Letter W - Glossary of words in ‘The Northern Cottage and other poems’ by George Dugall
Author: George Dugall
Date: 1824
Source: ‘Glossary’ — an appendix with notes to The Northern Cottage and other poems; written partly in the Dialect of the North of Ireland by George Dugall (Londonderry: William McCorkell, 1824)
Comments: George Dugall (c.1790-1855) lived most of his life at Portlough near Newtowncunningham in Donegal. His book of poems The Northern Cottage and other poems; written partly in the Dialect of the North of Ireland (sixteen of which were written in what he describes sometimes as ‘braid Scotch’ and sometimes as the ‘dialect of the North of Ireland’), also contains an extensive and separately compiled ‘Glossary’ of Ulster-Scots words. George Dugall describes this Glossary as “a tolerably correct analogical specimen of the language … worthy of the unprejudiced and philanthropic eye of research, [hoping that] the acute and erudite philologer will not despise the simple data”. Indeed Dugall’s poems (see Ulster-Scots Poetry 1800-1899) were “cast”, he says, in the scene of “that part of the North of Ireland” where the dialect “bears a strong affinity to that of Scotland”. His poems are even richer in Ulster-Scots vocabulary than the Glossary indicates, and so citations from his poetry have also been excerpted for the Academy’s Historical Dictionary (see Dictionary).
Doc. ref. no.: USLS/TB/Hist/1800-1899/009-w
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Wa’, wall
Wad, a bet, a pledge, a penalty
Wae, woe
Waefu’, woful
Waft, woof
Wame, womb
Wamefu’, belly-full
Wark, work
Warl, world
Warlock, a wizard
Warly, niggardly, miserly
Warran, a warrant; to ensure
Warst, worst
Wa’s, walls
Wastrie, profusion
Wat, wet
Wattle, a branch of a tree
Wauk, to wake; to thicken
Waukin, awake
Waukrife, wakeful
Waul, to cull, to choose; choice
Waur, worse
Wean, a child
Wee, little, small
Wee-chiel, a little boy
Weel, well
Weet, wet
Weezened, dried, shrunk
Wha, who
Whalp, a puppy dog
Whang, a small leathern string
Whar , where
Whase, whose
Wheep, to blow a small whistle
Wheezle, to wheeze
Whin, furze
Whisht! hush! silence!
Whisk, to shake in a sweeping manner
Whissle, a whistle; to whistle
Whun-stane, a whin-stone
Wi’, with
Wicker, a barb
Wicket, crabbed
Wifie, dimin. of wife
Wimple, to tumble over, to meander
Win’, wind
Win’, to wind, to winnow, to make hay, to dry
Winna, will not
Wonner, a wonder
Wordy, worthy
Wraith, a spirit; a supernatural appearance resembling some person who is shortly to die
Wrang, wrong
Wreath, a heap of drifted snow
Wuddie, a rope of twisted rods
Wull, wool
Wummle, wimble
Wyte, weight, blame; to blame
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