The Royal Society of Edinburgh
What is (and was) Scots?
Answers and Questions from an Historical Perspective
Professor Jeremy Smith FRSE,
Professor of English Philology and Head, School of Critical Studies,
University of Glasgow
Monday 7 December 2015, Eyemouth High School
Report by Kate Kennedy
For many, Scots is a language; for others it is a dialect (or a collection of dialects);
for some it is 'slang'. Whatever we call it, the language variety known as Scots is a
complex and dynamic phenomenon with a fascinating history – a history which
cannot be separated from the people who spoke (and speak) it. This interactive
lecture offered some answers to the question in the title, but also posed some
questions for further pondering.
Professor Smith started by commenting that, as a language historian, people often
ask him “what is Scots?” and this is very difficult to answer and define. No natural
languages are pure and all undergo change, adding and losing material throughout
time. Indeed, language and how it is currently used can reveal interesting things
about its history. One aspect which demonstrates how languages change is that of
place names, which can take on their own life and remain in the landscape, even
when the people who first used them have long since moved on and the originating
language is no longer spoken in a place. For example, ‘Eyemouth’ is a comparatively
recent formation derived from ‘Invereye’, meaning ‘File Estuary’. Over time, the
current derivation has kept the ‘Eye’ component but added ‘Mouth’ in place of ‘Inver’.
In incorporating this style, it has changed from being a Celtic formation to a
Germanic-style place name. In Germanic languages, names are usually ordered with
the specific element followed by the generic part, as in ‘Eye’ (specific) ‘Mouth’
(generic).
This is the opposite to Celtic names. For example, Edinburgh was formerly known as
the Celtic Dunedin; the ‘Dun’ referring to ‘Castle’ and ‘Edin’ being the specific part,
‘Edin’s Castle’. In the current Germanic format, ‘Edin’ has been brought to the front
and ‘Dun’ has been replaced with ‘Burgh’, changing the meaning from ‘Castle’ to
‘Town’ or, in the German language, ‘fortified town’. Kirkcudbright, in southwest
Scotland, is an excellent illustration of how a place name can incorporate different
languages and cultures. ‘Cudbright’ refers to the Northumbrian saint, Cuthbert; the
Northumbrian hegemony spread from the north of England to southern parts of
Scotland. ‘Kirk’ is the Norse for ‘church’ and, therefore, the word Kirkcudbright means
the church of Saint Cuthbert. The third interesting cultural element of Kirkcudbright
refers to the sequencing of the two words ‘Kirk’ and ‘Cudbright’, which is in a Celtic
format. Kirkcudbright, therefore, brings together three cultures of the region; it has a
Celtic ordering, a Norse generic and includes the name of an Anglo-Saxon saint. The
existence of such place names usually indicates an area with a rich history of
settlement by different cultures.
Professor Smith also referred to other place names local to the Borders; including
‘Merse’, which is Old English from the language that stretched from the Lowlands of
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Scotland into the south of England, excluding the northwest of England (which
remained Welsh-speaking), Wales and Cornwall. The ‘Ay’ in Ayton’ may be similar to
the ‘Eye’ in Eyemouth, or may refer to an island in the middle of the ‘Merse’ or
marsh. The ‘ton’ part is Germanic and describes a settlement. Within the word
‘Berwick’, ‘Ber’ relates to beer and barley, with ‘wick’ denoting a farm settlement.
‘Channelkirk’ is a Germanic name, but the Kirk element shows that it has been a
Norse settlement in the past. Many places names which refer to rivers, such as the
‘Jed’ in ‘Jedburgh’, are extremely ancient terms dating from pre Indo-European
languages. All these names and their changes through time tell us that the landscape
in which we live has been home to many different people originating from many
different places. Professor Smith likened place names to ‘fossils’ of the people who
have lived in a region and commented that other aspects of language have similar
‘footprints’. The character and distribution of the languages of present-day Britain
derive from their complex histories.
The history of English is typically divided into four periods: Old English, also known
as Anglo-Saxon up to around 1100AD; Middle English, the language of Chaucer;
Early Modern English, the language of Shakespeare; and Late Modern English,
which continues to this day. Scots and English in Scotland also have a distinct set of
periods: Old English up to 1100AD, a particular version of Anglo-Saxon known as
Old Northumbrian; Older Scots to about 1375, of which only fragments of information
remain; Early Scots from 1375 to 1450; Middle Scots from 1450 to 1700; and Modern
Scots, 1700 to present day. Professor Smith explained that from around the period of
Modern Scots, it is also possible to distinguish a form of the language known as
Scottish Standard English. People started to write about this in the 18th Century and
referred to it as “Scottish purged of vulgarity”. The Scots language is very closely
related to English, but has a complicated relationship with it; some people regard it
as a distinct language and others as a dialect or sub-variety of English. A language
akin to Scots has been documented since the 14th Century. Professor Smith
commented that he is frequently asked whether Scottish Standard English should be
considered as an entirely separate language to English or as a dialect of English, to
which he replies that it is a “very complicated question”!
Languages and their development cannot be formatted into a rigid ‘family tree’-style
diagram with set boundaries and specific dates when changes occurred. Language
development is a more fluid process, with on-going subtle changes, altering
vocabulary over time and place. Scots vocabulary is formed from various different
sources. For example, the word ‘dreich’, which many would assume is authentically
Scottish, is in fact derived from an Old Norse word meaning tedious or lasting. Words
originating from Celtic often relate to cultural objects, animals and topographical
features. Other sources include Low German, with words such as ‘golf’ and ‘scone’
and, as previously mentioned, Norse words such as ‘dreich’. There are also words
deriving from French, such as ‘fash’, from the verb ‘facher’ (to be irritated) and words
relating to Latin, which are largely found in Scots Law terminology. Furthermore,
there are some Old English words which only survive in Scots; for example,
‘gloamin’, ‘haugh’ and ‘bannock’. In present-day English, words that originate from
old English are often monosyllabic nouns which form the core vocabulary, such as
‘hand’, ‘head’ and ‘wife’. English also has Norse words, including basic pronouns,
and French words which are often used to ‘show off’. This relates to the time after the
Norman Conquest when people wanted to use French-derived words to indicate their
status and intelligence. It is interesting that many of these ‘posh’ words are not
special in French; they are simply the basic word that everyone would use. They do
not have any connotations of ‘grandeur’; for example, ‘regard’ from the verb
‘regarder’ (to look at) and ‘commence’ from ‘commencer’ (to begin). There are also
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many words from Latin and, increasingly, from other languages, such as Urdu and
Hindi; for example, ‘pyjamas’, ‘bungalow’, ‘mulligatawny’ and ‘shampoo’.
Evidence of the sources of words can be found in documents, ancient poetry and
writing, and in inscriptions on material culture. Old English looked very different to the
language we read today; it included different letters such as one similar to the
Icelandic ‘thorn’, (Þ, þ), standing for ‘f’. There were also letters known as ‘Ash’, (Æ
æ) and ‘Eth’ (Ð, ð). Professor Smith read a piece of the poem Beowulf in Old English
pronunciation, commenting that some academics differ on how they believe it was
pronounced; but by and large there are accepted ways. On first look, and hearing the
Old English text from Beowulf, it appears like a foreign language but, on closer study,
aspects of current English can be identified. Peculiarities include the fact that Old
English had more than one word for ‘the’ and special endings for ‘the’ depending on
the role it was playing in the sentence. This is common in inflected languages; they
have special endings to denote the relationships between words. Old English
survives in manuscripts; for example, the Lindisfarne Gospels from the 8th Century.
This manuscript draws on the Celtic traditions of book illumination and uses the
‘diminuendo’, whereby the first word of the section starts with a big letter and
subsequent letters decrease in size within that word. In this manuscript, there are
also ‘scribbles’ which have been added at a later date. Professor Smith explained
that these were added around 1050 by Aldred, who felt the need to gloss the
manuscript and added words in between the Latin to help people read it. These
scribbles are among the earliest recordings of Old Northumbrian, the ancestor of
Scots. The actual words are not very exciting or revealing, but their existence is of
utmost importance to the history of language.
Over time, the English language developed and changed. For example, the
Ellesmere manuscript of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales is written in Middle English and
looks and sounds more recognisable than the Old English of Beowulf. One of the
earliest Scots texts to have continually been in print is Barbour’s Bruce. Originally
composed in the 1370s, it was first compiled in a printed edition in 1616, the cover of
which makes a claim for authenticity in that it was created from the oldest
manuscripts. Professor Smith also showed examples from other early texts, including
the first Shakespeare folio, dating from 1623 and written in Early Modern English. In
the line from Macbeth, “No, this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas
incarnadine, making the green one red," the verb incarnadine is an ‘inkhorn’ term, a
‘fancy’ word borrowed from another language (in this case Latin), which is deemed to
be unnecessary or overly pretentious. Shakespeare uses it here to show an element
of ‘class’. In some of his other plays (for example, Love’s Labour’s Lost),
Shakespeare mocks the use of these words, but uses it here as a character trait.
Macbeth and his wife often try to hide terrible things using fancy words; for example,
“the great kwell”, an old word for killing. Shakespeare was the first person to use the
word incarnadine in English.
Printing started in Scotland in 1508, continued for two years and died out, only
reappearing in 1560. An example of an early printed Middle Scots text is Dunbar’s
Golden Targe, in which Dunbar uses something similar to an inkhorn term in the
phrase “golden candle matutine”, (golden morning candle), referring to the Sun.
Matutine is an ‘aureate’ term. These date from a little earlier than inkhorn terms and
are derived from the Roman Catholic liturgy, which is then transferred across to the
vernacular. Aureate means gilded or gold; fancy in some way. A final text, Burns’
Tam O’Shanter, includes elements of Scottish Standard English. The words ‘hame’
and ‘dame’ rhyme in Scots but ‘storm’ rhyming with ‘warm’ is Scottish Standard
English; they do not rhyme in Scots pronunciation. This ‘code switching’ is the
beginning of the phenomenon of language and class; 18th-Century Scotland was
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beginning to associate some words and pronunciations with particular class groups,
something that had been common in English since the 16th Century. Indeed, the 18th
Century was a time when much of the Scots language in use today was configured
and ‘settled down’.
During the latter part of the talk, Professor Smith encouraged the audience to
participate in some interactive exercises devised to show the differences in
pronunciation. There are many examples in Scots where the Old English
pronunciation has been kept where it has changed in English; for example, ‘How now
brown cow’ is ‘Hoo noo broon coo’ in Scots. Some sounds have mostly disappeared,
even in Scots. The ‘gh’ in the word ‘sight’ would originally have had a guttural sound
similar to that at the end of ‘loch’; this can still be seen in some pronunciations of
‘bright’ (bricht) and ‘might’ (micht). Scots pronunciations can still be found in many
parts of the world with Scottish connections; such as Ulster and the Appalachians in
the United States. Despite containing identical vowel patterns, the words ‘good’,
‘food’ and ‘flood’ are largely pronounced in different ways in England and Scotland.
In Scotland, ‘good’ and ‘food’ rhyme, but do not in England; the vowel is longer in
many parts of England and makes an ‘oo’ sound. However, speakers of English from
both countries pronounce flood the same. Why do these words sound different
despite the end letters being exactly the same? There have often been suggestions
that spelling should change to reflect the differences; however, this ignores the basic
function of spelling. Language in its written mode is designed for long-distance
communication through both time and space. Spelling is a fossil history and contains
evidence of how words were pronounced in the past. It can be convenient to have an
agreed spelling system that is not dependent upon pronunciation.
Professor Smith commented that a major resource for the study of the history of
language, other than inscriptions and text, is the present-day language. Its current
format is the result of history and the things people say and write and their accents
are receptacles of history. “Just as place names are markers of historical
development, so is the speech and writing used by everyone, every day. The present
can explain the past, just as the past can explain the present”.
The Vote of Thanks was offered by Mrs Rosemary Daley, Eyemouth High School.
Opinions expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of the RSE, nor of its Fellows
The Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland’s National Academy, is Scottish Charity No. SC000470
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