Scottish Stuff: Black as the Earl O' Hell's waistcoat

 You know you're Scottish when your mother yells at you,"You're as black as the Earl o' Hell's waistcoat'.

What a great expression, lol. Very descriptive is it not? This is an old expression dating back to the 1700's in Scotland which is often used to describe how filthy you are. Such as a hard working man coming home from his day's work with his clothes filthy or a child after playing in the dirt, and coming home absolutely filthy. I have memories of my mother yelling at me as a child because I was always digging in dirt, mud or playing in a pile of bricks that I had found somewhere. I always had a habit of falling over too, so I was often getting my clothes filthy one way or another, lol.  As a  small child my mother would often change my clothes 2 or 3 times a day or I was grounded and sent upstairs to have a bath. I laugh at it all now but my mother was not impressed at how filthy I got out having fun. 

The expression can also mean  pitch black such as a dark night sky without any light or even a dark stormy sky. Scotland was always a very religious country; so the devil was always feared and given the name the Earl of Hell and was said to be dressed all in black.

Another term often used in Scotland is mawkit, which means dirty. As in, you have gotten your clothes dirty from some activity or something that is filthy and one says; eww, look at that, it's mawkit. 

Black affronted; is another expression used in Scotland, which is nothing to do with race whatsoever. It means to be absolutely embarrassed. Example of this would be unexpected house guests that turn up unannounced and you are in the middle of doing your housework or worse your house is messy. A Scottish woman would say she was black affronted. 

Throw a tartan fit, lol,  that's another good one that is used by us Scotts. We do love our tartan after all.

In the Edinburgh region they say, what a red neck or rid neck in that context also. Coming from the west of Scotland I hadn't hear this expression until I lived there for 3 years in the late 70's.  A pink fit is more modern language to mean similar embarrassment. I recall one of my mother's friends using that term. 

White heather is a lucky charm in Scotland, which we give to someone as a keepsake if they are going away somewhere , and the lucky white heather is to bring the person good luck wherever they go. We also use lucky white heather at our weddings too. We give this to our guests as a keepsake and the married couple also have their lucky white heather worn on the day. I had this at my wedding in Australia, which my mother sent over to Scotland for along with  tartan ribbon and silver horseshoes.  I still keep my lucky white heather in my china cabinet as a lucky charm. 

So there you go, a wee bit of Scottish education for you about the use of colours in our language and customs. 

Happy Halloween peeps

 

Halloween, the time of year in which the veil between the spirit world and our world is at its thinnest.

People were fearful of the dead returning and evil spirits being loose upon the world. In reality any day of the year the veil between worlds is at it’s thinnest is between 3.00 am and 5.00 am, because the human body’s vibrational frequency matches the same as the spirit world. That is the most common time when an ill or elderly person may die. So the witching hour of midnight is a just a superstition. 

People were also very superstitious about using a mirror at night on Halloween in case they saw an evil spirit. I recall old people talking about that and being afraid at night to look into a mirror or see a reflection in the windows if the curtains were open. 

Another superstition was for single young women to sit in front of a mirror brushing their hair with a candle lit and eating an apple with hopes of catching a glimpse of their future husbands.

In Scotland bobbing or dooking for apples was always a popular Halloween party game for children; as was dangling treacle scones on a string, children had to keep their hands behind their back’s and only use their teeth to catch the treacle scone. These scones are a triangle shaped scone made with baking soda. So they are not the same as the traditional scones that we think of for Devonshire tea. 

Toffee apples were also popular at Halloween when I was a child. When children went around the streets guising they were often given nuts in their shells, an apple and sweets ( lollies as they are called in Australia) in return for singing, reciting poetry, telling jokes and entertaining the people at each house the children called at. This was always good fun to be entertained by the neighbourhood children all dressed up in their disguise’s. 

Children often carved a Tumshi or Neep lantern, actually it was usually dad that got the task because carving out a turnip is really hard work.  Both Tumshi and Neep are old Scottish words a for turnip. Pumpkin is as American tradition and far easier to carve than turnip. 

 I fondly remember the afternoon craft classes in primary school where the teachers let us make paper lanterns to take home and we would draw pictures to hang up in the classroom for Halloween too.

A few days later of course was Guy Fox night on 5th November and we would again be drawing and painting pictures to decorate the classrooms. This all lead up to getting ready for Christmas so kids are in high spirits from Halloween onwards to Christmas and the New Year parties.

In America Halloween was started by Celtic people that immigrated to the US from Scotland and Ireland and it evolved into what it is now. 

Halloween did not catch on in Australia until the 1980’s but has really taken off since the 1990’s. When I left Sydney in 1995, Halloween was still not really celebrated in Sydney, but it was very popular in Canberra. The season in Canberra is cooler than Sydney in October so perhaps that has something to do with Halloween being so popular in Canberra.

Many people are now aware of the real Celtic origins due to social media, and really it is something that and the entire world an enjoy. Celebrating the end of summer and beginning of winter. 

If you are celebrating Halloween 🎃 I hope you have fun, watch some cartoons and movies to get into the mood too. Enjoy the fun 🎃👻🐈‍⬛🐈‍⬛🎃

Scottish word of the day: Skiddling in the sink

 Scottish children loved to play in the kitchen sink with water and cups and anything that held water when I was small. Which was referred to as skiddling, in English it means splashing about.  Hours of fun for the little ankle biter’s 🤣🤣 

https://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/sndns3399

Interesting Scottish dictionary on line too. I looked up the Scottish word Skelf, which means a splinter. 

https://www.dsl.ac.uk/results/%22Skelf%20%22

https://www.dsl.ac.uk/results/%22Slitter%20%22  Slitter, to spill or drip something on yourself, such as spilling soup down the front of your clothes. 

Words through the ages do change in spelling and also meaning. People my age group notice younger people starting to use words in a different context or meaning often, sometimes through misunderstanding or picking up words from American culture and not knowing the origin of the words. 

I tried to bring my children up to be familiar with Scottish words in use today as well as older words that are still in use from my region of Scotland. I did pick up Doric which is spoken in the east coast of Scotland in the mid 70’s, because I spent three years on the east coast of Scotland near Edinburgh. I just love language and origins of words. 

Even in Australia we have words that have derived from the British Isles, Ireland and Europe. Australia has its own slang which is funny and unique on top of that. Most people would be familiar with the slang words like Arvo, meaning afternoon. An O is often tacked on to the end of words in Australia. Smoko is your break time at work in Australia again you see the O tacked on at the end. 

Scottish language is quite different though because it is more anglicised in modern times, but the dropping of the letter G is common like the word skidding, becomes skiddlin’. It’s a fun language where Scottish people can joke,  with using a mix of Scottish and English words and the pronouncement of the words. I don’t know of other countries where that can be done. It’s kind of our own in house humour and how fast we speak too. I guess diction is  one of the things that makes it funny to us Scotts.