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scorrick

A fragment, the least particle. From Yorkshire: ‘Ah thowt ther would ha bin summat left, bud ther waant a scorrick’. The word turns up with several vowels, such as scerrick, scirrick, and scurrick, and the spellings with k are as common as those with c. In the form skerrick, it came to be common in colloquial Australian speech. The etymology isn’t known, but it sounds like a word with an Old Norse origin.


Found in: Cheshire East, Derbyshire, Derby, Cumbria, Dorset, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, Southampton, Lancashire, Blackpool, Sefton, Blackburn with Darwen, Rochdale, Oldham, Tameside, Stockport, Manchester, Bury, Bolton, Salford, Trafford, Warrington, Merseyside, Halton, Knowsley, Liverpool, Norfolk, Northamptonshire, Nottinghamshire, Nottingham, Scottish Borders, Highland, Aberdeenshire, Angus, Perthshire and Kinross, Stirling, Clackmannanshire, Dumfries and Galloway, East Lothian, West Dunbartonshire, Inverclyde, Glasgow, East Dunbartonshire, North Ayshire, South Ayrshire, East Ayrshire, South Lanarkshire, West Lothian, Edinburgh, Midlothian, Moray, Aberdeen, Renfrewshire, East Renfrewshire, Fife, Argyll and Bute, North Lanarkshire, Falkirk, Dundee, Wigan, Somerset, North Somerset, Bath and North East Somerset, Bristol, Staffordshire, Stoke-on-Trent, Warwickshire, Wolverhampton, Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall, Birmingham, Solihull, Coventry, Worcestershire, North Yorkshire, York, East Riding of Yorkshire, Kingston upon Hull, Calderdale, Bradford, Kirklees, Leeds, Doncaster, Rotherham, Sheffield, Barnsley, Wakefield, South Gloucestershire, Peterborough, Bournemouth, Poole,

About The Book

Wherever you go in the English-speaking world, there are linguistic riches from times past awaiting rediscovery. All you have to do is choose a location, find some old documents, and dig a little.

In The Disappearing Dictionary, linguistics expert Professor David Crystal collects together delightful dialect words that either provide an insight into an older way of life, or simply have an irresistible phonetic appeal. Like a mirror image of The Meaning of Liff that just happens to be true, The Disappearing Dictionary unearths some lovely old gems of the English language, dusts them down and makes them live again for a new generation.


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