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Learning in Literature

Bummler n. a blundering person, a bungler.

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“Bummler n. a blundering person, a bungler.”

18th December 2007

Bummler is a word I remember learning from my Argyllshire relatives, although our pronunciation of it is more suggestive of the spelling ‘boomalar’, which the Dictionary of the Scots Language notes to have been in use in Ross-shire in 1929. I find this word particularly interesting as I haven’t encountered it in spoken use outside the family. There appears to be very little written evidence for it, and any information about its current usage would be much appreciated.

The online dictionary records the use of bummler in Roxburgh and in Caithness in the early twentieth century, but there are very few illustrative quotations available. The dictionary includes only one contextualised example, from the Stonehaven Journal in 1890, which (without wishing to cast aspersions on those mentioned) I will share with you, as it provides a good illustration of the word in action: ‘He wis employed bi the then Cooncil o’ the Auld Toon, a set o’ hardfisted meeserable bummlers’. Like an English bumbler, a Scots bummler is one who bummles, or bustles about busily and ineffectually. Rather aptly, the origin of these words is unclear.

The earliest known evidence for any variant spelling of bummler occurs in a medieval Scots poem, The Flyting between Montgomerie and Polwart, written some time before 1585. In the flyting tradition, poets would hurl abuse at one another, and in this instance Patrick Hume of Polwart accuses Alexander Montgomerie of being, amongst other things, a swingeour (scoundrel), a knave, a mischant (villain) and a bumlar. Given that bummlin can mean making a lot of mistakes, particularly with words, Polwart may have intended this as criticism of his rival’s poetry. Something of the flyting tradition is still alive in the media, even though it is often rather one-sided, and there are many situations where this versatile Scots word may be of service.