Early Scots

Early Scots

Un-Anglish draft at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_Scots

Early Scots or Older Scots tells of the arising written tongue of Anglish-speaking Lowland

Scotland in the time frame 1100 to 1450 which began to sunder from the early Middle English

forebear of Northumbrian or Early Northern English. Throughout this time frame, it was

mostly called Inglis (kinword with "English"). Early lodestars such as Barbour’s 'Bruce and

Wyntoun’s Tale' were spellingwise the same as writing from northern England at the time but

by the end of the time frame when Middle Scots began to arise, spelling and speechsteadlore

had shifted weightily from that of Northumbrian Middle English.

Eretide Old English had been installed in south-eastern Scotland in the 7th hundredyear and mostly

lingered there until the 13th hundredyear, which is why in the late 12th hundredyear Adam

of Dryburgh spoke of his shire as "in the land of the English in the Kingdom of the Scots"

and why the early 13th hundredyear writer thought that the Firth of Forth "sunders the

kingdoms of the Scots and of the English".

Malcolm II's win at the fight at Carham in 1018 sickered the Gael's hold over the

Anglish-speaking land in what is now south east Scotland. Following the Norman overcoming

in 1066, Edgar the Atheling and his sisters Margaret and Christina fled as havenseekers to

Scotland along with many Scandinavian-swayed English-speaking trothens. Malcolm III took

Margaret as his wife. Malcolm had learned English while outcasted and his wife had no

Gaelic thus English became the homely tung of the Kingly household. Margaret undertook to

bring the Celtic church into line with Rome and welcomed English bishops to Scotland.

Through Margaret's deeds the Gaelic Rikeborns blended with that of the new Anglo-Norman

feeholding landowners.

From this time the Anglo-Norman burghs ur-townwise institutions were built by David I,

mostly in the south and east of Scotland. From the outset these burghs were

Anglish-speaking steads. Incoming burghers were mainly English (moreso from Northumbria,

and the Earldom of Huntingdon), Flemish and French. Although the warwaging rikeborns used

French and Gaelic, these small townish fellowships seem to have been using English as

something more than a shared tung by the end of the 13th hundredyear. They soaked up

further English speaking havenseekers fleeing William I and II and the topsy-turvydom of

Stephen's reign.

The rising economic sway of the burghs indrew further English, Fleming and Scandinavian

inwandering. As the economic might of the burghs grew, Gaelic-speakers from the hinterland

found it furthersome to gain a working knowledge of English. The institutional tung of the

burghs was made up of wordstock of almost wholly Anglo-Saxon roots such as toft (homestead

and land), croft (smallholding), ruid (land let by a burgh), guild (a trade gild), bow (a

bent gateway), wynd (lane) and raw (row of houses).

Norman French and English were becoming working tungs of the Kingdom and in the 12th

hundredyear the folk of the land were called "Franci, Angli, Scoti et Gallovidiani"

(French, English, Scots and Galloway-men). The end of the House of Dunkeld led to the

throne being given to three lowland households, the Balliols, Bruces and Stewarts who more

and more linked themselves with the Anglish-speaking land within the kingdom. The outcome

of this was the headtown shifted from Perth to Edinburgh, although Robert the Bruce was

himself a Gaelic-speaker, and James IV (Stewart) also spoke it.

By the 14th hundredyear, the kind of Northern English that come about from the above

happenings, called Inglis by its speakers, had outshoved Gaelic (Scottis) and Cumbric in

much of the lowlands and the Norman French of the court. It had also come to outshove Latin

as a tung for writs and booklore. In Caithness, it came into contact with both Norn and

Gaelic.

Wordstock The main wordstock is of Anglo-Saxon roots though Scots kept many words which fell out of

use further south. The flow of outlandish borrowings, such as Romanish by way of churchly

and law Latin and French, was much the same as that of English at the time but was often

unlike in detail for that of the ongoing sway of the Auld Bond and the clever use of Latin

words in bookcraft.

Throughout this time many words of Anglo-Saxon wellspring, such as anerly (alone), berynes

(grave), clenge (cleanse), halfindall (a half deal), scathful (harmful), sturting

(tilting, wrangling) thyrllage (thralldom) and umbeset (beset), were now only or almost

only found in Scots.

French borne warfare words such as arsoun (saddle-bow), bassynet (helmet), eschell

(batallion), hawbrek (coat of mesh), qwyrbolle (hardened leather), troppell (troop), vaward

(firstward) and vyre (crossbow bolt) became part of the tung along with other French

wordstock such as cummer (godmother), disjone (breakfast), dour (stern, grim), fasch (irk),

grosar (gooseberry), ladron (knave), moyen (ways), plenissing (fittings) and vevaris

(stock).

The wordstock of Scots was eked out by the speech of Scandinavians, Flemings, Dutch and

Middle Low German speakers through trade with, and inwandering from, the low kingdoms.

From scandinavian (often by way of Scandinavian swayed Middle English) came at (that/who),

byg (build), bak (bat), bla (blue), bra (hillside, slope), ferlie (wonder), flyt (outtake),

fra (from), gar (compel), gowk (gowk), harnis (brains), ithand (tireless), low (fireshoot),

lug (an outgrowth, ear), man (must), neve (fist), sark (shirt), spe (foresight), þa

(those), til (to), tinsell (loss), wycht (fearless) and wyll (lost, bewildered).

The flemings inbrought bonspell (games match), bowcht (sheep pen), cavie (henhouse), crame

(a booth), furisine (flint striker), grotkyn (a gross), howff (hallyard), kesart (cheese

vat), lunt (lightstick), much (a cap), muchkin (a flowstuff mete), skaff (scrounge),

wapinschaw (gathering of folkward), wyssill (change of sterling) and the coins plak, stek

and doyt.

A few Gaelic words such as breive (deem), cane (a tribute), couthal (deemhall of fairness),

davach (a mete of land), duniwassal (blue-blood), kenkynolle (head of the kindred), mare

(geldman) and toschachdor (leader) were found in early law writs but most became obsolete

early in the time frame. Gaelic words for landscape features have endured bogg (mire), carn

(pile of stones), corrie (hollow in a hill), crag (stone), inch (small island), knok

(hill), loch (mere or fjord) and strath (ea dale).

Bookcraft The Tung first came to light in bookcraft in the mid-14th hundredyear, when its written

word differed little from that of northern English byspeeches, and so Scots shared many

Northumbrian borrowings from Old Norse and Anglo-Norman French.

Wording from Legend of the Saints (Anglish: Folktale of the Holymen) 14th Hundredyear XXXIII.--GEORGE.

Ȝete of sancte george is my wil, gyf I connandes had þere-til to translat þe haly story, as wrytine in þe buk fand I. for he wes richt haly mañ & fele tynt saulis to god wane, nocht anerly thru his techynge bot erare thru sample geffine, hou men to god suld stedfast be & thole for hyme perplexite, of lyfe na ded dout hafand nane, bot to resyst ay to sathane & lordis of mykil mycht. & men callis hym oure lady knycht & men of armys ofte se I in til his helpe mykil affy, & namely quhen þai are in ficht.

Wording from The Brus by Barbour (1375 Downwritten by Ramsay in 1489) (a) THE POET’S PROEM. (Anglish: The wordwrights foreword.)

Storyß to rede ar delitabill, suppoß þat þai be nocht bot fabill, þan suld storyß þat suthfast wer, And þai war said on gud maner, Hawe doubill plesance in heryng. þe fyrst plesance is þe carpyng, And þe toþir þe suthfastnes, þat schawys þe thing rycht as it wes; And suth thyngis þat ar likand Tyll mannys heryng ar plesand. þarfor I wald fayne set my will, Giff my wyt mycht suffice þartill, To put in wryt a suthfast story, þat it lest ay furth in memory, Swa þat na lenth of tyme it let, na ger it haly be forȝet. For auld storys þat men redys, Representis to þaim þe dedys Of stalwart folk þat lywyt ar, Rycht as þai þan in presence war. And, certis, þai suld weill hawe pryß þat in þar tyme war wycht and wyß, And led thar lyff in gret trawaill, And oft in hard stour off bataill Wan [richt] gret price off chewalry, And war woydit off cowardy. As wes king Robert off Scotland, þat hardy wes off hart and hand; And gud Schyr Iames off Douglas, þat in his tyme sa worthy was, þat off hys price & hys bounte In fer landis renoenyt wes he. Off þaim I thynk þis buk to ma; Now god gyff grace þat I may swa Tret it, and bryng it till endyng, þat I say nocht bot suthfast thing!