7 ms·

I'm Scottish, but I work with a lot of Germans and every so often I try to learn some. I have found that Scots has a lot of similar works to German, sometimes m

I'm Scottish, but I work with a lot of Germans and every so often I try to learn some. I have found that Scots has a lot of similar works to German, sometimes more so than English. I guess this must be because it comes from Middle English which is related to High German. A few examples: "ken" (to know; "kenn" in German), "kirk" (church; "kirch" in German), "loch" (lake; literally "hole" in German), "reek" (smell; "riech" in German), "mair" (more; "mehr" in German). It's interesting to me because the other language I sometimes hear in Scotland other than English is Gaelic, which at least to my ear sounds nothing like any other language I've heard.

Symbiote 8y ago
These are words from Norse, you will find often closer cognates in Norwegian, Swedish or Danish. Ken, kirke, (Loch), røg, mere. But also barn (child), hus (House), flytte (move, flit), and no doubt mour if I actually knew any Scots.
- udp 8y ago
  Also present in North East English, which can be just as far removed from the Queen's English as the Scottish dialect. "Bairn" and "hus" definitely, and also "gan" (to go), "yam" (home, norwegian "hjem"). If Scots is now considered a language, then Geordie surely must be. Here's a nice example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaydon_Races#Lyrics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaydon_Races#Lyrics
  - NeedMoreTea 8y ago
    These trace back to the days of Viking raids and occupations for both Scots and Geordie.
  - BjoernKW 8y ago
    The usual criterion for distinguishing language from dialect is mutual intelligibility. Mutual intelligibility, however, is a continuum, with Scots verging towards the language end while Geordie being more on the dialect end of the spectrum. There’s a limited degree of mutual intelligibility between some other Germanic languages, such as Dutch, Afrikaans, Frisian and German, too. However, for all practical intents and purposes those are still separate languages. Someone once quipped that languages are dialects with an army, which could explain why Scots historically is considered a separate language while Geordie is not.
    - groovy2shoes 8y ago
      > The usual criterion for distinguishing language from dialect is mutual intelligibility. The problem with this criterion is that mutual intelligibility is not transitive, so it doesn't support an intuitive notion of sameness that one might expect. Consider some language with distinct dialects A, B, and C lying at different points on the dialect continuum. If A and B are mutually intelligible, and B and C are mutually intelligible, it is still possible that A and C are not mutually intelligible. However, this is a property we'd expect if this criterion were enough to say that A, B, and C were all dialects of the same language. In addition to being unintuitive, it also raises some tough questions, like: if they're all the same language today and the last speaker of B dies tomorrow, are A and C still dialects of the same language? From a linguist's point of view, there's no useful distinction between a dialect and a language. It's more common to talk about "varieties", which is a more general term that includes dialects, regiolects, sociolects, idiolects, &c. Grouping of varieties is done contextually and for utility, often for the sake of convenience, and often according to some guiding principles (phylogeny in diachronic linguistics, for example, helps us to understand the historical relationships among groups). There's some truth to the quip that a language is a dialect with an army and a navy, though: in practice, the distinction between the two is a sociopolitical one. Some people will be very upset if some outside group starts insisting that, in fact, no, you do not speak Arabic anymore, or, no, you do not speak Chinese anymore, or, no, Moldovan was never really a language. For many people, their native language is an integral part of their national identity, and it's not for outsiders to decide. It won't matter how precise and logical a definition someone comes up with, because it was never a scientific or philosophical issue to begin with. We allow social groups to self-actualize their own identities, or everyone is gonna have a bad time.
      - SilasX 8y ago
        >From a linguist's point of view, there's no useful distinction between a dialect and a language. I think you mean, for edge cases, there’s no useful distinction. Mutual comprehensibility is a pretty useful concept, and no one makes “Arabic is a the same language as English” their Hill-to-die-on.
vram22 8y ago
>I have found that Scots has a lot of similar works to German, sometimes more so than English. I guess this must be because it comes from Middle English which is related to High German. Yes. I'm not an expert, but it seems so. See this comment by me, for example, on a recent HN thread about German: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18155409 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18155409
DonaldFisk 8y ago
"Loch" in Scots isn't cognate with German "Loch" meaning hole, it's from Scottish Gaelic "loch" meaning lake, and cognate with Latin "lacus", English "lake", and German "Lache". Scottish Gaelic is a close relative of Irish and sounds quite similar to it. Edit: "reek" in Scots means "smoke" and is probably cognate with German "rauchen".
- dboreham 8y ago
  I'm in Montana and we have a local Loch. Except it's pronounced "Lock" (but still spelled "Loch"). But is isn't actually a Loch, just a reach of the river (that runs through it).
- koralatov 8y ago
  You're right: "reek" does mean "smoke" in Scots. In modern usage, by speakers of Scottish English, it means "smelly". I'm not 100% sure, but I'm confident that "reek" in this context was borrowed from Scots and the meaning has just drifted over time. Its etymology is interesting, and it consistently means "smoke" or "smoking": https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=Reek https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=Reek Scottish Gaelic (Gàidhlig) and Irish Gaelic (Gaeilge, often just called "Irish") are both direct descendants of Middle Irish, which ultimately comes from a Celtic root. Gaidhlig gradually replaced Pictish, now extinct, about a thousand years ago.
  - sparkzilla 8y ago
    Edinburgh used to be known as 'Auld Reekie' i.e. 'Old Smokey'.
  - FireForce 8y ago
    In English, reek is either a verb or a noun, not an adjective.
    - koralatov 8y ago
      Common Scottish English usage I encounter daily: "that bin reeks", "my dog rolled in fox poo and she reeks", "I was reeking of sweat", "that place reeked".
ekianjo 8y ago
I dont think reek is purely Scots though. Its also spelled the same way in English.
wirrbel 8y ago
As a German it feels like Scots and English might be described as dialects, i think the variety between standard German and swabian or Bavarian dialect (maybe not the accent of Stuttgart or Munich population but what grandmother spoke and the villagers still speak when they are among themselves). At least Swiss German is described as a dialect of German, and it is unintelligible for people north of the Main river. So if Scots is a dialect I would say Swiss German dialects might be their own language.

Symbiote 8y ago

These are words from Norse, you will find often closer cognates in Norwegian, Swedish or Danish. Ken, kirke, (Loch), røg, mere. But also barn (child), hus (House), flytte (move, flit), and no doubt mour if I actually knew any Scots.

udp 8y ago
Also present in North East English, which can be just as far removed from the Queen's English as the Scottish dialect. "Bairn" and "hus" definitely, and also "gan" (to go), "yam" (home, norwegian "hjem"). If Scots is now considered a language, then Geordie surely must be. Here's a nice example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaydon_Races#Lyrics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blaydon_Races#Lyrics
- NeedMoreTea 8y ago
  These trace back to the days of Viking raids and occupations for both Scots and Geordie.
- BjoernKW 8y ago
  The usual criterion for distinguishing language from dialect is mutual intelligibility. Mutual intelligibility, however, is a continuum, with Scots verging towards the language end while Geordie being more on the dialect end of the spectrum. There’s a limited degree of mutual intelligibility between some other Germanic languages, such as Dutch, Afrikaans, Frisian and German, too. However, for all practical intents and purposes those are still separate languages. Someone once quipped that languages are dialects with an army, which could explain why Scots historically is considered a separate language while Geordie is not.
  - groovy2shoes 8y ago
    > The usual criterion for distinguishing language from dialect is mutual intelligibility. The problem with this criterion is that mutual intelligibility is not transitive, so it doesn't support an intuitive notion of sameness that one might expect. Consider some language with distinct dialects A, B, and C lying at different points on the dialect continuum. If A and B are mutually intelligible, and B and C are mutually intelligible, it is still possible that A and C are not mutually intelligible. However, this is a property we'd expect if this criterion were enough to say that A, B, and C were all dialects of the same language. In addition to being unintuitive, it also raises some tough questions, like: if they're all the same language today and the last speaker of B dies tomorrow, are A and C still dialects of the same language? From a linguist's point of view, there's no useful distinction between a dialect and a language. It's more common to talk about "varieties", which is a more general term that includes dialects, regiolects, sociolects, idiolects, &c. Grouping of varieties is done contextually and for utility, often for the sake of convenience, and often according to some guiding principles (phylogeny in diachronic linguistics, for example, helps us to understand the historical relationships among groups). There's some truth to the quip that a language is a dialect with an army and a navy, though: in practice, the distinction between the two is a sociopolitical one. Some people will be very upset if some outside group starts insisting that, in fact, no, you do not speak Arabic anymore, or, no, you do not speak Chinese anymore, or, no, Moldovan was never really a language. For many people, their native language is an integral part of their national identity, and it's not for outsiders to decide. It won't matter how precise and logical a definition someone comes up with, because it was never a scientific or philosophical issue to begin with. We allow social groups to self-actualize their own identities, or everyone is gonna have a bad time.
    - SilasX 8y ago
      >From a linguist's point of view, there's no useful distinction between a dialect and a language. I think you mean, for edge cases, there’s no useful distinction. Mutual comprehensibility is a pretty useful concept, and no one makes “Arabic is a the same language as English” their Hill-to-die-on.

vram22 8y ago

>I have found that Scots has a lot of similar works to German, sometimes more so than English. I guess this must be because it comes from Middle English which is related to High German. Yes. I'm not an expert, but it seems so. See this comment by me, for example, on a recent HN thread about German: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18155409 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18155409

DonaldFisk 8y ago

"Loch" in Scots isn't cognate with German "Loch" meaning hole, it's from Scottish Gaelic "loch" meaning lake, and cognate with Latin "lacus", English "lake", and German "Lache". Scottish Gaelic is a close relative of Irish and sounds quite similar to it. Edit: "reek" in Scots means "smoke" and is probably cognate with German "rauchen".

dboreham 8y ago
I'm in Montana and we have a local Loch. Except it's pronounced "Lock" (but still spelled "Loch"). But is isn't actually a Loch, just a reach of the river (that runs through it).
koralatov 8y ago
You're right: "reek" does mean "smoke" in Scots. In modern usage, by speakers of Scottish English, it means "smelly". I'm not 100% sure, but I'm confident that "reek" in this context was borrowed from Scots and the meaning has just drifted over time. Its etymology is interesting, and it consistently means "smoke" or "smoking": https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=Reek https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=Reek Scottish Gaelic (Gàidhlig) and Irish Gaelic (Gaeilge, often just called "Irish") are both direct descendants of Middle Irish, which ultimately comes from a Celtic root. Gaidhlig gradually replaced Pictish, now extinct, about a thousand years ago.
- sparkzilla 8y ago
  Edinburgh used to be known as 'Auld Reekie' i.e. 'Old Smokey'.
- FireForce 8y ago
  In English, reek is either a verb or a noun, not an adjective.
  - koralatov 8y ago
    Common Scottish English usage I encounter daily: "that bin reeks", "my dog rolled in fox poo and she reeks", "I was reeking of sweat", "that place reeked".

ekianjo 8y ago

I dont think reek is purely Scots though. Its also spelled the same way in English.

wirrbel 8y ago

As a German it feels like Scots and English might be described as dialects, i think the variety between standard German and swabian or Bavarian dialect (maybe not the accent of Stuttgart or Munich population but what grandmother spoke and the villagers still speak when they are among themselves). At least Swiss German is described as a dialect of German, and it is unintelligible for people north of the Main river. So if Scots is a dialect I would say Swiss German dialects might be their own language.