SWEDISH WORDS CURRENT IN ENGLAND.
In the summer of 1847 I mentioned to my friend Professor Retzius at Stockholm, certain Scandinavian words in use at Whitby, with which he was much pleased, they not being akin to the German. I have since been mostly in the South of Europe, but have not lost sight of these words; and last spring I wrote out in Switzerland upwards of five hundred Swedish words, which greatly resemble the English, Lowland Scots, &c., but I doubt many of them have the same root with the German correspondents. I now beg you kindly to offer to the notice of our Anglo-Saxon and Icelandic scholars, as well as the estimable Northern savans at Copenhagen and elsewhere, the following words in use at Whitby, and I believe throughout Cleveland and Cumberland, where the local accent and manner of speaking is the same.
"Agg orm, Swedish (viper), agg worm, Whitby (pron. wōrrum).—Bloa bær (bilbery), blue berry.—By (village), as a termination to names of towns, occurs, perhaps, more frequently in this district than in others; there are some places in Cleveland called Lund and Upsal.—Bæck (brook), beck.—Djevul (devil), pronounced exactly in the Swedish manner at Whitby.—Doalig (poorly), dowly.—Eldon (tinder-box), applied to faggots.—Fors (waterfall), spelt force and foss in Yorkshire books.—Ful (ugly), pron. fool, usually associated with bigness in Cleveland.—Foane (silly), pron. fond at Whitby.—Giller (snare), guilder.—Gæpen (handful), gowpen.—Harr (grayling), carrling in Ryedale.—Kætt (flesh), kett, applied to coarse meat.—Lek (play), at Whitby, to lake.—Leta (to seek), to late at Whitby.—Lie (scythe), pron. lye.—Lingon (red bilberry), called a ling berry.—Ljung (ling).—Lopp (a flea).—Næbb (beak), neb.—Skaft (handle), skaft.—Skær (rock), Whitby skar.—Smitta (to infect), to smit.—Strandgata (creek), at Whitby ghaut.—Stæd (anvil), steady.—Sæf (a rush), siv.—Tjarn (pool), tarn.—Oenska (to wish for), we say to set one an onska, i.e. longing or wishing."
Will any one inform me which of the above are Anglo-Saxon words? I may add that there are many French words in the Swedish for aught I know, some of them Norman. As we find German words in the Italian, we may expect to find Scandinavian in the French.
Charles Watkins.