Cumbrian dialect
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The modern county of Cumbria is by no means unique in having a traditional local dialect, but the isolation of the area and its rich history mean that this is perhaps one of the most interesting rural dialects in the United Kingdom. As in any county, there is a gradual drift in accent towards its neighbours. Barrow-in-Furness, in the south of Cumbria, has a similar accent to much of Lancashire whilst the northern parts of Cumbria have a more Scottish sound to them.
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[edit] Brief History of the People and Language
The Celtic Influence
Despite the modern county only being created in 1974 from the counties of Cumberland, Westmorland and North Lancashire and parts of Yorkshire, Cumbria is an ancient land. Before the arrival of the Romans the area was the home of the Carvetii tribe, which was later assimilated to the larger Brigantes tribe. These people would have spoken Brythonic, which developed into Old Welsh, but around the 5th century AD, when Cumbria was the centre of the kingdom of Rheged, the language spoken in northern England and southern Scotland from Yorkshire to Strathclyde had developed into a separate language known as Cumbric. Remnants of Brythonic and Cumbric are most often seen in place names, in elements such as caer 'fort' as in Carlisle, pen 'hill' as in Penrith and craig 'crag, rock' as in High Crag.
The most well known celtic influence in Cumbrian dialect are the sheep counting numerals which are still used in various forms by shepherds throughout the area, and apparently for knitting. The word 'Yan' (meaning 'one'), for example, is prevalent throughout Cumbria and is still often used, especially by less well-spoken people and children, eg. "That yan owr there," or "Can I have yan of those?"
The Northern subject rule may be attributable to Celtic Influence.
Before the 8th century AD Cumbria was annexed to English Northumbria and Old English began to be spoken in parts, although evidence suggests Cumbric survived in central regions in some form until the 11th century.
The Norse Influence
A far stronger influence on the modern dialect was Old Norse, spoken by Norwegian settlers who probably arrived in Cumbria in the 10th century via Ireland and the Isle of Man. The majority of Cumbrian place names are of Norse origin, including Ulverston from Ulfrs tun ('Ulfr's farmstead'), Kendal from Kent dalr ('valley of the River Kent') and Elterwater from eltr vatn ('swan lake'). Many of the traditional dialect words are also remnants of Norse settlement, including beck (bekkr, 'stream'), laik (leik, 'to play'), lowp (hlaupa, 'to jump) and glisky (gliskr, 'shimmering').
Old Norse seems to have survived in Cumbria until fairly late. A 12th century inscription found at Loppergarth in Furness bears a curious mixture of Old English and Norse, showing that the language was still felt in the south of the county at this time, and would probably have hung on in the fells and dales (both Norse words!) until later.
Anything else?
Not really. Once Cumbrians had assimilated to speaking English, there were few further influences on the dialect. In the middle ages, much of Cumbria frequently swapped hands between England and Scotland but this had little effect on the language used. In the nineteenth century miners from Cornwall and Wales began relocating to Cumbria to take advantage of the work offered by new iron ore, copper and wadd mines but whilst they seem to have affected some local accents (notably Barrow-in-Furness) they don't seem to have contributed much to the vocabulary.
One of the lasting characteristics of still found in the local dialect of Cumbria today is an inclination to drop vowels, especially in relation to the word "the" which is frequently abbreviated. Unlike the Yorkshire dialect where 'the' is abbreviated to 'th' (θ) in Cumbrian the sound is harder like the letter 'ð' or simply a 't' and in sentences sounds as if it is attached to the previous word, for example "int'" instead of "in the" "ont'" instead of "on the".
[edit] The Accent and Pronunciation
Cumbria is a large county with several relatively isolated areas, so there is quite a large variation in accent, epecially between north and south or the coastal towns. There are some uniform features that should be taken into account when pronouncing dialect words.
Vowels (RP English > Cumbrian) - see IPA for a guide to phonetics
/ɑː/ as in father > /æ/, as in car /æː/
/eɪ/ as in day > /eː/
/aɪ/ as in pile > /æː/
/əʊ/ as in boat > /oː/
/ʌ/ as in bud > /ʊ/
/iː/ as in seen > /ɪ/ (not in all cases)
/iə/ as in year > /ijə/
words with 'oo', such as poor and moor are pronounced /uə/ 'poowa' and 'moowa' to rhyme with 'sewer'
Other Features
r is tapped once against the roof of the mouth when pronounced
dd in spellings is /ð/ (th as in then)
n tends to be omitted before t in mid-sentence
/t/ tends to be glottalised medially and sometimes finally (eg. the phrase 'I don't want to' might be pronounced [a doːʔ wɒʔuː]); this is not traditionally Cumbrian, but crept in with the migration of workers from the south west of England.
/k/ tends not to be released in the final position
- NB: the placename Kirkby (of which there are several in Cumbria) is always pronounced /kɜːbiː/, with the /k/ omitted, unlike most other parts of the country where it is pronounced /kɜːkbiː/.
[edit] Dialect Words
General words
ah I
ars I am
me my
us me
aye yes
nah no
thew you
areet alright (can be used as a greeting and return, and as per the normal use)
eh (generally used at the end of sentences to indicate that the phrase is a question. It can be inserted simply by habit and then has no particular meaning. The use of "eh" is more often linked to Carlisle than the Cumbrian dialect as a whole)
like (generally used as an intensifier midway thorugh or at the end of sentences)
owie, howie come on
wherst where is the
wi, wid with
yous you all, plural of you
Adjectives
aald old
bad sore, painful
badly ill, unwell (a bad 'ed is a headache)
barie good or nice
cack bad, horrible or awful
clarty muddy or messy
gammerstang awkward person
kaylied intoxicated
la'al small
ladgefull embarrassing
radge, radgy mad
reet right
slape slippery or smooth as in slape back colly, a border colly with short wirey hair
wam warm
Adverbs
gey very
kysty squeamish or fussy
owwer over ("ars garn owwer yonder fer a kip" - I'm going over there for a sleep)
vanya almost, nearly
vanear as above, coastal variant
Nouns
biddies fleas/old people
britches trousers
crack news/gossip; can also mean a conversation in the context of "having a crack with" someone
Jackal wild dog
keks, kegs underpants or trousers
knock-e-i-do a game played where the aim is to knock on someone's door then retreat without being caught
lug ear
nowt nothing
owt anything
scran food
scrow a mess
twining whinging or complaining
Verbs
bray beat (as in beat up someone)
chess chase
clarten messing about
deek look
gander look
gar go
garn going
jarn doing
laik play
loan borrow ("can ah loan 2 quid off yer?")
lowp jump
mek make
scower look at
skit make fun of
twat hit someone ("I twatted him in the face"), a woman's genitalia most likely from 'thwaite' meaning 'fertile valley,' also an insult.
wuk work
People
buwer unattractive girl
gadge person (usually a stranger, or someone whose name is not known)
lad young man
lass young woman
marra friend, companion, mate (mainly used in West Cumbria) mining slang
offcomer a non-native in Cumbria
potter gypsy
Places, landscapes, buildings etc
beck stream
crag stone or rock or cliff
fell a large hill or small mountain
ginnel a narrow passage, a back alley
hingins, hangins hinges
jam eater, a miner and common insult around Egremont/Whitehaven; jams like strawberry and raspberry being the one of the few things that coal dust isn't as noticeable in.
lonnin a lane
sneck door latch
tarn small lake
yam home
yat gate
Farming Terms
boos a division in a shuppon
bowins ragwort
cop the bank of earth on which a hedge grows
coo cow
cuddy horse
dyke a hedge, often on an earth-and-stone wall > dyking means to build a dyke
fodder gang passage for feeding cattle (usually in a shuppon)
gimmer female which has not had a lamb
hogg yearling sheep
hoss horse
liggin' kessin when an animal is lying on its back and can't get up
mowdy mole
mowdiing catching moles
shuppon/shippon a cow shed originally used for milking
stoop a gate post
syke a gutter or ditch between a cop and the road for drainage
tup a ram sheep
yowe ewe sheep (rhymes with cow)
The Weather
glisky when the sky is really bright so you can't see properly
mizzlin misty drizzly rain
syling pouring rain
Phrases
It'll be reet It will be alright
Garn yam Going home
ars garn yam I'm going home
oust fettal How are you
fine fettal Good health
werst thew of te where are you going
[edit] Cumbrian numbers
The Cumbrian numbers, often called 'sheep counting numerals' because of their (declining) use by shepherds to this very day, show clear signs that they may well have their origins in Cumbric. The table below shows the variation of the numbers throughout Cumbria, as well as the relevant cognate in Welsh and Cornish, which are the two closest British languages to Cumbric, for comparison.
| * | Keswick | Westmorland | Eskdale | Millom | High Furness | Welsh | Cornish | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | yan | yan | yaena | aina | yan | un | onen/unn | |
| 2 | tyan | tyan | taena | peina | taen | dau/dwy | dew/diw | |
| 3 | tethera | tetherie | teddera | para | tedderte | tri/tair | tri/teyr | |
| 4 | methera | peddera | meddera | pedera | medderte | pedwar/pedair | peswar/peder | |
| 5 | pimp | gip | pimp | pimp | pimp | pump | pymp | |
| 6 | sethera | teezie | hofa | ithy | haata | chwe(ch) | whegh | |
| 7 | lethera | mithy | lofa | mithy | slaata | saith | seyth | |
| 8 | hovera | katra | seckera | owera | lowera | wyth | eth | |
| 9 | dovera | hornie | leckera | lowera | dowera | naw | naw | |
| 10 | dick | dick | dec | dig | dick | deg | dek | |
| 15 | bumfit | bumfit | bumfit | bumfit | mimph | pymtheg | pymthek | |
| 20 | giggot | - | - | - | - | ugain | ugens |
NB: when these numerals were used for counting sheep, reputedly, the shepherd would count to fifteen or twenty and then move a small stone from one of his pockets to the other before beginning again, thus keeping score. Numbers eleven, twelve etc. would have been 'yandick, taendick', while sixteen and seventeen would have been 'yan-bumfit, tyan-bumfit' etc.
[edit] Cumbrian Poetry
- Derwent Pickering was a local writer who wrote in Cumbrian
- Norman Nicholson lived in Millom and wrote many poems about his native county
[edit] See also
Etymology of Cumbrian Place Names
