This is a model answer. You might have noted down other facts and ideas.

(a and b) There seem to be words that are similar in Scots and other languages. For example, the Doric word Quine seems to link to Kvinne for woman in Norse languages (although linguists also think the source may be an old English word cwene). The pronunciation of the word moose and hoose in Scots is similar to the pronunciation in Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and Dutch. Norwegian shows most similarities with Scots. Finnish is least like Scots. Gaelic has few similarities with Scots, the most similar being bhrèagha and bricht. The reason is that whereas Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and Dutch of Germanic origins, like Scots, Gaelic and Finnish belong to an entirely different language families, the Celtic and the language family respectively.

It might be interesting for your learners to look up the language families and see where certain families originated and how migration played a part in their reach.

(c) Gaelic has influenced many Scots words, particularly those related to the land such as glen, loch, craig, strath, cairn and corrie. Many retained Latin words borrowed into Scots are legal terms. Norse words feature the lack of ‘n’ in words like drucken, rather than drunken, and words like bigg rather than build. A fair number of French words borrowed into Scots are related to food and drink, such as gigot, ashet, howtowdie (from an old French word hétoudeau for a young capon), tassie (cup).

An example of silly sentences using some of the words:

The drucken dominie tottered doon the glen, went tae the kirk an sat on his dowp, his dubby breeks makkin a richt redd up o the pews. He made on he was luggin intil the sermon, but as he lookit up his thochts drifftit tae his plans fer a roon o gowf wi his caddie, followed by a denner o partan paté, howtowdie an tae settle his kyte, a fine tassie o tee.

Norse , Flemish, French, Latin, Gaelic Translation:

The drunken teacher tottered down the valley, went to the church and sat on his backside, his muddy trousers making a thorough mess of the pews. He pretended to listen carefully to the sermon, but as he looked up his thoughts drifted to his plans for a round of golf with his caddie, followed by a lunch of crab paté, boiled chicken with poached eggs and spinach, and, to settle his stomach, a nice cup of tea.

Return to Unit 4