The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #62235   Message #1005880
Posted By: Jim McLean
21-Aug-03 - 11:13 AM
Thread Name: Gaelic phrase
Subject: RE: Gaelic phrase
The Lowland Scottish dialect has nothing to do with colloquial English. They may both have their roots in old German and have French influences but that's as far as it goes. One could argue quite successfully that modern English is a dailect of Lowland Scottish. Take modern English words such as 'night, bright, light'. Their spelling points to their original pronounciation,with a gutteral, fricative sound as in Lowland Scottish (or just plain Scottish for that matter) i.e. 'nicht, bricht, licht'. There are also Gaelic and Scandinavian borrowings. There are too many examples .. look at a Burns' poem and tell me that an English reader sees it as having been written in colloquial English.
Cheers,
Jim McLean