Oan Scots and Respair

A mindin fae bairnheid: waitin aa day fur my posh Kentish kizzens tae win at wir hoose in the north ae Scotland, and the thocht occurrin. See if thir fae aa the wey doun thir in the sooth ae England, and am fae aa the wey up here, hou are we sposed tae ken the ither’s leid? If thir spikkin Inglis, whit dae I spikk? And keepin that tae myself – kennin in my hairt thir wiss nocht tae fear, bit fearin nanetheless.

It wiss dark bi the time a siller Jaguar annoonced itsel oan the gravel. Syne I mind kennin ilka ward; and widdershins, bein kent bi thaim and aa. Syne later, wae the lichts oot, sharin my room wae the kizzen I wiss closest tae in age. ‘Frazer, see in England, whit d’ye cry the toilet?’ And the puir seriousness in his repone. ‘In England, we call it the loo.’

Etymologically-savvy readers (i.e., maist PNR subscribers) wull aye huv jaloused that the ward ‘loo’ – sae specifically English tae Wee Frazer’s inchoate mind – is, in point ae fact, French. And nae even Auld, Norman French, bit recent French, fae the lest century. ‘Lieux d’aisances’; place of ease. Adoptit bi English sodgers durin the Erst Warld War.

Twas ever thus: the mair forcefully we attribute a ward tae a certain territory or nation, the mair likely wull find that same ward tae hae originatit fae ootlin pairts. In Scots, fur instance, thirs extralinguistic influences pairtit wae Inglis – French, Latin, Auld Norse, Dutch, Greek ...