Scots words in An Abandoned Woman

This book actually started off being called 'An Unkenspeckle Woman', meaning an inconspicuous woman, but it was pointed out to me that not understanding the title was unlikely to be a selling point! Again, we have some repetition from the other books here, and some words that will be in use today or obsolete, and some words that will not be exclusively Scots.

Ain: own

Ashet: serving dish

Bejant: first year student at St. Andrew’s University (from the French, bec jaune, or yellow beak, meaning a young bird)

Carline: old woman, witch

Claik: gossip (though Buchan claik simply means Buchan speech, Buchan dialect)

Compear: to appear in any court, as accused or as witness

Corbie: crow

Couped by the heels: knocked flat

Couthless: unsophisticated

Cuddy: donkey

Doocot: dovecot

Faisible: respectable, decent

Fou’: drunk

Gallant: flirt

General Assembly: the annual meeting of representatives of the Established Church in Edinburgh, where the Moderator is elected.

Gey: very

Gowf: golf

Green garten: giving a sister the green garten = a younger sister marrying before an elder one, an embarrassing situation for the elder sister.

Grushie: healthy

Heich-headit: haughty

Heritors: body of laity, usually landowners, who see to the buildings of a parish, the church, manse and schoolhouse, and appoint the schoolmaster.

Hirple: limp

Hizzie: hussy

Ill-gashioned: mischievous or ill-disposed (a Fife expression)

Jook: duck, dodge

Ken: know

Kenspeckle: well-known, conspicuous

Kirk Session: body of laity, known as elders, who with the minister run a particular church. The Session Clerk is their head. Not unlike a vestry in an Anglican church.

Kist: chest

Lammie: lamb

Lepping-on stane: mounting block

Lug: ear

Manse: oh, everyone will know this one! It’s the minister’s house, the vicarage equivalent. It’s also the name of the house where a particular professor lived and taught at Aberdeen University, so ‘Humanity Manse’ is where Latin was taught, for example.

Mercat: market

Midden: dung heap, refuse heap

Muir: moor

Pavie: panic, chaos

Rammie: fight, particularly street fighting.

Roup: auction

Shilpit: lazy, useless, unpromising generally

Skirl: yell, scream

Steading: farm buildings usually round a yard.

Swithering: indecisive

Taigle: dally (basically entangle)

Taigle the cleek: hinder progress generally, tangle things up

Tatties: potatoes

Un-better-maist: ungentlemanly, unladylike

Uncanny: creepy, not quite right (also not careful, not clever)

Whin: gorse

Yeld: barren