Glossary of Dorset dialect words

Asker
Archet
Bally-rag
Bee-pots
Biddle in a barken field
Bit 'n' drap
A girt clavy
Clinkers or tinklebobs
Cowlease
Drongway
Dumbledore
Emmet
Faddle of firewood
Gallycrows
Gilcups
Greygoles
Homhle
Hoss-stinger
A mampus in Yetminster
A pisty-poll
Popples
A Reddick
Sives
A smeech
Welshnuts
Wonthills
Yakkers

These are some words which are unique to the Dorset dialect, spoken in Dorset in the West Country of England.

Word Meaning
A
A-cothed Disease
A-drawen Drawing, for example "He be a-drawen a picture."
A-feard Afraid (Dorset motto, "Who's a-feard?")
Agean Against, for example "'e be runnin' agean thac strong wind."
Aggy The act of collecting eggs[1]
Aïght Eight
Ailen illness, ailing (verb or noun)[1]
Air vlees Flies that seldom land for hovering in the air
Aish or Aishy Ash tree
Aish-a-twiddick Ash twig
A-lassen Lest
Alik' Like
All's All this
Amper Pustules "I be all out in an amper!"
Aller The alder tree
Allum All of them
Anby At a near time, by and by
Annan? An interjectional exclamation. "What did you say?"
Anewst, or Aniste At nearest
Anigh Near, close by[1]
Ankly The ankle[1]
Any-when At any time[1]
Archet Orchard[1]
Arn A contraction of "e'er a one"
Ash candles The seed vessels of the ash tree
Asker Water newt
A-strout Stretched out[1]
A-stooded Stood (as a waggon) immovably in the ground
A-stoggd Having your feet stuck in either clay or dirt
At To play at, to have at
Athirt Across
Auverlook Overlook, bewitch, look on with the evil eye
Avore Before[1]
A-vroze Frozen[1]
Awaked Awake
Ax To ask[1]
Axen Ashes[1]
Ayer Air[1]
A-zet Set or planted
A-zew 1) To be dry of milk; no longer giving suck "The cow's a-zew" 2) To sew a pond, to drain or draw it dry.
B
Backhouse Outhouse[1]
Backside backyard or rear of property[1]
Bad Synonym for ill
B'aint be not
Ballyrag To scold[1]
Bandon Abandonment
Bandy A stick used for beating dung out of the way, usually long and sturdy with a bent end[1]
Bandylags Crooked/bowed legs
Bankrout Bankrupt
Bantling Child
Barken Barley[2]
Barry Borrow[2]
Batch Hillock[2]
Battenbuoard A tool for tamping thatch on a roof[2]
Baven A faggot of untrimmed branches[2]
Beas' Beast, usually refers to cattle[2]
Beatplough A tool used for cutting turf[2]
Becall To deride
Bedraggled angels Wet sheep
Beens Because, possible contraction of 'being as'[2]
Bee-pot Beehive[2]
Beknown Known about
Bennits The bent tips of grasses and similar[2]
Ben't Wasn't
Bibber Shiver with cold[2]
Bide Dwell[2]
Biddle Beetle[2]
Bird-kippy To keep birds from the corn[2]
Bissen Bist not, Art not
Bit-an'-drap A bite to eat and a drink[2]
Bit-an'-crimp Every last scrap of something[2]
Biver To shake or quiver with cold or fear
Black Bards Rooks (or 'storytellers')
Black-bob Cockroach
Blatch Black or sooty[2]
Blather An uproar[2]
Bleare To cry outload and fretful like a child
Blether To bleat or blare much; to talk noisily
Blood beads Berries
Bloody Warriors Wallflowers
Blooth Blossom[2]
Bottom Steadfast[2]
Braims Membranes
Brake A thicket
Brembles Brambles
Brinton or Braton Bold, audacious[3]
Brockle Broken[3]
Bruckly or Brickley Brittle[3]
Brushen Huge/giant
Budget A leather pouch for a whetstone[3]
Bull-head Tadpole
Bumbye By-and-by[3]
Bundle To bound quickly
Bunker Rabbit
Button-crawler Woodlouse
Bwoneyard Graveyard/churchyard
C
Caddie An uproar or carry-on[3]
Caddle Muddle[3]
Cag Cloy/clog
Cag-mag Rotten meat
Cammish Awkward
Car Carry or move: to car hay is to stack hay[3]
Carner Corner
Cas'n Can'st not
Cast Prematurely born
Cazelty weather Extremely bad weather (casualty weather)[3]
Chalky Ghostly
Chammer Chamber, bedroom, room
Charken, charked Burn (to charcoal), burned
Chattermag Magpie
Chawly-whist Ashamed
Chaw Chew[3]
Cheese-late A floor for drying cheese[3]
Chetlens The entrails of any edible animal
Chilver or Chilver hog A yearling ewe lamb
Chimley Chimney[3]
Chop Sell, barter or exchange[3]
Chump A log of wood[3]
Clavy Mantelpiece[3]
Clinker Icicle[4]
Clitty Stringy and sticky, tangled in clods or lumps
Clodgy Dumplike, close
Clot Lump, clod
Clutchéd Clutched
Cockle Tangle[4]
Codgloves Hedger's gloves, with a bad for all the fingers together
Comely or Come To be ripe. Inviting
Conk-load Nose-full
Conzum-ed Consumed
Cowheart Coward
Cowlease An uncut field, meadow[4]
Cradlehood Early stages of childhood, infancy, still in the cradle[4]
Crate Womb
Creezey Silky
Crewel Cowslip
Cricket A low stool or chair for a child[4]
Crims Cold-shivers, creeping of flesh
Croodle To rock, to coo. To make little crowings
Croopy To sink one's body, bending down the thighs behind the legs
Crousty Grumpy, in a bad mood[4]
Culver Wood pigeon
Curdles Hair curls[4]
Cuty Wren
D
Dabster Someone who is skilled in something, an expert[4]
Dadder To confuse or bewilder[4]
Dander Vex, anger[4]
Darkling bird Blackbird
Daw Jackdaw
Death-biddle Deathwatch beetle
De-da Simple, foolish, slow-witted
Devil's bird Magpie
Dewbit A bite to eat taken first thing in the morning before breakfast[4]
Didden Did not
Dorring Mocking
Doughbiaked Feeble-minded[5]
Dout Put out a flame or fire, "Dout the candle" for example[5]
Downdashious Audacious[5]
Drashel The strip of wood or concrete at the bottom of a doorway, the threshold[5]
Draty Draught, draughty, full of draughts of air
Drawlatcheten Idle, lazy[5]
Drinky Having consumed too much alcohol, inebriated[5]
Dread-fulled Full of dread
Dread gates School gates
Drean To drawl in speaking
Dree Three
Drisk A fine, wind-driven mist
Drownsy Drowned
Drush Thrush
Duckish Dark, gloomy[5]
Drong Squeeze or compress[5]
Drongway A narrow passage or alley; Most commonly a narrow footpath between two fenced fields[5]
Dumbledore Bumblebee[5]
Dummet Dusk
Dungy Downcast, dull
Dunnick Sparrow
E
'e He
Eacor Acorn
Eet Yet[5]
Effets Newts[5]
Egg-tree Ovary
Elebm Eleven
Em Them
Emmets Ants[5]
En Him
Engripement Grievance
'enself Himself
'es His
'e's He is
Eth, ethly Earth, earthly
Ethed Buried
Ether-hunger The hunger for earth, sometimes felt by persons approaching death
Evemen Evening[5]
F
Faddle To pack or bundle together[6]
Fantod Fuss[6]
Farterous Father-like
Feasen Faces
Fess Pleased with, proud[6]
Fevrell February
Fleeceful As much as fills a fleece
Fleecy Fleece; drunk, drunken
Flummocks To scare or frighten[6]
Footling Something worthless, beneath contempt[6]
Footy Insignificant, small, trivial[6]
Fowel The placenta of a cow
Freen Free from
Frith Thin twigs that have broken off from trees and bushes, historically used to make brushes; brushwood[6]
Frog-hopper Grasshopper
Furby Foul or sticky matter, as that on a tongue in sickness
G
Gake To stare open-mouthed, gawk, gape[6]
Gallycrow Scarecrow[6]
Gannywedge A wide yawn or to spread apart[6]
Gap Mouth
Gapmouth Nightjar
Gawl, Gawly An opening, an empty place, a bare patch; empty hollow
Gi'e To give, to yield
Gilcup or Giltcup A small, yellow flower of the family Ranunculaceae, common in meadows and pasture; buttercup[6]
Girding Taunting
Girt Large, great[6]
Glene To joke with[7]
Glory hole Vagina
Glow Stare or watch with fixed, open eyes
Glutch To swallow[7]
Gnang To mock by half-clear sounds, wagging the jaw with a grin
God's stinking tree Elder
Goocoo Cuckoo
Goocoo pint Wild arum, snakeshead, Arum maculatum
Goocoo's bread Wood sorrel
Goocoo spettle or Spume Cuckoo spit, a white froth secreted by insects
Grab Crab apple tree
Gramf'er Grandfather
Gramm'er Grandmother
Grave To bury
Greygole A small, blue woodland flower of the hyacinth family; Bluebell[7]
Gribble A young crab tree or blackthorm
Grotten A sleep-slade, a run or pasture for sheep
Growed Grew
Gurrel Girl
Gwain Going[7]
Gwains-on Rowdy behaviour (goings-on)[7]
H
Hag-ridden A nightmare attributed to a supernatural presence of a witch or hag, by whom one is ridden to sleep
Halterpath A path for a horse and rider; Bridleway[7]
Handy Thereabouts, an approximation, "Ees 6' or somewhere 'andy" for example[7]
Hangen house A shed under the continuation of the roof of the house
Han'pat Nearby, close at hand[7]
Harled Tangled
Hassen Hast not
Hatch A small gate[7]
Heabm Heaven
Heal or Healéd To cover over[7]
Hedlen Headlong[7]
Heissen A prediction of evil
Hetful Hot
Heth Hearth
Hethcropper A horse or pony bred on a heath[7]
Hidy-buck Children's game, hide-n-seek[7]
Ho To be anxious or to show caution[8]
Hoar-stone Standing stone or ancient boundary stone
Hobble A field-shed for cattle
Hobby Horse Woodlouse[8]
Hogget A yearling sheep of either sex, the meat of a hogget
Hogget shears Sheep shears
Hold wi' Side with
Holm Holly
Holrod Cowslip
Holway Hollow lane
Homhle A duck[8]
Honey-zuck A climbing plant of the family Caprifoliaceae; honeysuckle[8]
Honking Inhale deeply
Hook To gore with the horns
Hoss-stinger or Ho's adder Dragonfly[8]
Hummock Cow
Hustle To moan, spoken of the wind
Hwome Home
I
Ice-candles Icicles[8]
Inneath Behind, inside
Inon Onion[8]
Inwards Innards
J
Joppety-joppety Anxious, nervous trepidation[8]
K
Keech To clear a riverbank of weeds[8]
Kit Friend or family, kin[8]
Knog Knob
L
Lag Leg
Lagwood The larger cut-off branches and twigs of a tree
Laminger One who has become lame
Lamploo A game of tag in which those caught join hands with the pursuer/s to form a chain[9][10]
Lear An ailing in sheep
Leaze Field
Leery Hungry[9]
Lerret A traditional, double-ended boat with a flat bottom and high sternposts, which can be launched from a steep bank or beach [9][11]
Let A stopping or interruption
Limber Skinny, slim, slender[9]
Limner Painter and decorator[9]
Lip Basket[9]
Lippen Wet weather, rainy, sometimes also referred to as lippy[9]
Lisome Cheery, happy[9]
Litter Confusion[9]
Litty Of light and easy bodily motion
Loneleft Left alone
Long tail Pheasant
Lovesome Lovely, loving
Lowsen To listen
Lure A disease of sheep; an ulcer in the cleft of the foot
Lwonesomness Lonesomeness
M
Magot An impulse or whim[9]
Maggoty Very drunk
Main Strength, power[9]
Mampus A crowd[9]
Mandy Saucy
Mare's tail Equisetum arvense (horsetail)
Mazzerdy Knotty
Meeces Mice
Mesh Moss[9]
Midin' Might not, may not
Milchi Milk, milky pale
Milk flower Snowdrop
Mingdom A stinking, dirty or unpleasant kingdom
Mommet A guy, an effigy
Moud or Moule Field mouse[12]
Mus'n Must not
Mwope Bullfinch
N
Nammet A light lunch of meat[12]
Near Parsimonious, miserly[12]
Nearen Nearby
Nesh, Neshen Tender
Nesseltripe The weakest or last born
Nether-ethed Buried
Netherwise Viewed from below
Nicky Kindling[12]
Nippy Peckish[12]
Nirrup Donkey[12]
No-but Nothing but
Noowhen At no time
Not Flowerbed[12]
Nuncheon A noon-time meal, luncheon[12]
Nuts Joy; testicles
O
Oone One
Orf A viral form of pustular dermatitis found in sheep, and communicable to humans
Out ov ban Instantly, at once[12]
Over-right Opposite[12]
Over-watch Baby-sit
Owl, owling To owl about, to ramble by night
P
Pank To pant
Parlour-sky Attic, loft
Parrick A piece of fenced off land, a paddock[12]
Peart Healthy, vibrant, full of life[13]
Pecker Green woodpecker
Peck upon Dominate[13]
Pelt A rage, to feel angry[13]
Peze, peaze To ooze out
Piaviours Flagstones[13]
Piggyback, a pig a back, a pack a back To carry a child on one's back with their arms around your neck and their legs around your waist.
Piss-a-bed Dandelion
Pisty poll To carry a child on one's shoulders with their legs around your neck and their arms around your forehead.
Pleck A small enclosure
'plexion Complexion
Pock-fretten Pock-marked from acne
Poll Head
Popples Pebbles[13]
Prog Food[13]
Purl Curl, swirl, frill; or an abbreviation of pur lamb
Pur lamb A castrated ram lamb
Puxy A miry or boggy place
Pwope A bunchy thing, an effigy, a doll, a puppet
Q
Quartere'il, Quaterevil A disease of sheep, a corruption of the blood
Quine The corner of a wall[13]
Quob Quiver, shake[13]
R
Rafty Rancid
Rake To reek
Rale Walk[13]
Rammish Strong smelling, rank
Ramshacklum Useless[13]
Rangle To reach about like a trailing or climbing plant
Rap Swap, barter or exchange[13]
Rathe Early[13]
Reames The frame or ligaments of a thing, skeleton
Rean Consume food quickly and greedily[14]
Reaphook A curved blade for cutting grasses; Sickle[14]
Reapy Reap
Red-bread Vagina
Reddick Small garden bird with a red breast, commonly known as a robin (Erithacus rubecula)[14]
Red rag Tongue
Reeve Unravel[14]
Riblets Little ribs
Roasting tomb Stove
Rod Penis
Rottletrap Rickety[14]
Ruddle A red earth by which they mark they mark sheep
Rudger or Rig An uncastrated horse
Rum Queer
Rumstick Queer, a queer man
S
Sar To serve or feed animals
Sarch To search
Satepoll A foolish or silly person[14]
Scaly Mean, stingy[14]
Sclerevil Hardened and evil
Scote To shoot along very fast
Scram Screwy-grown
Scratch, scratching To write, writing; to carve
Screak, screaking To creak loudly
Scriddick, scrid A small scrap or shred
Scrip Shepherd's coat
Scroff Small bits of dead wood
Scroop, scrooping The low sound of one hard body scraping against another
Scrounch, Scrunch To crunch strongly
Seem an I Seems to me
Shabby mothers Ewes
Shade Spirit, ghost
Shatten Shall not
Sheep nuts Coarse mix pellets, sheep food
Shim a she/him
Shockle To shake about lightly
Shoo A cry to fray away owls
Shram A screwing up or out of the body and limbs from keen cold
Sify To catch the breath in sighing; to sob
Sives Chives or garlic[14][15]
Skeat, skeating A looseness of the bowels
Sloey spears The sharp spines on the branches of the sloe or blackthorn
Slommock(en) A slatternly, thick-set, stocky, short, dirty woman
Smame To smear
Smeech A cloud of dust[16]
Smirchéd Tarnished
Smoor To smear
Snabble To snap up quickly; To eat quickly or greedily[16]
Snake's-head Arum maculatum
So't Soft
Soldier's tears Mullein, a tall, stiff flowered, woolly plant
Somen Someone
Somewhen At some time
Soonere Ghost
Span-new Clean and shiny, like new[16]
Spawl, spawly A splinter flown off, as from wood or stone; splintered
Sprak Spry, lively[16]
Speare Thin, lanky
Spet To spit
Spiles The beard of barley
Spotter (Great or lesser) Spotted Woodpecker
Spume Come, semen
Squitters Diarrhoea in cattle
Stare Starling
Stiver To stiffen up much as an angry dogs hairs
Stumpy To walk with short stamoing steps
Sweethearts Goose grass
Sweven A dream
T
Taffle To tangle, as grass or corn beaten down by weather
Tarble Tolerable
Tardle To tangle
Teake to To reach forth to a man or thing with a ready good will
Teare Eager and bold as flies on food
Tet Teat
Tewly Small and weakly
Theave A three-year-old sheep
Theosom These
Thick as inkle weavers Close in friendship, from inkle, a kind of tape for a very narrow loom at which the weavers sat close side by side
Thieves Fairies
Thik That
Thirtover Perverse
Thumbles Thumbs
Tidd'n 'tis not
Tilty Grumpy, irritable, ill-tempered[16]
Tinklebobs Icicles[16]
Torrididdle A state of bewilderment or confusion[16]
Toyear This year; as in today, tomorrow etc.[16]
Trapes, Trapesèn A woman who tramps about bodly
Tree-tears Leaves
Tuen Tune
Tup A ram; (of a ram) to copulate with a ewe
Twanketen Sad, melancholic[16]
T'wards Towards
'twere It were
Twiddick A small twig
Twink Chaffinch
Twoad Toad
Twoad's meat Toadstools
U
Undercreepen Devious, sly, underhand[17]
Unheal To uncover
Unray To undress
Upsmitten Dust or liquid sprayed or blown upwards
Upsydown Upside down, overturned[17]
V
Vall To fall
Vang To earn[17]
Veag Wrath, a high heat of anger (Anglo-Saxon faegth)
Veäre Weasel
Veäry Fairy
Veäry ring Fairy ring, a ring of fungi
Veäry tale Fairy tale
Vess'y To versey, to read verses by turns
Vilthy Filthy
Vinny Veiny or mouldy, like the Dorset cheese, Blue-vinny[17]
Vitty Neat and proper[17]
Vive Five
Vlee Fly
Vlesh vlee A blowfly, a flesh fly
Vlit Flit
Vlittermouse Bat
Vloat Float
Vlutterbie Butterfly
Vog Fog
Vokket To go about here and there
Voley Vole
Vom Vomit
Vorehearing Premonition, forewarning
Vore-right Going forward without regard to consequences or seemliness
Voretold Foretold
Vorewarn Forewarned
Voul Foul
Vower, vowr, vow'r Four
Vuzzen Fir trees
W
Wagwanton Quaking grass
Want Mole
Want-heave Mole hill
Want-heave slave A mole
Ware Pond[17]
Waxen crundels Swollen tonsils
Weave To rock backwards and forwards in pain
Welshnut Walnut[17]
Werret To concern or worry[18]
Wether A castrated male lamb
Wevvet Cobweb
Wevvet queens Spiders
Wheel-bird Nightjar
Whinnick To whine softly or slightly
Whiver To hover, to quiver
Winker Eyeball
Woak Oak
Woodculver Wood pigeon or ringdove
Woone One
Wont Mole, small burrowing mammal of the family Talpidae[18]
Woppen Big, heavy[18]
Wopsy or Wops Wasp[18]
Wordle World[18]
Wurse Devil, arch-fiend
Y
Yakker Acorn[18]
Yer Your
Yer tiz Here it is, yes it is
Yis Earthworm[18]
Yoller Yellow
Yollerheads Daffodils
Yoller roses Primroses
Yop Speak rapidly, jabber[18]
Z
Zeale or Zack Sack[18]
Zebm Seven
Zedgemocks Tufts of sedge grass
Zet up To anger, infuriate[18]
Zing Sing
Zive Scythe
Zix Six
Zounds Sounds
Zummat Something[18]
Zwail Swagger[18]
Zweal To scorch
Zweat Sweat
Zween, zweemy A feeling of swinging around in the head

See also

Wiktionary has a category on Dorset English.

Citations

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Newton (2014), p. 7.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Newton (2014), p. 8.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Newton (2014), p. 9.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Newton (2014), p. 10.
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Newton (2014), p. 11.
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Newton (2014), p. 12.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Newton (2014), p. 13.
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Newton (2014), p. 14.
  9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Newton (2014), p. 15.
  10. ^ Bertha Gomme, Alice (2009). The Traditional Games of England, Scotland, and Ireland With Tunes, Singing-Rhymes and Methods of Playing etc. (Complete). Library of Alexandria Publishing. ISBN 9781465572899.
  11. ^ "Lerrets and Fishing Off Chesil Beach". Dorset Ancestors. 21 November 2011. Retrieved 22 July 2017.
  12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Newton (2014), p. 16.
  13. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Newton (2014), p. 17.
  14. ^ a b c d e f g h Newton (2014), p. 18.
  15. ^ Barnes (1863), p. 84.
  16. ^ a b c d e f g h i Newton (2014), p. 19.
  17. ^ a b c d e f g Newton (2014), p. 20.
  18. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Newton (2014), p. 21.

References

  • Barnes, William (1863), A Grammar and Glossary of the Dorset Dialect, Berlin: A. Asher and Co.
  • Newton, Gill (2014), Dorset Dialect, Sheffield: Bradwell Books, ISBN 9781910551011

Harvey, PJ (2022), Orlam, London: Picador, pp. 283–297, ISBN 978-1-5290-6311-0

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