Word of the week

• threap v. argue, contend, be disputatious; quarrel; assert
• abune, aboon, abuin, etc. adv. and prep. above, over; etc.
• abune, aboon, abuin, etc. adv. and prep. above, over; etc
• abune, aboon, abuin, etc. adv. and prep. above, over; etc.
• wee adj. small, tiny, little, restricted in size
• cranreuch n. hoar-frost
• first foot v. to be the first person to enter a house on New Year’s morning

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threap v. argue, contend, be disputatious; quarrel; assert

“threap v. argue, contend, be disputatious; quarrel; assert”

28th January 2008

Threap is derived from the Old English verb threapian meaning rebuke , reprehend. It is recorded with this sense in the ninth-century writings of the English King, Alfred. The earliest known uses of threap in Scots are found in the late fifteenth-century Tale of Ralph the Collier. In one example, the word means quarrell: "thank me not ouir airlie (too soon), for dreid that we threip". In another it means assert or maintain: "the forestaris … have me all at inuy for dreid of the deir (are hostile towards me out of concern for the deer), Thay threip that I thring doun (kill) ... the fattest".

Threap is also used as a noun denoting a dispute or argument, and both verb and noun are used in Scots phrases. If you keep up, or stand tae your threap, you keep to your own opinions regardless of all opposition, and if you threap doon someone’s throat, or threap on someone, you try to force your opinions on them. Several place-names denoting lands that were subject to an ownership dispute contain the term threap. The most famous Threapland, or disputed land, is better known as The Debatable Land, the territory between the Esk and the Sark that was claimed by both England and Scotland during the Middle Ages.

Activists have long been threapin about the status of Scots and its perception as slang rather than a language in its own right. An noo, sic threapin is beginnin tae pey aff. In December, the Minister for Schools and Skills, Maureen Watt, announced that the omission of Scots from A Curriculum for Excellence had been redressed and, earlier this week, the Culture Minister, Linda Fabiani, ordered an audit of the Scots language. Scottish Language Dictionaries very much welcomes these developments and applauds the hard work and perseverance that has made them possible.