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(Redirected from Cumbrian)
''Not to be confused with the Celtic Cumbric language''
Cumbria, in the extreme North West of England, 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 Great Britain. 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 North-East English sound to them. Whilst clearly being an English accent approximately between Lancashire and Geordie it shares much vocabulary with Scots.
'Cumbrian' here refers both to Cumbria but also to Cumberland, the county which existed up to the enactment of local government re-organisation in 1974, when the distinction between Cumberland and Westmorland was lost.
Despite the modern county being created only 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 element in Cumbrian dialect is 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.
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.
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' (?) in Cumbrian (as in Lancashire) the sound is harder like the letter '?' 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".
Cumbria is a large area with several relatively isolated districts, so there is quite a large variation in accent, especially between north and south or the coastal towns. There are some uniform features that should be taken into account when pronouncing dialect words.
When certain vowels are followed by the glides or , an epenthetic schwa is often pronounced between them, creating two distinct syllables:
★ 'feel' > ; 'fear' >
★ 'fool' > ; 'moor' >
★ 'fail' >
★ 'file' > ; 'fire' >
This was once common across Britain, but it is now confined to Cumbria, most of Yorkshire and the more rural parts of Lancashire.
Most consonants are pronounced as they are in other parts of the English speaking world. A few exceptions follow:
and have a tendency to be dropped or unreleased in the coda (word- or syllable-finally).
is realised in various ways throughout the county. When William Barrow Kendall wrote his Furness Wordbook in 1867, he wrote that 'should never be dropped',[1] suggesting the practice had already become conspicuous. It seems the elision of both and began in the industrial towns and slowly spread out. In the south, it is now very common.
in the word final position may be dropped or realised as : 'woo' ''wool'' ; 'pow' ''pole'' .
is realised as following consonants and in word-initial position but is often elided in the coda, unless a following word begins with a vowel: 'ross' ; 'gimmer' ; 'gimmer hogg' .
is traditionally always pronounced, although in many places it has been replaced by the glottal stop now common throughout Britain.
may be consonantal as in 'yam' ''home'' . As the adjectival or adverbial suffix '-y' it may be or as in 'clarty' ''muddy'' . Medially and, in some cases, finally it is as in 'Thorfinsty' (a place) .
Stress is usually placed on the initial syllable: 'yakeren' ''acorn'' .
Unstressed initial vowels are usually fully realised, whilst those in final syllables are usually reduced to schwa .
★ 'ars' I am
★ 'awez' Come on
★ 'cowie' thing or sometimes can refer to a ectasy pill
★ 'thew' you
★ 'thine' yours
★ 'us', 'es' me
★ 'wherst' where is the
★ 'djarn' doing(as in 'whut yer djarn? - what you doing?)
★ 'kaylied' intoxicated
★ 'kystie' squeamish or fussy
★ 'la'al' small
★ 'ladgeful' embarrassing or unfashionable (mainly in and around Penrith)
★ 'slape' slippery or smooth as in slape back colly, a border colly with short wirey hair
★ 'gey' very
★ 'owwer' over ("ars garn owwer yonder fer a kip" - I'm going over there for a sleep)
★ 'vanya' almost, nearly. 'vanear' is a coastal variant
★ 'bait' packed meal that is carried to work
★ 'bait bag' bag in which to carry bait
★ 'biddies' fleas
★ 'bift/bifter' cigarette
★ 'britches' trousers
★ 'cheble or chable' table
★ 'cur dog' sheepdog - collie
★ 'garn' thread for knitting (Furness)
★ 'kets' sweets
★ 'lewer' money
★ 'scrow' a mess
★ 'shillies' small stones or gravel
★ 'skemmy' beer
★ 'snig' small eel
★ 'yam' home, as in: as garn yam (I'm going home)
★ 'jinnyspinner' A Daddy Long Legs
★ 'bowk' retch (as in before vomiting)
★ 'bray' beat (as in beat up someone)
★ 'bubble' cry
★ 'chess' chase
★ 'chor' steal (Romany origin, cf. Urdu chorna)
★ 'clarten' messing about
★ 'deek' look (Romany origin, cf Urdu dekhna)
★ 'doss' play (wanna doss hide and seek? - Do you wish to play hide and seek?)
★ 'fistle' to fidget
★ 'gander' look
★ 'gar' go
★ 'garn' going
★ 'howk' to pick at or gouge out
★ 'hoy' throw
★ 'jarn' or 'jurn' doing
★ 'laik' play
★ 'lait' look for
★ 'lowp' jump
★ 'nash' run away
★ 'ratch' to search for something
★ 'scop' to throw
★ 'scower' look at
★ 'sow ' sexual intercourse
★ 'skit' make fun of
★ 'twat' hit someone ("I twatted him in the face")
★ 'twine' whinge or complain
★ 'bairden' child
★ 'buwler/bewer' girl
★ 'gammerstang' awkward person
★ 'mot' woman/girl/girlfriend
★ 'offcomer' a non-native in Cumbria
★ 'potter' gypsy
★ 'gadgey' man
★ 'charva' man
★ 'marra' west cumbrian man
★ 'boos' a division in a 'shuppon'
★ 'cop' the bank of earth on which a hedge grows
★ 'fodder gang' passage for feeding cattle (usually in a 'shuppon')
★ 'liggin' kessin' when an animal is lying on its back and can't get up
★ 'stoop' a gate post
★ 'lonnin' country lane
★ 'hossing' raining heavily (it's hossing it duwn)
★ 'glisky' when the sky is really bright so you can't see properly
★ 'mizzlin' misty drizzly rain
★ 'syling' pouring rain
★ 'ars garn yam' I'm going home
★ 'hasta' Have you?
★ 'oust fettal' How are you
★ 'werst thew of te' where are you going
★ 'wh'ista' Who are you? (especially used in Appleby)
★ 'werst t' frae' Where are you from?
★ 'owz it gan?' How is it going? (how are you)
★ 'a ways then' provoke fight
★ 'wha ya de'yan?' What are you doing?
Main articles: Yan Tan Tethera
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 geographically closest British languages to Cumbric, for comparison.
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.
The following poets are known for writing about Cumbria-
★ William Wordsworth
★ Derwent Pickering was a local writer who wrote in Cumbrian
★ Norman Nicholson lived in Millom and wrote many poems about his native county
★ Cumbria
★ Cumbric
★ Dialect
★ Etymology of Cumbrian Place Names
★ Sounds Familiar? — Listen to examples of regional accents and dialects from across the UK on the British Library's 'Sounds Familiar' website
★ Listen to Pronunciation
★ Lakeland Dialect Society
''Not to be confused with the Celtic Cumbric language''
Cumbria, in the extreme North West of England, 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 Great Britain. 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 North-East English sound to them. Whilst clearly being an English accent approximately between Lancashire and Geordie it shares much vocabulary with Scots.
'Cumbrian' here refers both to Cumbria but also to Cumberland, the county which existed up to the enactment of local government re-organisation in 1974, when the distinction between Cumberland and Westmorland was lost.
Brief History of the People and Language
The Celtic Influence
Despite the modern county being created only 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 element in Cumbrian dialect is 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.
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' (?) in Cumbrian (as in Lancashire) the sound is harder like the letter '?' 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".
The Accent and Pronunciation
Cumbria is a large area with several relatively isolated districts, so there is quite a large variation in accent, especially 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 |
|---|---|
| as in 'bad' | |
| as in 'bard' | |
| as in 'house' | (North only) |
| as in 'bay' | in the North-East, and between and elsewhere |
| as in 'bear' | |
| as in 'bide' | (South), (North) |
| as in 'boat' | |
| as in 'bud' | |
| as in 'boo' | , or |
When certain vowels are followed by the glides or , an epenthetic schwa is often pronounced between them, creating two distinct syllables:
★ 'feel' > ; 'fear' >
★ 'fool' > ; 'moor' >
★ 'fail' >
★ 'file' > ; 'fire' >
This was once common across Britain, but it is now confined to Cumbria, most of Yorkshire and the more rural parts of Lancashire.
Consonants
Most consonants are pronounced as they are in other parts of the English speaking world. A few exceptions follow:
Stress
Stress is usually placed on the initial syllable: 'yakeren' ''acorn'' .
Unstressed initial vowels are usually fully realised, whilst those in final syllables are usually reduced to schwa .
Dialect Words
General words
★ 'ars' I am
★ 'awez' Come on
★ 'cowie' thing or sometimes can refer to a ectasy pill
★ 'thew' you
★ 'thine' yours
★ 'us', 'es' me
★ 'wherst' where is the
★ 'djarn' doing(as in 'whut yer djarn? - what you doing?)
Adjectives
★ 'kaylied' intoxicated
★ 'kystie' squeamish or fussy
★ 'la'al' small
★ 'ladgeful' embarrassing or unfashionable (mainly in and around Penrith)
★ 'slape' slippery or smooth as in slape back colly, a border colly with short wirey hair
Adverbs
★ 'gey' very
★ 'owwer' over ("ars garn owwer yonder fer a kip" - I'm going over there for a sleep)
★ 'vanya' almost, nearly. 'vanear' is a coastal variant
Nouns
★ 'bait' packed meal that is carried to work
★ 'bait bag' bag in which to carry bait
★ 'biddies' fleas
★ 'bift/bifter' cigarette
★ 'britches' trousers
★ 'cheble or chable' table
★ 'cur dog' sheepdog - collie
★ 'garn' thread for knitting (Furness)
★ 'kets' sweets
★ 'lewer' money
★ 'scrow' a mess
★ 'shillies' small stones or gravel
★ 'skemmy' beer
★ 'snig' small eel
★ 'yam' home, as in: as garn yam (I'm going home)
★ 'jinnyspinner' A Daddy Long Legs
Verbs
★ 'bowk' retch (as in before vomiting)
★ 'bray' beat (as in beat up someone)
★ 'bubble' cry
★ 'chess' chase
★ 'chor' steal (Romany origin, cf. Urdu chorna)
★ 'clarten' messing about
★ 'deek' look (Romany origin, cf Urdu dekhna)
★ 'doss' play (wanna doss hide and seek? - Do you wish to play hide and seek?)
★ 'fistle' to fidget
★ 'gander' look
★ 'gar' go
★ 'garn' going
★ 'howk' to pick at or gouge out
★ 'hoy' throw
★ 'jarn' or 'jurn' doing
★ 'laik' play
★ 'lait' look for
★ 'lowp' jump
★ 'nash' run away
★ 'ratch' to search for something
★ 'scop' to throw
★ 'scower' look at
★ 'sow ' sexual intercourse
★ 'skit' make fun of
★ 'twat' hit someone ("I twatted him in the face")
★ 'twine' whinge or complain
People
★ 'bairden' child
★ 'buwler/bewer' girl
★ 'gammerstang' awkward person
★ 'mot' woman/girl/girlfriend
★ 'offcomer' a non-native in Cumbria
★ 'potter' gypsy
★ 'gadgey' man
★ 'charva' man
★ 'marra' west cumbrian man
Farming Terms
★ 'boos' a division in a 'shuppon'
★ 'cop' the bank of earth on which a hedge grows
★ 'fodder gang' passage for feeding cattle (usually in a 'shuppon')
★ 'liggin' kessin' when an animal is lying on its back and can't get up
★ 'stoop' a gate post
★ 'lonnin' country lane
The Weather
★ 'hossing' raining heavily (it's hossing it duwn)
★ 'glisky' when the sky is really bright so you can't see properly
★ 'mizzlin' misty drizzly rain
★ 'syling' pouring rain
Phrases
★ 'ars garn yam' I'm going home
★ 'hasta' Have you?
★ 'oust fettal' How are you
★ 'werst thew of te' where are you going
★ 'wh'ista' Who are you? (especially used in Appleby)
★ 'werst t' frae' Where are you from?
★ 'owz it gan?' How is it going? (how are you)
★ 'a ways then' provoke fight
★ 'wha ya de'yan?' What are you doing?
Cumbrian numbers
Main articles: Yan Tan Tethera
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 geographically 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.
Cumbrian poetry
The following poets are known for writing about Cumbria-
★ William Wordsworth
★ Derwent Pickering was a local writer who wrote in Cumbrian
★ Norman Nicholson lived in Millom and wrote many poems about his native county
See also
★ Cumbria
★ Cumbric
★ Dialect
★ Etymology of Cumbrian Place Names
External links
★ Sounds Familiar? — Listen to examples of regional accents and dialects from across the UK on the British Library's 'Sounds Familiar' website
★ Listen to Pronunciation
★ Lakeland Dialect Society
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psst.. try this: add to faves
