Concise Scots Dictionary
Second Edition
Scottish Language Dictionaries
Edition: 2
The bestselling Scots dictionary, substantially revised and updated
First published in 1985, the Concise Scots Dictionary offers a comprehensive single-volume reference. This new edition is the result of thirty years’ research and has been revised and updated throughout to reflect modern Scots usage, alongside coverage of older Scots. Combining accessible style, clear layout and durable hardback format, this is a user-friendly and robust dictionary that you can turn to again and again for reference and enjoyment.
The dictionary contains:
- Over 40,000 headwords: 23,000 full entries and 17,000 cross-references
- Over 1100 words and usages new for this edition, including coverage of Orkney and Shetland Scots
- Comprehensive coverage of variant spellings and regional forms, including Ulster Scots
- Extensive cross-referencing allows easy navigation
- Updated and extended pronunciation information
- Information on grammar and register shows how and when to use the words
- Inflected forms, including verb tenses
- Field labels indicate where a word belongs to a specialist domain
- Thousands of idioms, phrases, and proverbs
- Improved and extended information on etymologies
- Extensive coverage of language, from older Scots to modern-day usage
'A masterpiece ... an endless source of entertainment as well as fact. A book for every household in the land.' - The Scotsman
'An outstanding achievement' - The Herald
The entries make fascinating reading, and some are further enlivened by accompanying idioms. 'A sarkfu o sair banes' is 'a person stiff or sore from hard labour or from a beating' ('sark', a shirt or shift, since the 14th century, from Old English serc and Old Norse serkr). Summing Up: Recommended.
