An Attempt at a Glossary of Cheshire Words |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
abbreviation Acad anciently Anglo-Saxon Anglo-Saxon language Ash calls Bailey beat Belgice birds blow Brord calls it obsolete Chaucer Cheshire Cheshire word chiefly colloquial common corn Danish DEAVE DEET derived Dictionary dirty Diversions of Purley England etymology expression farantly Flemish FLIG frumenti Gervase Markham Glossarium Gloucester's Chronicle hair Halma haps head Hearne's Glossary hedge horse Islandic itch Jamieson Johnson Junius KIBBO KIFT Kilian labour Lancashire language lapwing Littleton means milk MULLIGRUBS Norfolk northern counties oats old English old French old French language old word participle perf perfect tense perhaps a corruption person Pewit piece Piers Plouhman plural pron pronounced pronunciation Purley rain Randle Holme RINER ripe says Scotch SEECH seems sense Skinner Somner SONGAL Southernwood substantive Suio-Gothic suppose TACK term Teut Teutonic Teutonice That'n thing This'n THRIPPOW tion Todd translation Tusser Vulgaria WHAP Wicliffe
Popular passages
Page 112 - ON, to excite to anger or violence, is still used in Cheshire. It is a good old word, used by Wicliffe in his Path Waye to Perfect Knowledg; and also in a MS. translation of the Psalms by Wicliffe, penes me : " They have terrid thee to ire.
Page 47 - HOGG, s. a heap of potatoes of either a conical or roof-shaped form, probably so called from its resemblance to a hog's back. It is always covered with straw and earth, to preserve the potatoes from the frost; such is the usual mode in Cheshire. HOGG, v. to put up potatoes in this way. HOLLIN, or HOLLEYN, s. the holly-tree : an almost literal adherence to the Anglo-Saxon Holayn. HOLT, or rather HOULT, *. a holing, going into a hole, or putting a ball into a hole, which is required at several games....
Page 4 - Provincial words, occompanied by an explanation of the sense in which each of them still continues to be used in the districts to which they belong, would be of essential service in explaining many obscure terms in our early poets, the true meaning of which, although it may have puzzled and bewildered the most acute and learned of our commentators, would perhaps be perfectly intelligible to a Devonshire, Norfolk, or Cheshire clown.
Page 105 - The following metrical adage is common in Cheshire : The Robin and the Wren Are God's cock and hen, The Martin and the Swallow Are God's mate and marrow.
Page 97 - CANKER'D, adj. ill-tempered. CARLINGS, s. gray peas boiled ; so called from being served at table on Care Sunday, which is Passion Sunday, as Care Friday and Care Week are Good Friday and Holy Week ; supposed to be so called from that being a season of particular religious care and anxiety. See Brand's Popular Antiquities, 4to, vol. ip 93 : also Ihre, Dictionarium Suio-Gothicum in voce
Page 111 - We heard the church bell toll what in Spain is called ' Las Animas,' The Souls. A man bearing a large lantern with a painted glass representing two naked persons enveloped in flames, entered the court, addressing every one of the company in these words — ' The holy Souls, brother ! Remember the holy Souls.
Page 77 - A wooden settee or settle, with a very high back sufficient to screen those who sit on it from the external air, was with our ancestors a constant piece of furniture by all kitchen fires, and is still to be seen in the kitchens of many of our old farm-houses in Cheshire. So in Tusser's Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry, we read, " If ploughman get hatchet or whip to the Skreene, Maids loseth their cocke if no water be seen.
Page 44 - Gull, s. a naked gull ; so are called all nestling birds in quite an unfledged state. They have a yellowish cast ; and the word is, I believe, derived from the AS geole, or the Sui.
Page 38 - . to work hard, to struggle with difficulties. In hard times we must fend to live. Lan. Fend is also used in the following sense. When a person is not easily convinced, it is said, You must fend and prove with him. It is probably, in both senses, an abbreviation of Defend. FETTLE, s. order, good repair. FETTLE, v. to repair, or put in order. Dr. Johnson explains this word, to do trifling business, to ply the hands without labour; and calls it a cant word, from Fed.
Page 68 - Ff. ii. 38, f. 73. (2) To touch, or feel. North. (3) The skin of a person. Line. RINER. A toucher. It is used at the game of quoits. A riner is when the quoit touches the peg or mark. A whaver is when it rests upon the peg and hangs over, and consequently wins the cast. " To shed riners with a whaver" is a proverbial expression in Ray, and means, to surpass anything skilful or adroit by something still more so.