Expert: Kaye McAlpine - 3/4/2009

Question
Hi Kaye,

I am doing a speech at school on William Wallace. It sounds a bit plain right know so I was wondering if you could provide me with some Scottish language/slang to use for words such as:

- hello
- good morning/afternoon
- nicknames for the English (no offense)
- battle or fight
- army
- any other common terms or slang that i could work in

Answer
Hi Justin

It's always best to stick to what you know. Using words out of context is never wise - it won't make your talk better. Best to get the fact right. Scots sounds wrong when it's dropped into English - it's like someone trying to 'get down with the kids' - it sounds wrong. And anyway, the grammatical construction is different at times from English.

Are you doing this speech from Wallace's viewpoint? If you are, please, please put any thoughts of Braveheart out of your mind if they were indeed in there in the first place. The movie is a travesty of Wallace's life and also of the man. He was from minor nobility, he travelled to France and Italy, he would not have painted himself with woad, or decked himself in the kilt. - so don't use 'freedom'  - that comes from book 1 of John Barbour's poem The Bruce - which starts 'A! Fredom is ane nobill thyng /  freedommays man to haiff lyking / Fredome all solace to man giffis / he lyvis at es that frely levys!'. Actually, a lot of that film came from aspects of Bruce's campaigns, not Wallace's, so it's best not to go there - ever, in my opinion, but then I have huge issues about Titanic too.

That rant out of the way, what you might want is to use lines such as 'Guid morrow / guid day' for good morning / good afternoon'.  Greetings words do tend to change a bit throughout the country, then as now, so they're a bit sticky anyway.

In terms of the English - that was, at times, a bad enough epithet to have this side of the Border. Wallace would not have balked at killing a man for being English.
We find the words 'English dogs' - or 'English dugs' in writings, poetry and song, so you could get away with that, and 'the Southeroun army' or 'Suddron curs' could be used for the English - the Southern army or Southern dogs.

Fechts and battils happen, but the sounds of the fight are interesting. Men can be dinged doon. - 'wi dingand dusch he dung him doon' occurs in the Bruce. swords clappered doon oan blazouns and helms. Fell straiks cleave helms.

An army is an army - but do remember that at Stirling Brig, the Wallace was not alone - Sir Andrew de Moray was there too - he had brought his forces down from the North where he was fighting and joined with Wallace's men. de Moray had been extremely successful in the North, but he died of wounds he sustained at Stirling Brig, and is often written out of history, but please at least give him a nod - 'My brither in airms, that guid Lord Andro de Moray brocht his men fae the North an fought wi me an mine at Stirling Brig. And I lang lamented the deith o him' would be a good start. Likewise, Wallace lamented the death of Sir John de Graham - his right hand man and one of the few  mounted cavalrymen who did not flee at the Battle of Falkirk when the might of the English longbow shattered the Scottish schiltron (it would have been like the first napalm attack - no one had seen the English longbowmen in action in Scotland or England before that). By the way, the knights fled, I think, not from fear but from expediency - they lived to fight another day - but (I think) about 2500 of Wallace's army perished.

Common terms and slang aren't relevant. There's no point putting slang into a historic speech or report. It would be out of date, and late mediaeval slang is not really a starter.

So, concentrate on the facts. Wallace was a man of his time. he was brutal, but he was also resulute. He did not shirk from what he believed in. and he went to a terrible death, knowing that the trial was a travesty - and quite rightly, he spoke only once, to deny treason, as he had never sworn allegiance to Edward 1 - known as malleus Scotorum - the hammer of the Scots.

Did you know that miners in Falkirk, when their bondsman status was lifted in the 19th century, chose to march past the Wallace Stone, which stands where people think Wallace stood to view the advancing English army, to symbolise their free state. Wallace now epitomises a universal freedom and resolution - maybe his legacy is as important as the man was.

Good luck

Kaye