30 must-know SCOTTISH WORDS you need to know when visiting EDINBURGH 

Already gutted that I didn't mention the word DUG! Or BIG YIN! Aaah! What are some other ones that you've overheard in Edinburgh?

Hey all! Some noteworthy terms which we remembered only after we'd finished filming... "gonnae no" means "go and not", but more commonly is used as "oh stop it". "amnae" = "I'm not". We use "how" in place of "why". "cannae" = "can't". So it's technically accurate to say "Amnae coming out tonight" "Gonnae no. How?" "Cannae be arsed". If you have other suggestions please share them!

2:07 Pal 2:09 Hen 2:51 Chum 3:26 Blether 3:46 Juice 4:15 Buckie 5:25 Steamin' 5:27 Supper 6:10 Chippy Sauce 7:00 Piece 7:17 Braw 7:38 Barrie 8:17 Shan 8:38 Bawbag 9:18 Eejit 9:28 Ned 9:30 Bam 11:04 Rank 11:06 Reekie 11:22 Honking 11:27 Jobbie 11:59 Pure 12:13 Yonks 12:56 Easy Oasie 13:28 Yous 13:41 Geeze 14:34 Shoogle 14:36 Skoosh 15:23 Outwith

A few more: Squint - Askew (that picture's squint) Bahookie - Backside (right in the bahookie) Wheesht - Hush Dreich - Dreary and Drab (the weather's dreich) Glaikit - Foolish and Stupid (don't be glaikit) Haver - Babble (stop, you're havering) Peelie-Wally - Pale and Sickly Looking (you're looking a little peelie-wally) Sleekit - Sly or Cunning (the sleekit person) Chore - To Steal (they chored it) Gaff - Young Party Involving Alcohol (do you want to go to the gaff?) Bairn - Child (look at the bairns) Radge - Crazy (that's radge!) Haar - A Type of Fog (here comes the haar)

Super funny, Kakibot. But you hit this right on the nail! How about the word "Radge"!

It’s me again I loved when my mum called me hen, it was the most endearing word. It was like saying oh my we bairn I love you my wee hen.

Hey! You don't need to worry about being classist or anything for using the words ned and bam. The idea that they are acronyms was only a relatively recent thing (so they are what you call "backronyms"). They don't actually stand for anything. Ned is believed to be derived from the Teddy Boy subculture (or Teds) which were similarly gangs of young men. Bam is short for Bampot, which is just another Scottish word for an idiot or a crazy person. I think that one has the same origin as the northern English word "barmy", meaning crazy. Hope that helps!

And of course, doing your messages...

Kat literally is preparing me to move to Scotland! thanks for all the work you do about this beautiful country, really, every video you upload brings me so much joy!

I've always seen it spelt “gie's” as in “give us” (“us” with a zz sound means “me” - I sometimes see it spelt “iz” but it feels weird). Gie's a shot o yer Game Boy! Gie's some o yer cake!

Piece -Sandwich Messages -Shopping Baffies- Slippers Haud yet wheesht- be quiet Skelp yer Lug- smack your ear Dey pronounced Di- Grandfather Mither-Mother Faither- Father Awa tae the Skil- Away to the school

The term 'pal' can be one of the most terrifying Scots words. It all depends on circumstance and intonation...

I'm visiting Scotland for the first time this coming July with my girlfriend, and I have been viewing lots of your videos for tips and this one helps to!

"Scunner' is my favourite Scot's word .

Fanny-baws :)

Great video Kakibot, as you allude to, a lot of words are more commonly used in certain parts of Scotland and words like barrie and chorie are more popular in the city of Edinburgh. As an aside, there are phonetic similarities with Swedish and Norwegian in the use of words like bra (braw) and nu (noo (now)) and kirk for a church.

Love “blether!”

Cute video! (Added bonus with octopus as second star). Supper, I know that one from my Irish grandmother, it’s used here occasionally in the Northeast as well. I use it often. Yous is very New Yorker and Northeast New Jersey, lol. I do get a big kick out of scran and messages. Shoogle and Skoosh, those are great.

Bam and Ned threw me 😆 🤣 thank you 😊 have a great week.

Chum in French Canada is boyfriend ❤

I enjoyed watching this video. I learned a lot. Will be coming there and these words would really help. Thanks thanks! 😊

The use of "Yous"... interesting that in some parts of northern States in America "Youse" is also used for plural of "you". Where in the southern States they say "y'all". Loved the video, thanks

Again, wonderful. You had a great time filming that one, I can tell. We learn a lot when we listen, and we always appreciate your research, time, and energy. Thank you. Here in the US (South) we've been using "Pal" for generations. I have to assume many of the words we use came from the old country of our ancestors. Good to see these words are still in use.

In the South (Oklahoma) we use the word "juice" to mean literally some sort of fruit drink, not fizzy drink, which is "Pop" or "Soda" but then again, most people say "Coke" when it could be a Dr. Pepper or Pepsi.

Appreciate your Channel and insights, have been very helpful as my wife and I plan our upcoming trip to Ireland and Scotland

Very interesting. I love these little quirks in language, when I come across a nice word like some of these, I like to change them around and incorporate them into my writing. I've noted most of these down for future reference 😊.

Hi kakibot,I'm from Dundee and never heard of to chum me but chum is pal .we use piece a lot also Cundy means drain cludgey means toilet, press means cupboard.

And the word greeting meaning crying, especially when it's a baby. A baby can also be shoogled, perhaps to stop it greeting...

I had a friend who came from Portobello ( I am in Devon where no one drinks Buckfast!) and she used to talk about doing her messages, shopping and when she left to go home she would say, I am away haime. So lovely I use that myself. Many of the words you used are fairly general all over the country especially the ones for smells.

We use a lot of these here in Newcastle ( not a million miles away ! )

Supper can also be biscuits and toast later in the day, tea is often dinner. High tea is a meal of fish and chips, bread and butter, cakes and biscuits.

This was so fun. Love your pins. It would be fun to have a few pins with fun words Shoogle

Been watching your videos for years always enjoy them, have noticed you are starting to develop a slight Scottish accent when you say say certain words and phrases and not just the Scottish words your explaining but in your general conversation. 👍

First briefs, but you didn’t follow with pun intended 😂

Piece is used in Fife a lot, also in Fife a friend is called a Neebur or Neebs for short

Brilliant to see this. Been here a couple of years after too long doon South. I still occasionally have no idea what a local is saying to me!! Over in Fife we also have a lot of these words (it's not just the Central Belt). Of course 'OUTWITH' goes with 'INWITH'. Surprised (though you had lots to get through) you didn't mention 'KEN', or 'BEN', and would have loved to see phrases like 'MESSAGES ON THE BUNKER' or how some phrases get switched (e.g. ROLL ON SAUSAGE rather than a Sausage roll) but these might be pure Fifeisms.

Thanks for uploading such wonderful and helpful content! I am planning to move to Scotland in the future and your videos will be a great help! I would like to ask if it is difficult to find a part time job or even a regular job in Scotland? I would like to be a photographer, but I'm not sure if there are any opportunities for that. If you could help me out a bit, that would be great! Love from Slovenia❤️

There are pubs in Lanarkshire that sell Buckie in a hauf n hauf.

"Schemies" which predates neds, essentially the same thing. Used to be quite specific to Edinburgh.

In Japan, soft drinks are also called “juice” even there’s no fruit in the ingredients. I didn’t know that “juice” in terms of drinks must be made of fruits until when I learned that in the US attending college.😅

Im perfectly fluent in Scottish dialogue having watched Rab C Nesbitt as a teenager.

And there's people who live on a stair, which can puzzle some tourists...

Skelf … that wee splinter of sharp wood that sticks in your skin

Skooch can also be used to ask someone to move and give you room on the couch for example.

Buckfast was the cheapest way to get drunk other than getting somebody else to pay.

Spicket = tap ( as in fawcet) , strone = a stream of milk from a cow's teat , pick = to abort ( of a cow) , steek yer e'en = shut your eyes, shuin = shoes, neb = nose ( on your face) , pech = to pant ( as in short of breath) , clockin = the desire to sleep , or of a hen , the desire to sit on eggs. Meat is food in general and not necessarily flesh . When someone put too much sugar in my great-grandmother's tea she said in disgust it was " jist bee's meat ".

A piece is single 'piece' of bread, with a topping, folded in half (the topping goes inside the fold, don't be a drunk me that night). It's not actually a sandwich, we just use the terms interchangably. If anyone cares why it's called that... I think that 'chum' thing, is why Weegies think of Edinburghers as the 'public school' tossers of Scotland.

I heard that meanin for “ned” is a backronym, it's no what it meant when it wis first bein used

Just 3minutes in and a couple of points maybe worth mentioning: Scots tend to only insult their friends. So being called 'my friend' or 'pal' may be an indication that you've been talking when you really ought to've been listening. On the other hand, if speaking to a foreigner perhaps with less conversational English however, then that norm does not usually apply, unless you're the very loud opinionated type, then it may be taken as a last warning before encountering an extreme emotional experience. Hen is a bit like the 'N-word' in the US, but here it's between the genders. "If ah'm a hen, you're a duck"..."If ah lay eggs, you lay muck" Women will tend to address each other as hen. In fact the word is derived from Scots Gaelic - meaning 'yourself'. How is it going hen? Howzit gaun hen? How are you yourself? By the way, (barrawey) in Scotland an actual hen is an adult 'chicken'; chick - baby hen, chicken - adolescent hen, hen - fully mature adult hen. As in puppy, pup, dog.

Am a right smartypants but I like to dress up as a ned and visit classy joints, cos am really into prejudice :P

I love your pun, perhaps unintended, with the double meaning of the word briefs. Remembering your early days in advertising you said one of your first briefs was about underpants/bawbags. Briefs is also a word for men's underpants...

"Yous" I heard (northern) irish people use too!

Can I suggest scran, meaning food?

I would say juice didn't come into Scottish until the 80s. I grew up using the word "ginger", as did my parents and grandparents.

You can hear yous in the U.S. as well. In Pittsburgh PA they say yunz and words can be slurred together such as "Jew guys go to da store?" did you guys go to the store.

One word which confused me when I first moved here is ‘Ken’, which means ‘know’. If someone replies with ‘Ken’ they are saying ‘I know’

Slightly late to the party, but I have a pet peeve about slang word etymology where it's claimed that the word originates from an acronym or abbreviation. Most of the time, these are invented - for example "COP" is not derived from "Constables On Parade". So I am suspicious about NED being derived from Non Educated Delinquent, and Bam is almost certainly made up - there's a related word "bampot" which is related to the very similar words barm/barmpot/barmy used in different parts of England.

Watch Scottish comedy shows like Chewin' the Fat to see many of these words used to the highest degree.

Twee … too cutesy for words … roll your eyes cute like wee china dolls your grannie collected

Salt ,n, sauce is an Edinburgh/east coat thing. You don't really get it in Glasgow/west coast. Chan? I never heard that one! Auld Reekie? lol That's not why it has that name! But that is why the word for "smoke" became conflated with the word for "stench". Can you imagine where the stench was coming from? It wasn't the smoke! lol Jeez is sometimes said as Jeez-o, both derived from taking the Lord's name in vain. Whereas "geis" is simply a contraction of "gie us" meaning "give me". In Scots the word "us" can mean "me". "Ah wis gauny chum er ower the shoogly bridge fur a piece an a swally ah juice, but Jeez-o she canny hauf blether, so it wis a braw maurnin onywise, so Ah jist went aff fur a Bucky an a wee bidey wae Jimmy. Aye, we git pure reekin' so we did. Ah hudny seen yon eedjit in manys a yonk, so we wis a easy ozy n then these neds turned up an huckled us right aff the scheme. Ah wis pure ragin so Ah wis, an ah telt them, Yoos yins ur cruisin fur a bruisin, Ah'll tell ye thon fur nuhin boy!"

It has to be vinegar in the brown sauce for me .. water added to brown sauce is not natural 😅

I' ve only heard the word shan used in the phrase " shan gabbit" , which I think means when a persons chin protrudes beyond their upper jaw. Neds is an older term than the meaning attached here, going back to the 1960s at least. Crazy people have been bampots for yonks and again I think classing it as an acronym is wrong. Mingin means smelly , why it has been adopted down south to mean ugly I don't know.

Youse are pure barry but it's pure shan that ye left oot stoor (dust) and ken (know). My Aussie flatmate wondered for ages who ken was ya ken? See Trainspotting for further details.

Chum & Pal are both brands of dog food!

Chittering bite, scunner, drookit

Unsure if Scottish, but to 'skooch' means to move over, or 'skooch past' means squeese past.

oh hen, yuv been swiggin the bucky? hod oan al phone ye a taxi.

How about "doobly doo"? I've only heard it from a certain Edinburgh youtuber I follow

First!

hmm 🤔 chum am born and bred Scot and never used "chum" as for bucky very small amount of people drink it a certain type of person(neds)! a lot of the stuff you are talking about is East Coast totally different from the rest of Scotland just a thought I have never heard of some of the words you speak, bawbag is west coast anyway west is best !!

How 'bout, "I cunnah make the engines work, Captain. I'll put more delithium crystals in!" (sorry, that's my U.S.-centered limigted view. Though I hope to learn _real_ Scottish words!

Hiya! Great channel!.. just a wee comment on the word 'Hen'. The Scots word Hen is short for Hennie? The sticky stuff that bees make? The English call it honey.

Outwith should not just be a Scottish word. It isn''t even Scots, it's just Scottish standard English. In the context it's just such a useful word, and explains itself. I don't even think we have a word in Scots for it. I'm sure it's 'oot wae' and not 'ootwae'. Might be wrong.

Oxster … wish spell check dinnae correct me!

Shan is from the cant of the Scottish traveling people it was used to describe something utterly distasteful or shameful

Skoosh means juice like squash

Im sorry, i hardly use any of these words but doesn't mean I'm less Scottish. Im a proud Scot and a proud brit, but i find this sort of stuff just cringable.

You should have checked this list with a Scot first