883, “Local Records and Notes”, in Newcastle Courant, Newcastle upon Tyne, England, page 2:

The sperm whale is of course the best producer, but this species is not flagrant in the southern seas. The whale usually found is small in size and the head reservoir does not contain very large quantities of the oil. Among the smaller Cataceans, the porpoises, the puffy dunters, and grampuses, an excellent grade of oil is secured for commercial purposes by the natives who ply the waters many days and nights seeking the specie.^([sic])

1904, “South Sea Fish Oils”, in Pacific Oil Reporter, volume 6, number 1, San Francisco, C.A.: Pacific Oil Reporter, page 5:

(dialect, Scotland, Northumberland) A porpoise.


dretch

dretch (third-person singular simple present dretches, present participle dretching, simple past and past participle dretched)

dretches (present singular third-person)
dretching (participle present)
dretched (participle past)
dretched (past)
draitch (alternative Scotland)
drich (alternative Scotland)

From Middle English dretchen, drecchen, drechen, from Old English *dreċċan (“to draw out, delay, linger”), from Proto-West Germanic *drakkjan, from Proto-Germanic *drakjaną (“to draw, pull”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰreǵ- (“to pull, drag, scratch”). Cognate with Scots dratch, dretch (“to dawdle”), Dutch trekken (“to draw, pull, tear, pluck, trek”), German trecken (“to draw, trek”), Danish trække (“to draw, pull”), Norwegian dråk (“stripe”), Swedish dialectal drakig (“striped, streaked”), Icelandic rák (“streak”).

cog

(intransitive, UK dialectal, Scotland) To move slowly and heavily; dawdle; loiter.


dretch

dretches (plural)
draitch (alternative Scotland)
drich (alternative Scotland)

(UK dialectal, Scotland) A person slow in the execution of a job; a dawdler.


flaysome

en-adj

flaysome (comparative more flaysome, superlative most flaysome)

more flaysome (comparative)
most flaysome (superlative)
fleysome (alternative)
fleesome (alternative)

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Terrifying; frightful.


pock-pudding

"Devil take that old man," said M'Aulay, "he would tell every thing, were it to cost one one's life; but it's no jesting matter to you neither, my Lord, for I reckon on your friendly and fraternal benevolence, as a near kinsman of our house, to help me out with the money due to these pock-puddings; or else, to be plain wi' ye, the de'il a M'Aulay will there be at the muster, for curse me if I do not turn Covenanter rather than face these fellows without paying them; and, at the best, I shall be ill enough off, getting both the scaith and the scorn."

1819, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter IV, in Tales of My Landlord, Third Series. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC:

(derogatory, Scotland, archaic) An English person.


progue

(Scotland, US, dialect) A sharp point; a goad.


progue

en-verb

progue (third-person singular simple present progues, present participle proguing, simple past and past participle progued)

progues (present singular third-person)
proguing (participle present)
progued (participle past)
progued (past)

(Scotland, US, archaic, transitive) To prick

(Scotland, US, archaic, transitive) to goad.


king of the doos

en-noun

king of the doos (plural kings of the doos)

kings of the doos (plural)
King of the Doos (alternative)

From king + of + the + Scots doo (“dove”). Compare king of the mullets (Dicentrarchus labrax, Apogon imberbis) and similar terms.

Carrier Pigeon
English Carrier
Homing Pigeon


forloppin

From for- + loppin, past participle of loup (“to run, leap”).

(UK dialectal, Scotland) Being a runaway, vagabond, or renegade.


stacket

Compare French estacade and English stockade.

Also, I would advise you to fortify the said sconce, not only by a foussie, or graffe, but also by certain stackets, or palisades. […] The whilk stackets or palisades should be artificially framed with re-entering angles and loop-holes, or crenelles, for musquetry, whereof it shall arise that the foemen— […]

1819, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter II, in Tales of My Landlord, Third Series. […], volume IV (A Legend of Montrose), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; Hurst, Robinson, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 32:


sprug

(Northern England, Scotland) house sparrow


yaird

On Tuesday, by the first break of day, he went over the street to his yaird barefooted and bareheaded, (as David did when he went up Mount Olivet, fleeing out of Jerusalem from his son Absolom,) he locked the yaird doore behinde him, haveing charged them that were in the house with Helen Gardener, the baillie’s wife, to attend her, sitting quyet besyde hir.

1842, The Woodrow Society, Row’s History of the Kirk of Scotland, Edinburgh Printing Company, page 434

and in this equipage, with his little phizie (fusee) upon his shoulder, he marches to the church yaird, where the May-pole was sett up, and the solemnitie of that day was to be kept.

1870, Sir Walter Scott, Old Mortality, A. & C. Black, page 425:

A witness, Thomas Storie, said that Dalmahoy, with ‘a young woman Iron coloured of a high stature [i.e. tall] in common habit’, called at a neighbour’s house and asked for a drink of ale and enquired ‘if there was a yaird or any place for him and her to walk in’, and that they went to the yaird in question where Storie saw him ‘kissing and Imbraceing the said woman’.

1998, Leah Leneman, Alienated Affections: The Scottish Experience of Divorce and Separation, 1684-1830, Edinburgh University Press, page 30:


pepper dulse

pepper dulse (usually uncountable, plural pepper dulses)

(Scotland) A pungent edible seaweed, Osmundea pinnatifida.


sillock

From sill (“newly hatched young of fish, fry”) + -ock, ultimately from Old Norse síl, síld (“herring”), whence also dialectal Swedish sil (“the young of fish, fry”) and Norwegian sil (“sand-eel”). More at sile.

suffix

(Scotland) A pollock or a coalfish, sometimes especially a young coalfish.


seannachie

seannachies (plural)
schenachy (alternative)
seannachy (alternative)
senachie (alternative)
senachy (alternative)
sennachie (alternative)
sennachy (alternative)
shanachie (alternative)
shanachy (alternative)
shenachie (alternative)

From Irish seanchaí and Scottish Gaelic seanchaidh, from Old Irish senchaid.

Take a glass of wine, Sir Arthur, and drink down that bead-roll of unbaptized jargon, that would choke the devil - why, that last fellow has the only intelligible name you have repeated - they are all of the tribe of Macfungus - mushroom monarchs every one of them; sprung up from the fumes of conceit, folly, and falsehood, fermenting in the brains of some mad Highland seannachie.

1816, Sir Walter Scott, The Antiquary, Oxford University Press, published 2002, page 65:

(Ireland, Scotland) a bard, genealogist, or storyteller in Gaelic culture.


scomfish

en-verb

scomfish (third-person singular simple present scomfishes, present participle scomfishing, simple past and past participle scomfished)

scomfishes (present singular third-person)
scomfishing (participle present)
scomfished (participle past)
scomfished (past)

(archaic, intransitive, transitive, Scotland) To suffocate, stifle, or smother.


squabash

squabash (third-person singular simple present squabashes, present participle squabashing, simple past and past participle squabashed)

squabashes (present singular third-person)
squabashing (participle present)
squabashed (participle past)
squabashed (past)

January 17 1827, Walter Scott, diary
his satire of the Baviad and Maeviad squabashed at one blow a set of coxcombs

(Scotland, slang, dated, transitive) To crush, quash or squash.


scranny

en-adj

scranny (comparative scrannier, superlative scranniest)

scrannier (comparative)
scranniest (superlative)

Rat.
I’ll slily seize and
Let blood from her weasand,—
Creeping through crevice, and chink, and cranny,
With my snaky tail, and my sides so scranny.

1820, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Oedipus Tyrannus; Or, Swellfoot The Tyrant: A Tragedy in Two Acts:

Observe in the whole lot, from the magnificent lord of the herd down to the scranniest runt, the superlative of self-reliance, the air of puffy arrogance and solid disregard of public or private opinion such as few of us attain.

1901, New England Magazine: An Illustrated Monthly - Volume 24, page 177:

“Well, in the first place," I explained the little lady, "they've got three of the scranniest kids, and the mother herself don't look very strong."

Among the affairs of men their voices, single or united, amounted to no more than a scranny interruption easily put aside;

2001, Margaret Mead, Geoffrey Gorer, John Rickman, Russian Culture, →ISBN, page 38:

'Look at him, said Ada, pursing her lips. 'Is he fighting material? If Hitler's crack Panzer divisions see a scranny feller like him coming towards them, will they panic?"

2007, David Nobbs, The Complete Pratt, →ISBN, page 31:


glunch

en-verb

glunch (third-person singular simple present glunches, present participle glunching, simple past and past participle glunched)

glunches (present singular third-person)
glunching (participle present)
glunched (participle past)
glunched (past)

Borrowed from Scots glunch, of uncertain origin, possibly an alteration of glum or glump.

(Scotland, intransitive) To look sullen or glum; to frown


glunch

(Scotland) A sullen or glum look; a frown.


croodle

croodle (third-person singular simple present croodles, present participle croodling, simple past and past participle croodled)

croodles (present singular third-person)
croodling (participle present)
croodled (participle past)
croodled (past)

Too dark to see well, but judge from movements of old bird's head and croodling noise.

Do pigeons croodle, or only doves?

2017, Thomas Rohrer, Worms Drowning in the Rain:

(originally Scotland, dialect) To make a cooing sound.


rickle

From Scots rickle, from Old English hrēac (“stack”) with the Scots suffix -le (“full (of)”).

It was no more than a butt and a ben, with a rickle of sheds behind it where old Pooty kept his donkey that was nearly as old […]

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song, Canongate Books, published 2008, →ISBN, page 22:

(chiefly Scotland) A loose, disordered collection of things; a heap; a jumble.

(chiefly Scotland) A small rick of grain.

We came home by a place called Speke Hall — built 1589 — the queerest-looking old rickle of boards that I ever set eyes on; […]

1844, Jane Welsh Carlyle, letter to Thomas Carlyle dated 28 June 1844, re-printed in New Letters and Memorials of Jane Welsh Carlyle (ed. Alexander Carlyle), John Lane (1903), pages 136-137

(chiefly Scotland) A dilapidated or ramshackle building.

On a memorable night was the old rickle of a boat taken out to the West Sands during a terrible storm, when Admiral Maitland Dougall distinguished himself by his valiant services.

1899, Golf Illustrated, volume 2, page 93:

(chiefly Scotland) Any object in poor condition, particularly a vehicle.

But it's a bad disaise that can't be cured somehow, Manis said to himself — so be began to consider how to sell his rickle of a pony to advantage.

1899, Seumas MacManus, In Chimney Corners: Merry Tales of Irish Folk Lore, Doubleday & McClure, published 1899, page 228:

(chiefly Scotland) An emaciated person or animal.


rickle o' banes

en-noun

rickle o' banes (plural rickles o' banes)

rickles o' banes (plural)
rickle of banes (alternative)
rickle o' bones (alternative)
rickle of bones (alternative)

To behold him, mounted on his old shelty, was truly a laughable scene, the animal being always so lean — a perfect "rickle o' banes," […]

1876, John Mactaggart, The Scottish Gallovidian Encyclopedia, Hamilton, Adams and Co, page 46:

(idiomatic, chiefly Scotland) An emaciated person or animal.


umbeschew

en-verb

umbeschew (third-person singular simple present umbeschews, present participle umbeschewing, simple past and past participle umbeschewed)

umbeschews (present singular third-person)
umbeschewing (participle present)
umbeschewed (participle past)
umbeschewed (past)
umbechew (alternative)
umschew (alternative)
umchew (alternative)

(transitive, now chiefly dialectal, Scotland) To avoid; shun.

(intransitive, now chiefly dialectal, Scotland) To get away; escape.


minnie

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-minnie.wav

(Northern England, Scotland, informal, obsolete) Mother, mummy.


fyle

fyle (third-person singular simple present fyles, present participle fyling, simple past and past participle fyled)

fyles (present singular third-person)
fyling (participle present)
fyled (participle past)
fyled (past)

(Scotland, transitive) Alternative form of file.


mirken

mirken (third-person singular simple present mirkens, present participle mirkening, simple past and past participle mirkened)

mirkens (present singular third-person)
mirkening (participle present)
mirkened (participle past)
mirkened (past)

From Middle English mirkenen, merknen, from Old Norse myrkna (“to darken”). Cognate with Icelandic myrkna (“to darken”), Swedish mörkna (“to get dark, darken”), Danish mørkne (“to darken”), equivalent to mirk + -en. More at murk.

For quotations using this term, see Citations:mirken.

(intransitive, Scotland, rare) To grow dark.


groop

groops (plural)
grupe (alternative)
groap (alternative)
grube (alternative)

From Middle English grope, grupe, groupe, from Old English grōp (“ditch”), from Proto-West Germanic *grōpu, from Proto-Germanic *grōpō (“furrow, ditch, trench”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰreb-, *gʰrebʰ- (“to dig, furrow, scratch”). Cognate with Scots gruip (“gutter, drain, ditch, trench”), North Frisian groop (“pit”), Dutch groep (“a trench, moat”), Swedish grop (“a pit, ditch, hole, hollow”), Old English grēp, grēpe (“land-drain, ditch; furrow; burrow; privy”). More at grip, groove.

cog

(obsolete or UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) A trench or small ditch.

The groop is one foot six inches wide, six and one-half inches deep at one end … to carry off the urine into a reservoir under the Cowhouse, …

1816, James Cleland, Annals of Glasgow, Digitized edition, published 2007, page 373:

Cleaning the byre involved barrowing out the contents of the groop, sluicing it down and rebedding it with clean straw.

2008, Dennis O'Driscoll, Seamus Heaney, Stepping stones:

(obsolete or UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) A trench or drain; particularly, a trench or hollow behind the stalls of cows or horses for receiving their dung and urine.

(obsolete or UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) A pen for cattle; a byre.


stoater

She was a wee stoater with beautiful ringlets down to her shoulders.

2009, Dennis Canavan, Let the People Decide: The Autobiography of Dennis Canavan:

All legs and boobs and bare brown backs. Two stoaters.

2015, Catherine Forde, The Drowning Pond, →ISBN:

'Mind we saw a couple o' young lassies that time comin' oot and goin' intae the Co-op,' a man said. 'Fuckin' stoaters, man.

2016, BRM Stewart, Digital Investigations, page 90:

(Scotland, Ireland) A beautiful girl or woman.

Towards the end perhaps there were slight signs of tiring fingers but there is no doubt that, in the words of the cognoscenti, this was a stoater of a performance.

1984, Glasgow (Scotland). College of Piping, Piping Times - Volume 37, Issues 5-7, page 38:

There'll be other Christmases. But let's just promise future presents to each other'll be stoaters.

1992, Plays International - Volume 8, page 44:

Then Eric made a sudden quantum leap and realized that they absolutely must must MUST do a science-fiction version of Noel Coward's enduring and much-loved old stoater, Private Lives.

1993, Robert Farrar, State of Independence, →ISBN, page 89:

'That's a great dog you've got there,' he said. 'That's a real stoater.

1997, Flamingo Book of New Scottish Writing, page 5:

(Scotland, Ireland, more generally) Anything especially nice.

El Hakim's party won a mere trifle, but stood what poor Captain Scott was wont to term "a stoater" on Merlin, a good but uncertain horse, who had "lost" him in the trial at home.

1858, The Irish metropolitan magazine, page 117:

Owners back their horses for such “stoaters,” in short distance races, where a start is everything, that, in too many cases, woe betide the backs and pockets of the lads if they do not jump off in a twinkling.

1860, Sporting Magazine - Volume 36, page 306:

When it was known before starting the sum Lord Portsmouth stood on his filly, there was a perfect furore to back her, as a pony would be ' a perfect stoater ' for him ; and his commission, it was understood, considerably exceeded that sum.

1863, Baily's Magazine of Sports & Pastimes - Volume 5, page 96:

(Scotland, Ireland, horse racing) A horse that wins against the odds.

With this, Vinet lent him such a swinging stoater with the pitchfork souse between the neck and the collar of his jerkin, that down fell signor on the ground arsyversy, with his spindle shanks wide straggling over his poll.

1892, François Rabelais, Master Francis Rabelais, page 327:

Then you see, and it's so old a trick you'd think we'd have been prepared for it at our age, he draws back his left hand to punch me bang on the conk if I'm following his eyes right, and just as I'm wondering whether to duck or parry, he lets fly with his right and cops Davey's wee cousin a stoater on the left ear.

1976, Alex Hamilton, James Kelman, Tom Leonard, Three Glasgow writers:

Michael smacked him in the face with everything he had, a real stoater

2007, Christopher Brookmyre, Attack of the Unsinkable Rubber Ducks, →ISBN, page 400:


roolie

en-adj

roolie (comparative roolier or more roolie, superlative rooliest or most roolie)

roolier (comparative)
more roolie (comparative)
rooliest (superlative)
most roolie (superlative)

From Middle English rouly, roly, equivalent to roo + -ly. Cognate with Danish rolig (“calm”), Icelandic rólegur (“calm”).

(UK dialectal, Scotland) Peaceful; still.


beway

From by way equivalent to be- + way. Compare German wegen (“because of, by reason of”).

cog

[...] an' then hee'l turn him roon behint-afore an' play treeks, till collie gems at him; an' then beway o' makin friens again, hee'l Btreek an' pat him, [...]

1832, the mirror of literature, amusement, and instruction:

Be gannies," suggested Larry, " I think the best way would be for the three iv us to give the artichokes at the fire below, a warm reception beway iv a do sure, an' it'll soften the bargain wid ould Hardrade."

1857, Celtic Union, (Please provide the book title or journal name):

[...] is waistit and destroyit be divers personis that slais the dere and cunyngis thairof, and pasturis bestis thereintill masterfully beway of dede, [...]

1864, John Fullarton, Historical memoir of the family of Eglinton and Winton:

This young man afterwards became a member of Parliament from Scotland, and was for many years Grand Master of the [...] that week into as good English as he can and write it beway of version, being allowed to paraphrase it in his own way, [...]

1951, American Classical League, (Please provide the book title or journal name):

Wan was in front, beway he was the ginral, walkin' wid his chin up, proud as a paycock.

(dialectal, Ireland, Scotland, US) By way; because.


loopie

en-adj

loopie (comparative more loopie, superlative most loopie)

more loopie (comparative)
most loopie (superlative)

The guidwife had repeatedly given Peter the hint to throw the shawl into the bed, as it would be there concealed till the husband was gone; but Peter, the loopie — for who ever saw a packman that was not loopie? — began to think that he might manage to carry off both shawl and buckles […]

1825, Archibald Crawfurd, Tales of my grandmother:


binner

Aye, if he wis comin' in his fite claes, bodybulk, I doot ye wid be a' in a binner, as weel's the horses. . . . I kent fin ye wis in sic a binner 'it a' wisna richt.

1915, H. Beaton, Benachie, pages 50, 163:

(Scotland, dialect) A state of agitation; flurry.


binner

en-verb

binner (third-person singular simple present binners, present participle binnering, simple past and past participle binnered)

binners (present singular third-person)
binnering (participle present)
binnered (participle past)
binnered (past)

To see the lambs come binn'ring down the brae.

1768, A. Ross, Works (S.T.S.), page 163:

(Scotland, dialect) To create a bickering noise.


windlestraw

en-noun

windlestraw (countable and uncountable, plural windlestraws)

windlestraws (plural)
windlestrae (alternative)

Grey rocks did peep from the square moss, and stemmed / The struggling brook: tall spires of windlestrae / Threw their thin shadows down the rugged slope, / And nought but gnarlèd roots of ancient pines, / Branchless and blasted, clenched with grasping roots / The unwilling soil.

(UK, Scotland, dialect) A grass used for making ropes or for plaiting, especially Apera spica-venti.


windlestrae

windlestrae (countable and uncountable, plural windlestraes)

(Scotland) Alternative form of windlestraw.


surfaceman

To this I might have paid less heed but for its disquieting confirmation on a later day at a psychic parlour in Edgware Road. Proceeding there in company with my eldest brother-in-law, a plate-layer and surfaceman on the Northern.

(Scotland) A platelayer; one who maintains a railway track.


carse

From Middle English kerrs, cars, of uncertain origin. Perhaps Celtic: the term is "first found in a semi-Gaelic form", Carsach (c. 1143); compare Welsh cars (“bog, fen”), carsen (“reed”), Armoric kars, korsen (“bog plant, reed”). Alternatively, perhaps related to carr (“bog, march, swampland”) (perhaps suffixed with a variant of -ish, -sæ); compare Swedish kärr (“fen; bog”).

In the Carse of Gowrie to all the flat land , which is a great proportion of the district , is a deep rich clay

1799, James Robertson, General View of the Agriculture in the County of Perth:

[…] and the parish of St. Madois, now in the carse of Gowrie, is said to have been once on the southern side of the river. Such parts of the carse as are called inches, are elevated above the flat ground which has been covered with water. The soil of these eminences is[…]

1842, The Topographical, Statistical, and Historical Gazetteer of Scotland, page 214:

A carse is a district of country, consisting of deep horizontal depositions of alluvial or diluvial clay, on one or both sides of a considerable river; and may be of great or small extent, but generally comprehends a large tract of country[…]

1846, Henry Stephens, The Book of the Farm ...: To which are Added, Explanatory Notes ..., page 66:

(Scotland) Low, fertile land; a river valley.


sprechery

It is unspeakable the quantity of useless sprechery which they have collected on their march.

1814 July 7, [Walter Scott], Waverley; or, ’Tis Sixty Years Since. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC:

(Scotland) inferior movables, especially those collected by depredation


waucht

“Bring us a bottle, then.”
“Bring twa,” here interrupted Johnny Yuill, in a loud voice; “for I′m dooms dry, and ′ll sen′ owre a bottle to my ain share at a waucht, and I′m sure ye′ll manage the ither yersel, Provost; and, if ye canna, I′ll help ye wi′ that, too.”

1851, John Mackay Wilson, The Provost of Starvieston: Tales of the Borders, and of Scotland, volume III, page 144:

1893, Robert Louis Stevenson, David Balfour [aka Catriona], 2009, page 228,
“But ye′ll be for a bite or ye go?” said he.
“Neither bite nor sup,” said I. “I had a good waucht of milk in by Ratho.”

He was singin′ and roarin′ wi′ the loudest, and takin′ great wauchts frae the bowl, far mair than was guid for him.

1898, John Buchan, John Burnet Of Barns, published 2008, page 173:

(Scotland) A large draught of any liquid.


elt

en-verb

elt (third-person singular simple present elts, present participle elting, simple past and past participle elted)

elts (present singular third-person)
elting (participle present)
elted (participle past)
elted (past)

From Middle English elten (“to mold, knead, work”), from Old Norse elta (“to chase, hunt, knead”), from Proto-Germanic *alatjaną (“to drive, force, move”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁elh₂- (“to drive, move, go”). Cognate with Danish ælte (“to knead”), Swedish älta (“to dwell upon, brood, stir, knead”), Norwegian elte (“to knead”), Norwegian elta (“to pursue, plod”), Icelandic elta (“to chase”).

cog

Du's eltin dat creature to death, boy!?

Sh. 1908 Jak. (1928), Dictionary of the Scot Language

(transitive, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) To injure (anything) by rough handling; handle roughly.

Whin shü cam oot an fann me dere Wi peenie fairlins eltit.

Sh. 1891 J. Burgess Rasmie's Büddie 22, Dictionary of the Scot Language

Mi böts ir a' eltit wi' glaar.

Sh.11 1950, Dictionary of the Scot Language

He was elt(er)ed wi' gutters fae head to foot.

Cai.3 1950, Dictionary of the Scot Language

(transitive, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) To begrime; soil with mud; daub; smear.

(transitive, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) To work persistently or laboriously; be occupied in working (e.g. in the earth, rake among dirt, etc.).

(transitive, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) To meddle; interfere.

(transitive, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) To knead dough; stir dough previously kneaded to a proper consistency before baking.

(intransitive, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) To become soft; become moist, as damp earth.


forworth

en-verb

forworth (third-person singular simple present forworths, present participle forworthing, simple past forworthed or forword, past participle forworthed or forworthen or forworden)

forworths (present singular third-person)
forworthing (participle present)
forworthed (past)
forword (past)
forworthed (participle past)
forworthen (participle past)
forworden (participle past)

From Middle English forworthen, from Old English forweorþan (“to perish, pass away, vanish; deteriorate, sicken”), from Proto-Germanic *frawerþaną (“to perish, come to ruin”), equivalent to for- (“away, wrongly, badly”) + worth (“to turn into, become”). Cognate with Dutch verworden.

prefix

(intransitive, rare, Scotland, Northern England, obsolete) To perish, forfare; come to nought or ruin; go wrong.

(intransitive, rare, Scotland, Northern England, obsolete) To degenerate (into); become (something inferior); come to.


excambion

excambions (plural)
excambium (alternative)

(law, Scotland, historical) exchange or barter, especially of lands.


rampler

en-adj

rampler (comparative more rampler, superlative most rampler)

more rampler (comparative)
most rampler (superlative)


lich-wake

lich-wakes (plural)
lichwake (alternative)
lich wake (alternative)
lyke-wake (alternative)
lykewake (alternative)
likewake (alternative)
likewalk (alternative)
lykewalk (alternative)

In some parts of Scotland is still kept up the custon of Lyke-wake (Lich-wake), or watching beside the dead body before its burial.

1871, Walter Field, Stones of the temple, or, Lessons from the fabric and furniture of the church:

Funeral rites in the house (lich wakes) should be avoided out of regard for the health of the members of the family.

The custom of the "lich-wake," corresponding largely with the surviving Irish custom of waking the dead, had not then died out in Scotland, and in Monifieth was frequently practised.

2016, Arthur Morrison, The Shadows Around Us:

(obsolete, Scotland) The wake, or watching, held over a corpse before burial.


hantle

hantles (plural)
hantel (alternative)
hauntle (alternative)
hontle (alternative)
hancle (alternative)
hankle (alternative)
hantill (alternative)

Of obscure origin. Perhaps from Middle English *antel, *antæl, from Old English *antæl, *andtæl, equivalent to and- + tale (“number”); or more likely of North Germanic origin, related to Swedish antal, Danish antal (“a number, multitude”), Dutch aantal (“a number, a great many”), and German Anzahl (“a number, quantity, multitude”). The addition of initial h is believed to be due to influence from Middle English handfull (“handful”).

cog

An Irish creature, Erbert Ellison was the name, ran the place for the trustees, he said, but if you might believe all the stories you heard he ran a hantle more silver into his own pouch than he ran into theirs.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 15:

(Scotland, northern UK) A considerable number or quantity; a great many; a great deal.


barley-bree

When neibors anger at a plea, / An' just as wud as wud can be, / How easy can the barley-bree / Cement the quarrel! / It's aye the cheapest lawyer's fee, / To taste the barrel.

(humorous, obsolete, Scotland) Liquor that is made from barley; strong ale.


clishmaclaver

“Some people endeavour to defend this, saying, that it assists devotion, and a great deal of idle clish-maclaiver of the same kind […].”

1789, John Moore, Zeluco, Valancourt, published 2008, page 271:


shabble

(archaic, Scotland) A kind of bent sword or hanger (weapon).


croggan

From time immemorial "croggans" and "bollachans" or milk basins were made out of clay by the people in the district for their domestic use, but besides these there is no record of any other utensils having been manufactured.

1901, Windsor and Kenfield, Brick and Clay Record, volumes 14-15, page 265:

He had sent the ground officer with a "croggan of tar" with which he marked the ears of all the stock.

1982, Inverness Gaelic Society, Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness, volume 53, page 72:

In the Western Isles a native tradition of building pots, known as croggans, by hand, survived into the 20th century.

1989, National Museums of Scotland, The Wealth of a Nation, page 139:

(Scotland) A clay urn made by hand in the Outer Hebrides.


collie-shangie

collie-shangies (plural)
collieshangie (alternative)

/ˈkɒliˌʃɑŋi/

From Scots collie-shangie, from collie (“a breed of dog”), and shangie (“an object tied to a dog's tail”). The frustration of having a shangie attached made the highly energetic collies irritable and likely to fight.

She therefore glanced at a table-cloth not quite clean, and conned over her proposed supper a minute or two, before, patting her husband on the shoulder, she bade him sit down for "a hard-headed loon, that was aye bringing himsell and other folk into collie-shangies."

1819, Sir Walter Scott, Guy Mannering, page 30:

But though the weaver tried to dance all desire of mischief down, and manfully vowed that he would make vengeance the work of another day, such seemed not the pleasure of the less philosophic spirits of the company. They had counted on a collie-shangie, and resolved to have one.

1841 April, “Rustic Controversies - The Penny Wedding”, in Fraser's Magazine, volume 24, page 456:

At five minutes to eleven rode off with Beatrice, good Sharp going with us and having occasional "collie-shangies" with collies when we came near cottages (A. Thomson and Kennedy following).

1869 September 6, Victoria Queen of England, “A Visit to Invertrossachs”, in More Leaves From the Journal of A Life in the Highlands From 1862 to 1882, page 69:

(archaic, Scotland) A loud quarrelsome fight.


stickit minister

en-noun

stickit minister (plural stickit ministers)

(Scotland) A candidate for the clerical office who fails, disqualified by incompetency or immorality.


pinnage

(Scotland) Obsolete spelling of pinnace.


pellack

Did not the devil appear in the midst of the Tay, dressed in a priest's scapular, gambolling like a pellack amongst the waves

1828 May 15, [Walter Scott], Chronicles of the Canongate. Second Series. […] (The Fair Maid of Perth), volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] [Ballantyne and Co.] for Cadell and Co.; London: Simpkin and Marshall, →OCLC:

(Northern England, Scotland, archaic) A porpoise.


daffing

daffing (usually uncountable, plural daffings)

Willy, Willy Wilkin,
Kissed the maids a-milking,
Fa, la, la!
And with his merry daffing,
He set them all a laughing.
Ha, ha, ha!

1886, James Orchard Halliwell, “Fourteenth Class: Love and Matrimony: CCCCXLI”, in The Nursery Rhymes of England:


astriction

astriction (countable and uncountable, plural astrictions)

Payment of dry multures will even imply a title; being exclusive of any other supposition than astriction

1833, George Joseph Bell, Principles of the Law of Scotland:

(law, Scotland, historical) An obligation to have the grain growing on certain lands ground at a certain mill, the owner paying a toll. (The lands were said to be astricted to the mill.)


sclaff

From Scot sclaf, to shuffle: of echoic orig (

(Scotland) A slight blow; a slap; a soft fall; also, the accompanying noise.


sclaff

en-verb

sclaff (third-person singular simple present sclaffs, present participle sclaffing, simple past and past participle sclaffed)

sclaffs (present singular third-person)
sclaffing (participle present)
sclaffed (participle past)
sclaffed (past)

The striker sclaffed the ball between the goalie's legs.


make moan

make moan (third-person singular simple present makes moan, present participle making moan, simple past and past participle made moan)

makes moan (present singular third-person)
making moan (participle present)
made moan (participle past)
made moan (past)

when, too late awaking, well they kent / That their fayre guest was gone, they both begonne / To make exceeding mone, as they had been undonne.

1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

These yellow cowslip cheeks / Are gone, are gone. Lovers, make moan.

c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, A Midsommer Nights Dreame. […] (First Quarto), London: […] [Richard Bradock] for Thomas Fisher, […], published 1600, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):

In the bleak mid-winter / Frosty wind made moan, / Earth stood hard as iron, / Water like a stone […]

1872, Christina Rossetti, In the Bleak Midwinter:

(now chiefly Scotland) To lament, complain.


sperling

sperlings (plural)
spirling (alternative)
spurling (alternative)

Osmerus eperlanus
Osmerus eperlanus#Translingual

(Scotland, obsolete) A European smelt (Osmerus eperlanus).


sybo

From cibol. Compare Scottish Gaelic siobann, siobaid.

the head's taen aff them, as clean as I wad bite it aff a sybo!" rejoined Cuddie.

1851, Walter Scott, chapter 32, in Waverley Novels: Old Mortality, page 772:

A person at whom Inglis had a grudge, was owner of a beautiful garden and flower plot, in which he took great delight, priding himself on the beauty and variety of his flowers and he size and quality of his sybo and carrot beds.

1863, Hawick Archaeological Society, Transactions of the Hawick Archaeological Society, page 98:

Yes; in romantic dew - mountain dew, my respected sir, that could give scent to a sybo.

1868, John Wilson, James Frederick Ferrier, James Hogg, Noctes Ambrosian: Volume 1, page 86:


curch

Borrowed from Scots curch, from Middle Scots curche, from Early Scots curche (English Middle English keverchef). Doublet of kerchief.

The snood was exchanged for the curch, toy, or coif, when a Scottish lass passed, by marriage, into the matron state.

1810, Walter Scott, “Canto III. The Gathering.”, in The Lady of the Lake; […], Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for John Ballantyne and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, and William Miller, →OCLC, (please specify the stanza number):

(Scotland) A square piece of linen formerly worn by women instead of a cap; a kerchief.


misteous

en-adj

misteous (comparative more misteous, superlative most misteous)

more misteous (comparative)
most misteous (superlative)

Availing themselves of the propensity of the populace to credit mystery, the avidity with which prophetical rumours are circulated, and the exaggerations of ignorance and terror, certain "misteous propheseis of Merlyne," […]

1801, John Leyden, The complaynt of Scotland:

(UK dialectal, Scotland) Misty; obscure; vague.


sonsy

sonsy (comparative more sonsy, superlative most sonsy)

more sonsy (comparative)
most sonsy (superlative)
soncie (alternative)
soncy (alternative)
sonsie (alternative)

From Scots, from Scottish Gaelic sonasach.

[…]as black a Jacobite as the auld leaven can make him; but a sonsy, merry companion, that none of us think it worth while to break wi' for all his brags and his clavers.

1824, Sir Walter Scott, chapter 10, in Redgauntlet:

The housemaid at the boarding-house where we have stayed since we left Heathstock is a fat, sonsy, good-natured girl, perfectly ignorant and stupid, but she has not been long in the colony, and seems willing to learn.

1866 January 10, Mary Anne Barker, “Letter VI”, in Station Life in New Zealand, London: Macmillan & co, published 1870, page 44:

(UK, Scotland) lucky; fortunate; thriving; plump


inborrow

en-verb

inborrow (third-person singular simple present inborrows, present participle inborrowing, simple past and past participle inborrowed)

inborrows (present singular third-person)
inborrowing (participle present)
inborrowed (participle past)
inborrowed (past)
inborgh (alternative)

From Middle English inborȝ (“bail”), from Old English inborh (“bail, security in cases of theft, a security required in cases where property had been stolen”), from in- + borh, borg (“a security, pledge, loan, bail; payment”), equivalent to in- + borrow. Related to Old English borgian (“to borrow; lend; be surety for”). More at borrow.

cog

(transitive, UK dialectal, Scotland, obsolete) To redeem or buy back from pawn; resume a pledge by restoring the money that has been lent on it.


breastie

1785, Robert Burns, To a Mouse
Wee, sleekit, cow'rin, tim'rous beastie,
O, what a panic's in thy breastieǃ


selly

en-adj

selly (comparative sellier or more selly, superlative selliest or most selly)

sellier (comparative)
more selly (comparative)
selliest (superlative)
most selly (superlative)
silly (alternative)
sillie (alternative)

From Middle English selly, selly, sellich, from Old English sellīċ, seldlīċ (“rare, strange, wondrous”), from Proto-West Germanic *seldalīk, from Proto-Germanic *seldalīkaz, equivalent to seld + -ly.
Cognate with Scots selly, silly (“approved, good, worthy”), Old Saxon seldlīk (“rare, wonderful”), Gothic 𐍃𐌹𐌻𐌳𐌰𐌻𐌴𐌹𐌺𐍃 (sildaleiks, “wonderful”).

cog

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Rare; wonderful; admirable


selly

His brother was […] selly sick and sore unsound.

1470–1485 (date produced), Thomas Malory, “(please specify the chapter)”, in [Le Morte Darthur], (please specify the book number), [London: […] by William Caxton], published 31 July 1485, →OCLC; republished as H[einrich] Oskar Sommer, editor, Le Morte Darthur […], London: David Nutt, […], 1889, →OCLC:

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Wonderfully, wondrously.


selly

sellies (plural)
silly (alternative)
sillie (alternative)

The line is a masterstroke of noncommitment, for the event is a "selly" in the sight of some unidentified readers.

1995, Robert J. Blanch, Julian N. Wasserman, From Pearl to Gawain:

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) A marvel; wonder; something wonderful or rare


ploughgate

ploughgates (plural)
plowgate (alternative)

Not having one ploughgate of land.

1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company, →OCLC:

(Scotland) The Scottish carucate or hide: a unit of land area and tax assessment intended to support a household.


teind

From Scots teind (“tenth”), from Middle English tende, variant of tenthe (“tenth”); see that entry for more.

That in the cale where the Teind was set separately from the Stock, the Duty was commonly far above the true Value of what was paid for the Teind

1731, Alexander Baine, Notes, for the Use of the Students of the Municipal Law in:

What have I been paying stipend and teind parsonage and vicarage for, ever sin' the aughty-nine, an' I canna get a spell of a prayer for't, the only time I ever asked for ane in my life?

1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter VII, in Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume I, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company, →OCLC, page 195:


teind

en-verb

teind (third-person singular simple present teinds, present participle teinding, simple past and past participle teinded)

teinds (present singular third-person)
teinding (participle present)
teinded (participle past)
teinded (past)
tiend (alternative)


anenst

He lives anenst the church.

He shall have a bel, that's Abel; / And by it standing one whose name is Dee, / In a rug gown, there's D, and Rug, that's drug: / And right anenst him a dog snarling er, / There's Drugger, Abel Drugger. That's his sign. / And here's now mystery and hieroglyphic!

c. 1610, Ben Jonson, “The Alchemist”, in William Gifford, editor, The Works of Ben Jonson, volume 4, published 1816, page 88:

He said nothing anenst this particular.

(UK, Scotland, obsolete) About; concerning; anent.


gowdie

Carduelis carduelis
Carduelis carduelis#Translingual

(Scotland) Eurasian goldfinch, European goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis).


chanking

en-adj

chanking (comparative more chanking, superlative most chanking)

more chanking (comparative)
most chanking (superlative)

I would return to Edinburgh but it's chanking!

(Scotland, slang, of weather) Extremely cold.


mischieving

And it ate up sheep and men and women and was a fair terror, and the King had his heralds cry a reward to whatever knight would ride and end the mischieving of the beast.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song:

(now Scotland) The causing of damage or terror; rampaging.


lawly

lawly (comparative more lawly, superlative most lawly)

more lawly (comparative)
most lawly (superlative)

From Middle English lawly, Northern variant of Middle English lowly, louly, louelich, equivalent to law (“low”) + -ly. More at lowly.


mimmerkin

mimmerkins (plural)
mymmerkin (alternative Scotland)
memmerkin (alternative Scotland)
mymerken (alternative Scotland)
mymmerkyn (alternative Scotland)
memmerkyn (alternative Scotland)

From mimmer + -kin. Cognate with Scots mimmerkin, memmerkin (“a dwarf, dwarfish creature”). Compare also mimmering (“doting, dreaming”).

'So it's your problem, no mine, if the wee mimmerkin's run,' he added, wiping his hand on his jerkin. 'Get a move on, man, Iw ant to get a hold of Bernard Stewart before he takes refuge the wrong side of that wall.'

2014 February 14, Pat McIntosh, The Gil Cunningham Omnibus: The Harper's Quine, The Nicholas Feast, The Merchants's Mark, St. Mungo's Robin, C & R Crime, →ISBN:

'A mimmerkin. A dwarf.' 'I am not a dwarf.' Maude Benet had been stern. Sometimes even sharp. But she had not called folk names. Elspet had telt him, as Maude would have done. And he had laughed at her.

2016 November 3, Shirley McKay, 1588: A Calendar of Crime: A Novel in Five Books, Casemate Publishers, →ISBN:

(archaic, Scotland, dialectal) A deformed or freakish person; a dwarf or dwarfish creature.


whitret

whitrets (plural)
futret (alternative)
whitterick (alternative)
whittret (alternative)

We maun off like whittrets before the whole clanjamfray be doun upon us.

1815 February 24, [Walter Scott], Guy Mannering; or, The Astrologer. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and Archibald Constable and Co., […], →OCLC:

But even so he was gey slow to get on with the courting and just hung around Kirsty like a futret round a trap with a bit of meat in it, not sure if the meat was worth the risk […].

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 21:

(Scotland, UK dialect) A weasel or stoat.


plouter

en-verb

plouter (third-person singular simple present plouters, present participle ploutering, simple past and past participle ploutered)

plouters (present singular third-person)
ploutering (participle present)
ploutered (participle past)
ploutered (past)
pleiter (alternative)
plotter (alternative)
plowter (alternative)

As I did not want to plowter about any more in the drizzle and the dark, I put my waterproof over the muzzle of one gun, and made a sort of wigwam with two or three rammers that I found, and lay along the tail of another gun, wondering where Vixen had got to, and where I might be.

1894 May, Rudyard Kipling, “Servants of the Queen”, in The Jungle Book, London, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co., published June 1894, →OCLC, page 187:

(Scotland, Ireland, Northern England, dialect) To splash around in something wet; to dabble.

He's left th' yate ut t' full swing, and miss's pony has trodden dahn two rigs uh corn, un plottered through, raight o'er intuh t' meadow!

1847 December, Ellis Bell [pseudonym; Emily Brontë], chapter IX, in Wuthering Heights: […], volume I, London: Thomas Cautley Newby, […], →OCLC, page 187:

[O]f course he prefers plottering about the house [...]

1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 18: Penelope]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC, part III [Nostos], page 703:

So one night after they had all had supper in the kitchen and old Sinclair had gone pleitering out to the byres, old Mistress Sinclair had up and nodded to Kirsty […].

There's certainly a small boat that people plouter about in.

(Scotland, Ireland, Northern England, dialect) To potter.


plouter

plouters (plural)
pleiter (alternative)
plotter (alternative)
plowter (alternative)

(Scotland, Ireland, Northern England, dialect) The act of ploutering, or splashing about.


swack

en-adj

swack (comparative swacker, superlative swackest)

swacker (comparative)
swackest (superlative)

From Middle English swac (“weak”), possibly borrowed via Scots swack, ultimately from Old English *swæc (found in derivative swæcehēow (“weakmindedness, nonsense”)), from Proto-West Germanic *swak (“weak”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian swäk, West Frisian swak, Dutch zwak, German Low German swack, German schwach, Norwegian Bokmål svak.

Matthew advanced to the foot of the stairs and whistled. The signal had been expected, for presently he was joined by a swack youth of about eighteen years, who carried a couple of long salmon-spears.

1881, Charles Gibbon, For Lack of Gold, page 307:

A swack, healthy lass, with plump bust, arms, and legs (the last then evident), laughing lips, eyes over which the dark hair strayed—a guileless face, full of light and love.

1897, George A. Mackay, Where the Heather Grows, page 161:

it came the turn of a brave young childe with a red head and the swackest legs you ever saw, […] and as soon as he began the drill you saw he'd carry off the prize.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 37:

He made a run for shelter, and he was a swack enough lad them days for all his weight of years.

1949, William Chambers, Robert Chambers, Chambers's Journal, page 707:

He was a swack billy-boy, with the same high color as the landlord, and the same tight spaniel curls.

1953, Edward Ballard Garside, The Man from Brazil, page 162:


cleck

en-verb

cleck (third-person singular simple present clecks, present participle clecking, simple past and past participle clecked)

clecks (present singular third-person)
clecking (participle present)
clecked (participle past)
clecked (past)

From Scots cleck, from Old Norse klekja.

Poor he might be, but the creature wasn't yet clecked that might put on its airs with him, John Guthrie.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 46:

(chiefly Scotland, transitive) To hatch (a bird); (colloquial) to give birth to (a person).


claik

claik (third-person singular simple present claiks, present participle claiking, simple past and past participle claiked)

claiks (present singular third-person)
claiking (participle present)
claiked (participle past)
claiked (past)


claik

(Scotland) The cry of a goose, or other bird.

you might hide with your lass on the top of Ben Nevis and have your bit pleasure there, but ten to one when you got up to go home there'd be Mistress Munro or some claik of her kidney, near sniggering herself daft with delight at your shame.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 79:


losh

and then he said Chrissie! Tired? and she said Losh, no, and my name's Chris, Ewan.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 130:

(Scotland) Expressing surprise, wonder etc.


wastry

Syne Chae had the toddy made and he handed a glass to Ewan first, as was right with a man, and another to Chris, with three spoonfuls of sugar in it, Mistress Strachan might have had something to say about that if she'd seen such wastry.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 136:

(Scotland, Northern England) Extravagance, wastefulness.


coldrife

en-adj

coldrife (comparative more coldrife, superlative most coldrife)

more coldrife (comparative)
most coldrife (superlative)

From Scots cauldrife, from Old Scots "cauldrife", a compound of "cauld" and the (Scots) suffix "-rife" (compare "auldrife", "warkrife", "spendrife" etc.), from the adjective rife.

Long Rob began to glint his grey eyes at her, he'd have to think of getting married himself, he said, fine it must be to sleep with a slim bit the like of herself those coldrife winter nights.

1932, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Sunset Song (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 147:


malagruze

en-verb

malagruze (third-person singular simple present malagruzes, present participle malagruzing, simple past and past participle malagruzed)

malagruzes (present singular third-person)
malagruzing (participle present)
malagruzed (participle past)
malagruzed (past)
malagarouse (alternative)
malagrooze (alternative)

the storms came malagarousing the trees down the length and breadth of the shrilling Howe.

1933, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Cloud Howe (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 276:

"Why remember those nasty centuries when honest folk were queered, pestered and malagroozed by clanjamfries of greedy gangsters who called themselves governments and stock exchanges?"

(Scotland, now rare) To cause havoc to; to disarrange, put into disarray.


witherweight

witherweights (plural)
wither weight (alternative)
wother weight (alternative)
widder wecht (alternative)
wodderweght (alternative)

From wither- (“counter-”) + weight. Compare Middle English witherweȝen (“to counter-weight, counter-balance”).

cog

It is good to have a speciall care that gifts come not in the ballance with grace; for that is too gross a wither-weight. Lay by the painted case when you weigh the jewell; […]

He puts it ay so upon their hand that he gives them it with a wother weight; […]

So, upon the whole, you judge that the balance preponderates on our side just now ?" " I should think sae, Sire, when sic a clod as this castle of Roxburgh is thrown into the bucket. It is nae witherweight this for the end of a weigh-bauk.

1822, James Hogg, The three perils of man; or, War, women, and witchcraft - Page 317:

(UK dialectal, Scotland) A counterbalancing weight; counterweight.


buirdly

en-adj

buirdly (comparative buirdlier, superlative buirdliest)

buirdlier (comparative)
buirdliest (superlative)

Borrowed from Scots buirdly, alteration of earlier buirly (“burly”), of uncertain origin.

So John Muir was brought in from his seat in the lorry, he was big and cheery and buirdly, John Muir, a roadman of Segget [...].

1933, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Cloud Howe (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 293:

(Scotland) Sturdy, well-built; solid, stocky.


bangster

“[…]but ere this preparative pass, that we dare not correct our scholars for fear of bangsters and clanned gentlemen, they shall have all the blood of my body first.”

1840, Thomas McCrie, The life of Andrew Melville, the Scottish reformer, abridged for the Board from McCrie's Life of Melville, page 15:

(archaic, Scotland) A violent, overbearing man; a ruffian, bully or braggart.

None can ever match his fling,
At a reel, or round a ring.
Wightly can he wield a rung;
In a brawl he's aye the bangster:[…]

1829, Robert Chambers, “The Maid that Tends the Goats”, in The Scottish songs, volume 2, page 506:


scathely

scathely (comparative more scathely, superlative most scathely)

more scathely (comparative)
most scathely (superlative)
skaithly (alternative)

From Middle English skathlye, equivalent to scathe + -ly. Compare Middle English skathely (adverb).

(British, dialectal, Scotland) Harmful; scatheful.


scathand

scathand (comparative more scathand, superlative most scathand)

more scathand (comparative)
most scathand (superlative)
scatheand (alternative)
scaithand (alternative)
skathand (alternative)
skaithand (alternative)

From Middle English skathand, scathende, from Old English sceaþiende, present participle of sceaþian (“to scathe”), equivalent to scathe + -and.

(UK dialectal, chiefly Scotland) Harmful; scathing.


nickum

From Scots nickum, a suffixed form of Nick.

Folk said he fair was a nickum, that loon, young Ewan Tavendale that came form the Manse […]

1933, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Cloud Howe (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 451:

(Scotland) A mischievous person; a scallywag.


antrin

antrin (comparative more antrin, superlative most antrin)

more antrin (comparative)
most antrin (superlative)

From Scots antrin, present participle of anter (“to adventure, venture”).

But there was more to it than that, some never knew it, but real enough, an antrin magic that bound you in one with the mind, not only the body of a man, with his dreams and desires, his loves, even hates […]

1934, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Grey Granite (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 554:


eident

eident (comparative more eident, superlative most eident)

more eident (comparative)
most eident (superlative)

From Scots eident, Scottish form of ithand.

far off through the hedges some eident body was at work with a lawn-mower, clinkle-clankle, a bairn was wailing in a bairn's unease as Chris dug and raked […]

1934, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Grey Granite (A Scots Quair), Polygon, published 2006, page 553:

(Scotland, Ireland) Busy, industrious, diligent.


rackle

en-noun

rackle (countable and uncountable, plural rackles)

From Middle English rakyl (“chain”), apparently related to Old Frisian rakels (“chain”), French racle ("the iron ring of a door" (from a Germanic source)), and also Middle English rakente, from Old English racente (“chain, fetter”). More at rackan.

gloss

(countable, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) A chain.

(uncountable, UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Noisy talk.


rackle

en-verb

rackle (third-person singular simple present rackles, present participle rackling, simple past and past participle rackled)

rackles (present singular third-person)
rackling (participle present)
rackled (participle past)
rackled (past)
rakkill (alternative)

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) To talk noisily; rattle on.


litster

From Middle English litestere, from liten (“to dye”) (from Old Norse litr) + -stere (see -ster).

But it was the woolen industry that provided the elder Smibert with a livelihood, for as a litster he spent his days dyeing wool, which was then woven into cloth.

1995, Richard H. Saunders, John Smibert: Colonial America's First Portrait Painter, Yale University Press, →ISBN, pages 1–2:

Other women ran businesses that required reliance on a network of suppliers, sometimes of raw materials. Isobel Provand in the Canongate was a litster.

2002, Margaret H. B. Sanderson, A Kindly Place?: Living in Sixteenth-Century Scotland, Tuckwell Press, published 2002, →ISBN, page 122:

The smell of the tanners' and the litsters' work still hung in the night air, although they had long since gone to their weary beds.

2008, Shona Maclean, The Redemption of Alexander Seaton, Penguin Canada, published 2010, →ISBN:


manrent

en-noun

manrent (countable and uncountable, plural manrents)

Borrowed from Middle Scots manrent, from Northern Middle English manreden, from Old English manrǣden. Doublet of manred.

Although there is no precise statistical analysis of assythments, bonds of manrent were only very rarely used in such circumstances.

2003, Christine Peters, Women in Early Modern Britain, 1450-1640, page 25:

(historical, Scotland) A contract, usually military and between Scottish clans, in which a weaker man or clan pledged to serve, in return for protection, a stronger lord or clan.


buroo

buroos (plural)
broo (alternative)
burroo (alternative)

Representing a Scottish pronunciation of bureau.

Johnny kenned at once the coarse brute was drunk same as father was Friday nights when he got his money from the Broo.

193?, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, ‘Forsaken’, Smeddum, Canongate 2001

‘Anyway, MacFee is very good at stripping lead and copper and zinc and iron from old factories and houses that are going to be demolished – folk pay him to do that, and when work is short he never goes on the burroo.

1990, Alasdair Gray, “Quiet People”, in Every Short Story 1951-2012, Canongate, published 2012, page 461:

(Scotland, slang) The Labour Bureau; hence, unemployment benefits; the dole.


tranty

en-adj

tranty (comparative trantier or more tranty, superlative trantiest or most tranty)

trantier (comparative)
more tranty (comparative)
trantiest (superlative)
most tranty (superlative)
trantie (alternative)

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) (used in reference to children) Intelligent, advanced, or forward for one's age; precocious.


shoggle

en-verb

shoggle (third-person singular simple present shoggles, present participle shoggling, simple past and past participle shoggled)

shoggles (present singular third-person)
shoggling (participle present)
shoggled (participle past)
shoggled (past)

It stood for a moment in rigid immobility, then ere the maniacal echoes of that shout had quavered into silence among the cliffs, it shoggled over the ridge and was lost to view.

1897, Bertram Mitford, The Sign of the Spider:

The awful silence of this sepulchral place was presently , as we rested for ten minutes , broken by a posse of baboons , who having espied us from their krantzes above, came shoggling down to see what we were.

1889, Henry Anderson Bryde, Kloof and Karroo: Sport, Legend and Natural History in Cape Colony:

(obsolete, Scotland, Northern England, dialect) Alternative form of shoogle (“shake, rock rapidly”).


scunnersome

en-adj

scunnersome (comparative more scunnersome, superlative most scunnersome)

more scunnersome (comparative)
most scunnersome (superlative)

‘But all the same it is damned scunnersome, spam, spam, spam, at every meal.’

1955, Robin Jenkins, The Cone-Gatherers, Canongate, published 2012, page 19:


compear

en-verb

compear (third-person singular simple present compears, present participle compearing, simple past and past participle compeared)

compears (present singular third-person)
compearing (participle present)
compeared (participle past)
compeared (past)
compeer (alternative)
compeir (alternative)

(law, Scotland) To appear before a judge in court personally or by attorney.


piend

…the hip-rafters being termed piend rafters.

1868, Villa and Cottage Architecture: Select Examples of Country and Suburban Residence Recently Erected. With a Full Descriptive Notice of Each Bulding …, Blackie & Son, page xii:

Figs. 119 to 135 illustrate various types of couples, ordinary, end, hip, and piend, used in the roof…

1900 February 23, “The Waverly Station at Edinburgh of the North British Railway.”, in Engineering: An Illustrated Weekly Journal, volumes LXIX — FROM JANUARY TO JUNE 1900, page 248:

Small but smart two-storey piend-roofed mansion-house built for the Robertsons of Auchleeks c. 1820.

2007, John Gifford, Perth and Kinross (The Buildings of Scotland; 10), Yale University Press, page 164:

(Scotland, architecture) The angle or edge formed where two surfaces meet. More specifically, the sloped edges of a pavilion or hip roof.


saftie

It was not likely, thought Graham, that the poor wee crooked saftie would be able to take advantage of those circumstances.

1955, Robin Jenkins, The Cone-Gatherers, Canongate, published 2012, page 82:


sharny

en-adj

sharny (comparative more sharny, superlative most sharny)

more sharny (comparative)
most sharny (superlative)

Between her and the sharny-toed brier-ragged heather-nibbling boys had been no kinship […].

1955, Robin Jenkins, The Cone-Gatherers, Canongate, published 2012, page 168:


cloit

en-verb

cloit (third-person singular simple present cloits, present participle cloiting, simple past and past participle cloited)

cloits (present singular third-person)
cloiting (participle present)
cloited (participle past)
cloited (past)

James Kennedy, The Droukit Pedlar
Dazed was he, an’ fairly doitit,
Kack’d wi’ anguish o’ despair,
Sprauchled up, then owre he cloited,
Cowpit catmaw doun the stair.

(Scotland, intransitive) To fall heavily


farrand

From Middle English farand, farende, farinde, from Old English farende (present participle of Old English faran (“to set forth, go, travel, wander, proceed”)), from Proto-Germanic *farandz, present participle of Proto-Germanic *faraną (“to go, fare, travel”), equivalent to fare + -and. More at fare.

der

farand (alternative)
farant (alternative)
farent (alternative)
farrant (alternative)
farren (alternative)

A sore matter for a sinner to be corrected, and yet to go light-farrand under it.

Likely he was, right fair and well farrand, Manly and stout, […]

1756, William Hamilton, A New Edition of the Life and Heroick Actions of the renoun'd Sir William Wallace, etc.:

My farand friends farewell ! so near my heart, / My dowsome cow, my good old mare, and cart !

When, four years before, Ainsworth took land next his own and rebuilt the farmstead "on a new-farrand plan," he had felt a secret irk against him, […]

1893, K. Snowden, Tales of the Yorkshire Wolds:

(obsolete, Scotland, Ireland, Northern England) Having a specified form or disposition; fashioned.


axle tooth

axle teeth (plural)
axeltooth (alternative)
assiltooth (alternative)
axill tooth (alternative)

From Middle English axyltothe, of North Germanic origin, from axyl, from Old Norse jaxl (“a jaw-tooth, grinder”) + Middle English tothe (“tooth”). Cognate with Scots assletuith, asseltuith (“molar, axletooth”). Compare also Danish axeltand (“molar, axletooth”), Swedish oxeltand (“molar, axletooth”).

[…] to loose an axill tooth or an eye, the death of some speciall friend: to dream of bloody teeth, the death of the dreamer […]

1607, Thomas Walkington, The optick glasse of humors:

Many Women would rather endure the Tooth-ach, than their blackness, which not withstanding the Commonalty regard not: yet such a marcour came upon Metrodorus his sons gums, that both his axle teeth, and also his gums, fell out.

1657, Jean de Renou, translated by Richard Tomlinson, A medicinal dispensatory, translation of original in French:

Cynodentes, are those Teeth betwixt the Axel Teeth and the Grinders, called Canini, Columellares, and Oculares, Eye-Teeth, as we say.

1702, Stephen Blancard, The Physical Dictionary:

When the Muscles contract in Length, they swell in Thickness, as may be perceived by laying the Finger upon the Masseter or Muscle of the lower-Jaw, and pressing the Grinders or Axel-teeth together […]

1738, Henry Bracken, Farriery Improv'd: or, a Compleat treatise upon the art of farriery:

The Lamperts in a horse's mouth are known by every person; they are flaps that many do not understand, they are pieces of loose skin that grow in the wicks of their mouths, adjoining the axel teeth, and when they are eating hay or corn, it is apt to get betwixt them, which makes their mouth fore, and they are afraid of eating.

1790, J. Cundall, The School of Arts; Or New Book of Useful Knowledge:

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) A molar tooth; molar.


banky

en-adj

banky (comparative more banky, superlative most banky)

more banky (comparative)
most banky (superlative)

(UK dialectal, Northern England, Scotland) Hilly; sloping.


arseling

From Middle English *arsling, from Old English earsling (“backwards, on the back”), equivalent to arse + -ling. Cognate with Dutch aarzeling, aarzelings, German ärschling, ärschlings.

inh

arselings (alternative)
arselong (alternative)

(UK dialectal, especially Scotland, East Anglia) Backwards.


excambie

en-verb

excambie (third-person singular simple present excambies, present participle excambying, simple past and past participle excambied)

excambies (present singular third-person)
excambying (participle present)
excambied (participle past)
excambied (past)


starn

From Middle English sterne, starn, From Old Norse stjarna, from Proto-Germanic *sternǭ (“star”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂stḗr (“star”). Doublet of star.


barling

From Middle English barling, berling, from Old Norse berlingr (“bar, pole”) (found in berlings-áss (“bar, beam, plank, rail”)), a diminutive derived from Proto-Germanic *barō (“beam, bar, barrier”); equivalent to bar + -ling. Cognate with Swedish bärling (“pole, bar”).

der

A tripod can be formed of three hop poles or barlings. The former can be laid in depths up to 2^ metres and the latter in depths up to about 5 metres at low water if the tidal range does not exceed about 3 metres.

1970, Admiralty Manual of Hydrographic Surveying - Volume 2

[...] one pair of fetters, one pair of couplings, 2 barlings [poles], 2s 6d; one saddle, one bridle, one panel, 12s; one corn hutch and 1 chaff bin, 6s 8d; one plough, one pair of harness and one coulter, 2 plough sha-[rest torn] with chains, 14s.

1981, Ann Hughes, W. R. Owens, Seventeenth-century England, a Changing Culture:

On shallow waters they moved upstream using small barlings; [...]

2005, V. D. Golubchikova, Z. Í. Khvtísíashvílí, E. R. Akbalʹi︠a︡n, Severnai︠a︡ ėnt︠s︡iklopedii︠a︡:

(rare or UK dialectal, Scotland) A pole; (carpentry) the cross rafter of a roof.


herling

(archaic, Scotland) The young of the sea trout or similar trout, once thought to be a separate species.


spulzie

en-noun

spulzie (countable and uncountable, plural spulzies)

spulzies (plural)
spuilzie (alternative)
spulye (alternative)
spulyie (alternative)
spuilyie (alternative)

Captain Waverley, I must request your favourable construction of her grief, which may, or ought to proceed, solely from seeing her father's estate exposed to spulzie and depredation from common thieves and sorners

1814 July 7, [Walter Scott], Waverley; or, ’Tis Sixty Years Since. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC:


spulzie

en-verb

spulzie (third-person singular simple present spulzies, present participle spulzieing or spulzying, simple past and past participle spulzied)

spulzies (present singular third-person)
spulzieing (participle present)
spulzying (participle present)
spulzied (participle past)
spulzied (past)
spuilzie (alternative)
spulye (alternative)
spulyie (alternative)
spuilyie (alternative)


garvock

Sprattus sprattus
Sprattus sprattus#Translingual

(Scotland) A fish, garvie or sprat (Sprattus sprattus).


sparling

From Middle English sperlynge, shortened from Old French esperlinge, a Germanic borrowing, found in German Spiering, Spierling, Middle Low German spirling, Middle Dutch spierling, suffixed from the word now Dutch spier (“spar, pole; muscle”). See also sparrow for a homonymic bird-name.

(Scotland) A European smelt (Osmerus eperlanus).


pigg

piggs (plural)
pig (alternative)
pyg (alternative)

Uncertain. Perhaps from pig (“swine”), due to the shape. Compare also Middle English pig (“a container for wine; the hide of a pig used as a wineskin”), from pigge (“pig”). More at pig.

cog

lying useless here in this auld pigg

1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Company, →OCLC:

(Northern England, Scotland) A piggin (“an earthenware vessel, jar, crock”).


sowens

sowans (alternative)
sowins (alternative)

It was sowens she had in her hand for our supper, when a little old woman walked in and begged a lippie of meal of her.

1860, Thomas Pattieson, “The Smith and the Fairies”, in J[ohn] F[rancis] Campbell, transl., Popular Tales of the West Highlands: Orally Collected: With a Translation, volume II, Edinburgh: Edmonston and Douglas, →OCLC, page 61:

(Scotland) A food item made from the husk of the oat by a process similar to that by which common starch is made; flummery.


smittlish

en-adj

smittlish (comparative more smittlish, superlative most smittlish)

more smittlish (comparative)
most smittlish (superlative)

“I han't been nigh the smittlish consarn,” said the Leech.

“Tell us what caused this smittlish mood.”
“I do hope it is an infectious mood, Father,” Harriet replied, smiling at her dear papa.

(Scotland, dialect, rare) infectious; catching


beadsman

beadsmen (plural)
bedesman (alternative)

From earlier bedeman, from Middle English bedeman (“a petitioner”), equivalent to bead (“request, petition, prayer”) + -man.

suffix

(Scotland, historical) A public almsman; one who received alms from the king, and was expected in return to pray for the royal welfare and that of the state; a licensed beggar.


misguggle

en-verb

misguggle (third-person singular simple present misguggles, present participle misguggling, simple past and past participle misguggled)

misguggles (present singular third-person)
misguggling (participle present)
misguggled (participle past)
misguggled (past)
misgruggle (alternative)
misgoggle (alternative)
misgrugle (alternative)
misgaggle (alternative)
misgoogle (alternative)

From a conflation of mis- + guggle (“to soil, dirty”) and mis- + gruggle (“to disorder, rumple”).

(transitive, Scotland) To hack; slash; carve.


yass

Yass. I never got above the rank of shavetail. We were the dogfaces who gave ’em hell at Chateau Thierry.

1962, Joseph Commings, “The X Street Murders”, in The Mammoth Book of Perfect Crimes & Impossible Mysteries, published 2006:

(US, dialectal, Scotland) Pronunciation spelling of yes.