Gower dialect

The Gower dialect refers to the older vocabulary or slang of the Gower Peninsula on the south Wales coast. It was Normanised/Anglicised relatively early after the Norman conquest of England. Relatively cut off from the Welsh hinterland, but with coastal links across south Wales and the West Country, the region developed their distinct English dialect which endured to within living memory.

History

The Gower Peninsula was geographically insulated from 'mainland' modern language influences until well into the twentieth century. A number of words and pronunciations were recorded during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as distinct usages in Gower — many of which might once have been widespread but which had fallen out of use in the developing standard English.

Some Gower words seem to derive from the Welsh language (e.g. pentan), but many more of the words and usages are cognate with English country dialects including those of South Devon, Somerset and Wiltshire.^[1]

Vocabulary

Angletouch - a worm
Back - iron plate, part of a dredge
Beader/bidder - person appointed to summon guests to a Gower wedding
Bellamine - unglazed brown earthenware pitcher (cf Bellarmine)
Bett - prepared turf used for hedging
Blonkers - sparks
Bossey - a calf still running with its mother
Bubback - scarecrow; dull person
Bumbagus - the bittern (cf Welsh aderyn y bwn)
Butt - a small cart
Caffle - tangle
Carthen - winnowing sheet
Casn't - cannot
Cassaddle - harness piece for a draught horse
Cavey - humble
Charnel - box-like space above the fireplace, often used for hanging bacon
Clavvy/ Clevvy - large oak beam supporting the inner wall of a chimney
Clever - fine (adj)
Cliffage - tithe on quarried limestone, payable to the Lord of the Manor
Cloam - earthenware
Cratch - haystack
Culm - small coal used in lime-burning
Cust - could
Cuzzening - coaxing
Dab - a large stone used in playing duckstone
Deal - a litter (of pigs)
Dobbin - large mug
Dowset - Gower dish, similar to 'whitepot' (below)
Drangway - narrow lane or alleyway
Drashel - a flail
Dree - three
Dreppance - three pence
Drow - throw
Dryth - dryness
Dumbledarry - cockchafer
Evil - a three pronged dung-fork
Frawst / froist - a dainty meal (n); frightened/astonished (adj)
Gake - yawn
Galeeny - guinea-fowl
Gambo - a cart; wagon
Glaster - buttermilk in the churn
Gloice - a sharp pang of pain
Gurgins - coarse flour
Gwain - going
Hambrack/hamrach - a straw horse-collar (cf 'rach')
Herring-gutted - lean, skinny
Holmes - holly
Inklemaker - busy person
Ipson - the quantity that can be held in a pair of cupped hands
Ite - yet
Jalap - liniment; laxative tonic
Jorum - large helping of tea or beer
Keek - to peep
Keelage - foreshore berthing fee due to the Lord of the Manor
Keeve - large barrel or vat
Kerning - ripening; turning sour
Kersey - cloth woven from fine wool
Kittlebegs / kittybags - gaiters
Kyling - sea fishing
Lake - small stream or brook
Lancher / Lansher - greensward between holdings in a common field or 'viel'
Leery - empty
Lello - a fool; a carefree lad
Makth - makes
Mapsant - local saint's feast day celebrations (from Welsh mab - son; sant (holy)
Mawn - large wicker basket for animal feed
Melted - broken up, disintegrated
Mort - pigfat; lard
Mucka - a rickyard
Neargar, fargar - nearer, farther
Nestletrip / nesseltrip - smallest pig in a litter
Nice - fastidious
Nipparty / Noppit - perky
Nummit / Nommit - a simple lunch, e.g. of bread and 'soul', as might be sent to harvesters in the field (? 'noon meat'?)
Oakey - greased
Oakwib - cockchafer
Owlers - wool smugglers
Pentan - hob (from Welsh pen - head or top, tan - fire)
Pill - stream
Pilmy - dusty
Planche - to make a board floor (cf French plancher - a wooden floor)
Purty - to turn sulky
Quapp - to throb
Quat - to press or flatten
Raal - real
Rach - the last sheaf of corn to be harvested (see also 'hamrach')
Reremouse - the bat (animal)
Resiant - resident, particularly a person resident in the area but not having a feudal tenancy
Riff - short wooden stick for sharpening a scythe
Rining - mooching; scrounging
Rying - fishing
Scrabble - to gather up objects hastily
Shoat - a small wheaten loaf
Shrid - to trim a hedge
Slade - land sloping towards the sea
Soul - cheese or butter, as eaten with bread
Spleet - (1) a knitting needle (2) a quarryman's bar
Starved - perished with cold
Stiping - hobbling a sheep by tying its head to its foreleg with a band of straw
Tacker - a youngster
Tite - to overturn
Towser - a rough apron
Uddent - wouldn't
Umman - woman
Vair - a stoat or weasel
Vather - father
Vella - fellow
Viel/Vile - a field. The name is still used to describe a commonly managed field at Rhossili on Gower, which is farmed in a mediaeval strip field arrangement
Vitte - clever or smart
Vorrit - forehead
V'rall - for all
Vurriner - foreigner
Want - a mole (animal)
Weest - dismal
Whirret - a slap
Whitepot - a Gower delicacy of flour, milk & currants baked (cf. Devon dialect whitepot, a sort of bread-and-butter pudding)
Wimbling - winnowing
Witches - moths
Yau - ewe
Zig - urine
Zive - scythe
Zongals/songals - corn gleanings
Zul/sul - a plough
Zz'thee knaw - do you know