Gome World

A thousand ways to say "You're STUPID!"

The Scots are an uncharitable race.  Whether you are looking through your battered old copy of Munro, or in one of the more modern resources such as Chambers Concise Scots Dictionary and Scots Thesaurus, you will find only a quarter of a page devoted to "Gratitude," but thirteen and a half pages devoted to "Anger and Discontentment."  There are two pages of Scots words for "Intelligence," but twelve and a half pages of ways to describe "Stupidity" and "Weakness of character."  There are three times as many pages devoted to "Negative Character Types" than there are to "Positive Character Types," and while there is barely half a page devoted to Scottish terms of "Endearments," there are well over thirty pages on "Gratuitous Abuse, Disgust, Treachery, Villainous, Miserliness, Spendthrifts, Spongers, Slovenliness, Mockery, Nosiness, Quarrels, Abusiveness, Scolding, Bad-Workmanship, Shambles, Anxiety, Madness, Shame, Fear, and Loathing!"

You will find that Wullie is quick to dish out colorful and judgmental comments about those around him that are rarely complimentary. So although it is theoretically possible that you might hear him say, "I'm browden on yon sonsie birkie." (Rough translation:  "I am extremely fond of the sensible and smart young man."), it is much more likely to hear him explode with, "Yon crabbit, wranglesome, scabbie-heided bletherskate is nae better than a sappie-heided midden-raker!" (Rough translation: "That bad-tempered, quarrelsome boastful person, who incidentally has head lice, is no better than an empty-headed low-life who searches through stinking heaps of garbage."

Aaaaah, but it sounds so much better when said loudly in the Scots tongue.  It makes a person feel better just to say these insults out loud a few times.  Try it and you'll see.

The Scottish Place Name Game

The next time you are feeling under the weather, with a stuffy nose, a sore throat; the next time you are feeling bored and in need of mental stimulation I have a great suggestion for you.  Get your parents (or some other gullible grown ups) to take you for a drive around the Scottish countryside so that you can play the Scottish Place Name Game.  Actually there are at least three different versions that you can play.

Game 1:  Clear your blocked, stuffy nose and sore throat by saying out loud all the great village and town names with a "ch" in them.  As you may know the Scots pronounce the "ch" as if they are clearing their throat.  Try saying Auchtermuchty, Crianlarich, Balquhidder, and Achnaluachrach out loud four or five times fast.  It will clear your stuffed nose and sore throat wonderfully, although if you are sitting in the back seat of the car while you are doing it, those sitting in the front may find their hair, head and neck are now covered in spittle and snot by the time you are done... might be a good time to move on to a new game for while, to let them dry off.

Game 2:  Ask each other to come up with a good suggestion for why a particular town or village got its name.  So was Coldbackie named by a poor old man with a stoop and no shirt on his back who was passing through on a day when it was snowing...? 

What about this one?  If you look up your trusty copy of Munro you will see that the word muck means dirt, filth, or farmyard dung.  The word muckle means large or bulky.  So was the village of Bogmuchals built near a great big stinky swamp by someone who couldn't spell very well?  Maybe so.  Another charming town that you might pass through on the way must have been built during a particularly long wet spell of weather where it poured with rain for weeks on end (even though such a thing is extremely rare in Scotland), so that there wasn't a square inch that wasn't soaking wet, or at least damp, by the time they finished building the town.  So they called it Inchnadamph.

Game 3:  If your parents (or whoever is sitting in the front seats of the car) have dried off by now you can try playing the game called "Try pronouncing that!"  Have a go at Kirkcudbright.  Needless to say, it is not pronounced Kirk-cud-bright like it ought to be.  Oh no, that would be too easy.  As anyone knows it should be pronounced Cur-COO- bray (with the emphasis on the second syllable).  How about Friockheim?  You think it might be Fry-ock-hime?  Not quite.  The locals clear more spittle from their throats as they say FREE-ch-um!  Last but not least, if you really want to amuse yourself with this game drive around on the Western Isles where the Gaelic speakers amuse themselves no end. 

Give yourself ten points if you can instantly pronounce this village sign the way the locals do... Ardroil!

Gilleasbuig Munro

Gillespie Munro, author of the now famous, "Munro's Scottish-English Dictionary: a compendium of old Scots words and slang phrases," developed a keen interest in the Scots language at an early age; as soon as he was able to read, in fact.  He discovered that his parents had actually given him Gilleasbuig as the spelling for his first name.  But instead of pronouncing it "Gilly-ass-boo-ig" like it ought to be pronounced, by the look of it, they insisted that this spelling was the much more impressive Gaelic (pronounced "Gay-lick") spelling of his name.  Complete strangers were just supposed to look at the word Gilleasbuig and know that it ought to be pronounced "Gill-ess-pay."  Young Master Munro was both infuriated and fascinated by this, and made it his life's mission to seek out and explain as many ridiculous Scots words and slang phrases as he could.

Munro traveled all over Scotland in the middle of the last century, and found a rich variety of material for his dictionary from different regions of the country.  He was particularly fascinated by the Gaelic-speaking islands in the Northwest, where the words made no sense at all.  Munro's dictionary is also one of the only books in existence that makes reference to words commonly used by gomes.  It is quite possible that Gilleasbuig met Wullie-The-Mahaar-Gome during his travels.  They would certainly have got along well, since both of them are rude, bad-tempered, eccentric, and cantankerous.

Because Wullie tends to use more and more Scots slang the more agitated and bad-tempered he gets, Great Uncle Hugh McDougall gave Finn a copy of Munro along with Wullie. I have included an Appendix at the back of my books giving some excerpts from Munro's Scottish-English Dictionary: a compendium of old Scots words and slang phrases."  to help you understand Wullie's rants.  Although many dictionaries make for rather dull reading, Gilleasbuig Munro added some colorful comments to some of his entries.  Here is an example:

Ceilidh - (pronounced Kaylie!) is a Gaelic word meaning an informal social gathering, where, usually, there is singing, playing of musical instruments, dancing, storytelling and ample supplies of liquid refreshment.  Gaelic is a language that is lovely to listen to and impossible to write down.  Legend has it that when the Gaelic elders were finally forced to write down the words of their language they all got drunk and decided to amuse themselves by inventing the most ridiculous spelling imaginable to irritate the Lowlanders, and English speakers south of the border.  On the Island of Lewis, Hugh and Wullie once passed through a little village where the sign said, “EADAR DHA FHADHAIL” but the locals assured them that it was pronounced, “Ardroil.”

Very few copies of Munro's Scottish-English Dictionary are still in existence.  I have one of the last copies.  Here is a photograph of it, along with a figurine of Gilleasbuig Munro's favorite Border Collie sheepdog.

Gilleasbuig was very fond of that dog.  He named her, Mhairhfhaidr, which, of course, is pronounced, "Shep."