118-500: The lands of Finnart to the west of Greenock belonged to the Earl of Douglas in medieval times. Around 1455 they were forfeited to the crown. Finnart was given to the Hamiltons , while the western part of the barony of Finnart went to Stewart of Castlemilk and became the barony of Finnart-Stewart, or Gourock . Sir James Hamilton of Finnart inherited the barony and rose to high office, but
236-622: A cause celebre , seven young Greenock males stowed away on a cargo ship bound for Quebec . Treated with what was, even for the times, exceptional brutality, they were forcibly disembarked in Newfoundland ; by the time they were returned to Scotland, three of them had died. The Captain and mate of the cargo ship were tried in a blaze of publicity at the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh and served short prison terms. In 1714 Greenock became
354-538: A Scottish Parliament constituency. Greenock is the administrative centre of Inverclyde Council , the local authority responsible for the wider Inverclyde area in which Greenock is located. The council is based in the Greenock Municipal Buildings . Greenock's climate is temperate maritime having mainly cool summers and mild winters. The coastal location means that the heat capacity of seawater helps keep winter temperatures higher than locations just
472-644: A custom house port as a branch of Port Glasgow , and for a period this operated from rooms leased in Greenock. Receipts rose rapidly with the expansion of colonial trade, and in 1778 the custom house moved to newly-built premises at the West Quay of the harbour. By 1791 a new pier was constructed at the East Quay. In 1812 Europe's first steamboat service was introduced by PS Comet with frequent sailings between Glasgow, Greenock and Helensburgh , and as trade built up
590-905: A 1996 trial before the Census, by the General Register Office for Scotland (GRO), suggested that there were around 1.5 million speakers of Scots, with 30% of Scots responding "Yes" to the question "Can you speak the Scots language?", but only 17% responding "Aye" to the question "Can you speak Scots?". It was also found that older, working-class people were more likely to answer in the affirmative. The University of Aberdeen Scots Leid Quorum performed its own research in 1995, cautiously suggesting that there were 2.7 million speakers, though with clarification as to why these figures required context. The GRO questions, as freely acknowledged by those who set them, were not as detailed and systematic as those of
708-527: A Charter raising Greenock to a Burgh of Barony with rights to a weekly market. Further east, Saint Laurence Bay curved round past the Crawfurd Barony of Easter Greenock to Garvel (or Gravel) Point. When a pier (or dyke) was built making the bay an important harbour, the fishing village of Cartsdyke gained the alternative name of Craufurdsdyke. In 1642 it was made into the Burgh of Barony of Crawfurdsdyke, and part of
826-625: A Scots language listing. The Ferret, a UK -based fact-checking service, wrote an exploratory article in December 2022 to address misconceptions about the Scots language to improve public awareness of its endangered status. In Scotland, Scots is spoken in the Scottish Lowlands , the Northern Isles , Caithness , Arran and Campbeltown . In Ulster , the northern province in Ireland , its area
944-553: A broad bay with three smaller indentations: the Bay of Quick was known as a safe anchorage as far back as 1164. To its east, a sandy bay ran eastwards from the Old Kirk and the West Burn as far as Wester Greenock castle. The fishing village of Greenock developed along this bay, and around 1635 Sir John Schaw had a jetty built into the bay which became known as Sir John's Bay. In that year he obtained
1062-462: A collection of children's nursery rhymes and poems in Scots. The book contains a five-page glossary of contemporary Scots words and their pronunciations. Alexander Gray 's translations into Scots constitute the greater part of his work, and are the main basis for his reputation. In 1983, William Laughton Lorimer 's translation of the New Testament from the original Greek was published. Scots
1180-620: A common spelling until it was changed to Greenock around 1700. Grenock was also used in the 19th century, e.g. in Lloyd's List publications. The spelling Greenoak was found in two factory accounts dating back to 1717, and a legend developed of a green oak tree at the edge of the Clyde at William Street being used by fishermen to tie up their boats. No reliable source has been found referencing green oaks, however, and so this has been generally dismissed as imaginative Anglophone folk etymology . Nonetheless
1298-550: A contiguous urban area with Gourock to the west and Port Glasgow to the east. The 2011 UK Census showed that Greenock had a population of 44,248, a decrease from the 46,861 recorded in the 2001 UK Census . It lies on the south bank of the Clyde at the " Tail of the Bank " where the River Clyde deepens into the Firth of Clyde . Place-name scholar William J. Watson wrote that "Greenock
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#17330861108251416-433: A continuum ranging from traditional broad Scots to Scottish Standard English . Many speakers are diglossic and may be able to code-switch along the continuum depending on the situation. Where on this continuum English-influenced Scots becomes Scots-influenced English is difficult to determine. Because standard English now generally has the role of a Dachsprache ('roofing language'), disputes often arise as to whether
1534-678: A customs and excise museum which was open to the public. In June 2008 HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) announced that the building would close in 2011 as part of a rationalisation project with any jobs being transferred to offices in Glasgow , and despite a campaign to oppose these plans, the building closed in August 2010. Riverside Inverclyde arranged further refurbishment works, and in 2013 announced that space had already been let to companies including PG Paper Company Ltd and Toshiba which had planning permission to form meeting rooms and an executive office in
1652-553: A few miles inland. Although there has been recent debate the moderating influence of the North Atlantic Drift , a warm oceanic current that is the eastern extension of the Gulf Stream , means that Greenock's average temperature is approximately one degree Celsius greater than eastern Scottish coastal towns on the same latitude (55.94 degrees north); whilst in winter, Greenock is considerably warmer than continental locations at
1770-674: A name for the Lowland vernacular. The Gaelic of Scotland is now usually called Scottish Gaelic . Northumbrian Old English had been established in what is now southeastern Scotland as far as the River Forth by the seventh century, as the region was part of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria . By the tenth century, Middle Irish was the language of the Scottish court , and the common use of Old English remained largely confined to this area until
1888-413: A number of paradigms for distinguishing between languages and dialects exist, they often render contradictory results. Broad Scots is at one end of a bipolar linguistic continuum , with Scottish Standard English at the other. Scots is sometimes regarded as a variety of English, though it has its own distinct dialects; other scholars treat Scots as a distinct Germanic language, in the way that Norwegian
2006-612: A representative sample of Scotland's adult population) claim to speak Scots to varying degrees. The 2011 UK census was the first to ask residents of Scotland about Scots. A campaign called Aye Can was set up to help individuals answer the question. The specific wording used was "Which of these can you do? Tick all that apply" with options for "Understand", "Speak", "Read" and "Write" in three columns: English, Scottish Gaelic and Scots. Of approximately 5.1 million respondents, about 1.2 million (24%) could speak, read and write Scots, 3.2 million (62%) had no skills in Scots and
2124-501: A suitable medium of education or culture". Students reverted to Scots outside the classroom, but the reversion was not complete. What occurred, and has been occurring ever since, is a process of language attrition , whereby successive generations have adopted more and more features from Standard English. This process has accelerated rapidly since widespread access to mass media in English and increased population mobility became available after
2242-530: A tunnel under Greenock's west end. To regain custom, the Caledonian Railway extended (what is now known as the Inverclyde Line ) the Glasgow, Paisley and Greenock Railway west to Gourock; this line was built to run inland through deep cuttings and tunnels, with a tunnel under the whole length of Newton Street crossing under the other railway tunnel to emerge near Fort Matilda railway station . Spoil from
2360-575: Is also used, though this is more often taken to mean the Lallans literary form . Scots in Ireland is known in official circles as Ulster-Scots ( Ulstèr-Scotch in revivalist Ulster-Scots) or "Ullans", a recent neologism merging Ulster and Lallans. Scots is a contraction of Scottis , the Older Scots and northern version of late Old English : Scottisc (modern English "Scottish"), which replaced
2478-589: Is closely linked to but distinct from Danish . Native speakers sometimes refer to their vernacular as braid Scots (or "broad Scots" in English) or use a dialect name such as the " Doric " or the " Buchan Claik ". The old-fashioned Scotch , an English loan, occurs occasionally, especially in Ulster. The term Lallans , a variant of the Modern Scots word lawlands [ˈlo̜ːlən(d)z, ˈlɑːlənz] ,
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#17330861108252596-552: Is in Scots, for example. Scott introduced vernacular dialogue to his novels. Other well-known authors like Robert Louis Stevenson , William Alexander, George MacDonald , J. M. Barrie and other members of the Kailyard school like Ian Maclaren also wrote in Scots or used it in dialogue. In the Victorian era popular Scottish newspapers regularly included articles and commentary in the vernacular, often of unprecedented proportions. In
2714-796: Is lykest to our language..." ( For though several have written of (the subject) in English, which is the language most similar to ours... ). However, with the increasing influence and availability of books printed in England, most writing in Scotland came to be done in the English fashion. In his first speech to the English Parliament in March 1603, King James VI and I declared, "Hath not God first united these two Kingdomes both in Language, Religion, and similitude of maners?" . Following James VI's move to London,
2832-523: Is sometimes used in contemporary fiction, such as the Edinburgh dialect of Scots in Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh (later made into a motion picture of the same name ). But'n'Ben A-Go-Go by Matthew Fitt is a cyberpunk novel written entirely in what Wir Ain Leed ("Our Own Language") calls "General Scots". Like all cyberpunk work, it contains imaginative neologisms . The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam
2950-550: Is used to describe the Scots language after 1700. A seminal study of Scots was undertaken by JAH Murray and published as Dialect of the Southern Counties of Scotland . Murray's results were given further publicity by being included in Alexander John Ellis 's book On Early English Pronunciation, Part V alongside results from Orkney and Shetland, as well as the whole of England. Murray and Ellis differed slightly on
3068-529: Is usually defined through the works of Robert John Gregg to include the counties of Down , Antrim , Londonderry and Donegal (especially in East Donegal and Inishowen ). More recently, the Fintona -born linguist Warren Maguire has argued that some of the criteria that Gregg used as distinctive of Ulster-Scots are common in south-west Tyrone and were found in other sites across Northern Ireland investigated by
3186-721: Is well known in Gaelic as Grianáig , dative of grianág , 'a sunny knoll ' ". The Scottish Gaelic place-name Grianaig is relatively common, with another Greenock near Callander in Menteith (formerly in Perthshire) and yet another at Muirkirk in Kyle , now in East Ayrshire . R. M. Smith in (1921) described the alternative derivation from Common Brittonic * Graenag , 'gravelly or sandy place', as more appropriate, accurately describing
3304-567: The Celtic language that was historically restricted to most of the Scottish Highlands , the Hebrides , and Galloway after the sixteenth century; or Broad Scots , to distinguish it from Scottish Standard English . Modern Scots is a sister language of Modern English , as the two diverged from the same medieval form of English. Scots is recognised as an indigenous language of Scotland by
3422-544: The Earl of Douglas included the lands of Finnart, which lay to the west of the barony of Greenock. As a result of disputes with King James II of Scotland , the lands and estates of James Douglas, 9th Earl of Douglas , were forfeited to the crown in 1455. In 1457 the king gave Finnart to the Hamilton family . The western portion of the Finnart estates was given by the king to Sir Archibald Stewart of Castlemilk, and subsequently became
3540-470: The English Dialect Dictionary , edited by Joseph Wright . Wright had great difficulty in recruiting volunteers from Scotland, as many refused to cooperate with a venture that regarded Scots as a dialect of English, and he obtained enough help only through the assistance from a Professor Shearer in Scotland. Wright himself rejected the argument that Scots was a separate language, saying that this
3658-684: The Harland & Wolff shipyard (the present-day location of Container Way), the Old West Kirk was relocated to a new site on the Esplanade where it still stands. The shipbuilders provided the Pirrie Hall to the south of the site: this was opened in February 1925, just after the old church closed for work to commence, and was used during the works to accommodate services, enabling the congregation to see progress on
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3776-629: The Isle of Bute and the Cowal Peninsula. The hospital was commissioned to replace the Greenock Royal Infirmary , the Eye Infirmary, Gateside Hospital, Duncan Macpherson Hospital and Broadstone Jubilee Hospital. Construction work started at the end of August 1970 and the hospital was completed in 1979. In 2004 Inverclyde Royal Hospital faced proposals for a major downsizing with the loss of
3894-501: The Linguistic Survey of Scotland . Dialects of Scots include Insular Scots , Northern Scots , Central Scots , Southern Scots and Ulster Scots . It has been difficult to determine the number of speakers of Scots via census, because many respondents might interpret the question "Do you speak Scots?" in different ways. Campaigners for Scots pressed for this question to be included in the 2001 UK National Census . The results from
4012-706: The Protestant Church of Scotland adopted the 1611 Authorized King James Version of the Bible; subsequently, the Acts of Union 1707 led to Scotland joining England to form the Kingdom of Great Britain , having a single Parliament of Great Britain based in London. After the Union and the shift of political power to England, the use of Scots was discouraged by many in authority and education, as
4130-772: The Romance languages via ecclesiastical and legal Latin , Norman French , and later Parisian French , due to the Auld Alliance . Additionally, there were Dutch and Middle Low German influences due to trade with and immigration from the Low Countries . Scots also includes loan words in the legal and administrative fields resulting from contact with Middle Irish , and reflected in early medieval legal documents. Contemporary Scottish Gaelic loans are mainly for geographical and cultural features, such as cèilidh , loch , whisky , glen and clan . Cumbric and Pictish ,
4248-461: The Second World War . It has recently taken on the nature of wholesale language shift , sometimes also termed language change , convergence or merger . By the end of the twentieth century, Scots was at an advanced stage of language death over much of Lowland Scotland . Residual features of Scots are often regarded as slang. A 2010 Scottish Government study of "public attitudes towards
4366-555: The Shaw Stewart baronets . Greenock Greenock ( / ˈ ɡ r iː n ə k / ; Scots : Greenock ; Scottish Gaelic : Grianaig , pronounced [ˈkɾʲiənɛkʲ] ) is a town in Inverclyde , Scotland, located in the west central Lowlands of Scotland . The town is the administrative centre of Inverclyde Council . It is a former burgh within the historic county of Renfrewshire , and forms part of
4484-579: The University of Aberdeen , and only included reared speakers (people raised speaking Scots), not those who had learned the language. Part of the difference resulted from the central question posed by surveys: "Do you speak Scots?". In the Aberdeen University study, the question was augmented with the further clause "... or a dialect of Scots such as Border etc.", which resulted in greater recognition from respondents. The GRO concluded that there simply
4602-521: The 1970s and 1980s due to competition from South Korea and Japan. Scots language Scots is a language variety descended from Early Middle English in the West Germanic language family . Most commonly spoken in the Scottish Lowlands , the Northern Isles of Scotland , and northern Ulster in Ireland (where the local dialect is known as Ulster Scots ), it is sometimes called: Lowland Scots , to distinguish it from Scottish Gaelic ,
4720-640: The 1970s and 1980s meant that none of these companies are still trading. Greenock Shipbuilders included: Scotts, Browns, William Lithgows, Fergusons, Head the Boat Builder (lifeboats). Other marine engineering related companies included engine-makers – Kincaids, Scotts, Rankin and Blackmore (which included the Eagle Foundry) – ship repair (Lamonts) and Hasties for steering gear. Yacht builders included Adams and McLean (at Cardwell Bay). Other yards included Cartsburn, Cartsdyke, and Klondyke – all of which closed during
4838-637: The Bow Farm housing estate. The parish boundary with Gourock divided Easter Finnart from Finnart-Stewart (or Wester Finnart), which "extended from Achaneich to Achamead". The former Auchneagh House was sited adjacent to Fancy Farm, just to the west of the former municipal boundary: its location is marked by Auchneagh Road, which runs north west from the A78 Inverkip Road: the area is now a Greenock housing estate. The farms of Aughmead and West Aughmead were sited about 1 mile (1.6 km) further west. They lay to
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4956-542: The Crowns in 1603, the Standard English of England came to have an increasing influence on the spelling of Scots through the increasing influence and availability of books printed in England. After the Acts of Union in 1707 the emerging Scottish form of Standard English replaced Scots for most formal writing in Scotland. The eighteenth-century Scots revival saw the introduction of a new literary language descended from
5074-510: The Custom House was praised as "a grand National Structure" in "the highest style of elegance". By then there were scheduled steamboat sailings to Belfast , Derry , Liverpool, Inverness , Campbeltown , the Hebrides and "all the principal places in the Highlands". The Custom House underwent extensive refurbishment which was completed in 1989 and, until closure of the building in 2010, housed
5192-444: The French Vauquelin class destroyer Maillé Brézé blew up off Greenock with heavy loss of life following an accident involving two of her own torpedoes. Although this disaster occurred before the Free French Naval Forces were established, many people tend to regard the Cross of Lorraine on Lyle Hill as a memorial to the loss of the Maillé Brézé as well as to the later losses of the Free French Naval Forces which sailed from
5310-510: The Garvel estate for a harbour when Easter Greenock lands were put up for sale to meet debts, but were outbid by Sir John Schaw who then got a Crown Charter of 1670 uniting Easter and Wester Greenock into the Burgh Barony of Greenock. A separate Barony of Cartsburn was created, the first baron being Thomas Craufurd. In 1668 the City of Glasgow got the lease of 13 acres (5 hectares) of land upriver close to Newark Castle , and construction promptly started on Newport Glasgow harbour which by 1710 had
5428-411: The Inverkip road as far as Loch Thom . The map shows the western boundary as the Mile Burn. The notes quote Crawfurd's 1782 History of the Shire of Renfrew referring to a walk-mill called "Elie-mill" as "lying within the barony of Gourock". The mill site lies a short distance to the east of West Aughmead farm, on the location of the modern street named Aileymill Gardens. The extensive landholdings of
5546-399: The Kingdom of Great Britain, there is ample evidence that Scots was widely held to be an independent sister language forming a pluricentric diasystem with English. German linguist Heinz Kloss considered Modern Scots a Halbsprache ('half language') in terms of an abstand and ausbau languages framework, although today in Scotland most people's speech is somewhere on
5664-409: The Philosopher's Stane , a Scots translation of the first Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone , was published by Matthew Fitt . The vowel system of Modern Scots: Vowel length is usually conditioned by the Scottish vowel length rule . The orthography of Early Scots had become more or less standardised by the middle to late sixteenth century. After the Union of
5782-480: The Scots language was also featured. It was found that 1,508,540 people reported that they could speak Scots, with 2,444,659 reporting that they could speak, read, write or understand Scots, approximately 45% of Scotland's 2022 population. The Scottish Government set its first Scots Language Policy in 2015, in which it pledged to support its preservation and encourage respect, recognition and use of Scots. The Scottish Parliament website also offers some information on
5900-419: The Scots language" found that 64% of respondents (around 1,000 individuals in a representative sample of Scotland's adult population) "don't really think of Scots as a language", also finding "the most frequent speakers are least likely to agree that it is not a language (58%) and those never speaking Scots most likely to do so (72%)". Before the Treaty of Union 1707 , when Scotland and England joined to form
6018-512: The Scottish Executive recognises and respects Scots (in all its forms) as a distinct language, and does not consider the use of Scots to be an indication of poor competence in English. Evidence for its existence as a separate language lies in the extensive body of Scots literature, its independent – if somewhat fluid – orthographic conventions , and in its former use as the language of the original Parliament of Scotland . Because Scotland retained distinct political, legal, and religious systems after
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#17330861108256136-422: The Scottish average of 3.9% (figure is for the Scottish Parliament constituency and includes Gourock , Inverkip , Port Glasgow and Wemyss Bay ). In the early 17th century, the first pier was built in Greenock. Shipbuilding was already an important employer by this time. The first proper harbour was constructed in 1710 and the first well-known shipbuilders, Scotts Shipbuilding and Engineering Company ,
6254-495: The Scottish government, a regional or minority language of Europe, and a vulnerable language by UNESCO . In a Scottish census from 2022, over 1.5 million people in Scotland reported being able to speak Scots. Given that there are no universally accepted criteria for distinguishing a language from a dialect , scholars and other interested parties often disagree about the linguistic, historical and social status of Scots, particularly its relationship to English . Although
6372-505: The Standard English cognate . This Written Scots drew not only on the vernacular, but also on the King James Bible , and was heavily influenced by the norms and conventions of Augustan English poetry . Consequently, this written Scots looked very similar to contemporary Standard English, suggesting a somewhat modified version of that, rather than a distinct speech form with a phonological system which had been developing independently for many centuries. This modern literary dialect, "Scots of
6490-497: The Union, many Scots terms passed into Scottish English. During the 2010s, increased interest was expressed in the language. The status of the language was raised in Scottish schools, with Scots being included in the new national school curriculum . Previously in Scotland's schools there had been little education taking place through the medium of Scots, although it may have been covered superficially in English lessons, which could entail reading some Scots literature and observing
6608-442: The West Burn estuary and is reputed to have been the first Protestant church built in Scotland after the Reformation. The Schaw, later Shaw and Shaw-Stewart , family retained a leading role in Greenock over the following centuries. In 1670, Sir John Shaw obtained a charter from King Charles II , combining the lands of Finnart and the barony of Wester Greenock, to create the barony of Greenock. The coast of Greenock formed
6726-405: The accident and emergency department and the acute surgical ward in an effort to save costs. Many people criticised the plans complaining that the Inverclyde Royal Hospital was being seen as nothing more than a large health centre. In February 2007, after undertaking a review, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde proposed retaining the accident and emergency department and core inpatient services, including
6844-467: The activities of those such as Thomas Sheridan , who in 1761 gave a series of lectures on English elocution . Charging a guinea at a time (about £200 in today's money ), they were attended by over 300 men, and he was made a freeman of the City of Edinburgh . Following this, some of the city's intellectuals formed the Select Society for Promoting the Reading and Speaking of the English Language in Scotland. These eighteenth-century activities would lead to
6962-455: The barony of Finnart-Stewart, which had its seat at Gourock castle. In 1510 James Hamilton, 1st Earl of Arran , passed the Finnart estate on to his natural son who became Sir James Hamilton of Finnart , though still widely known as "The Bastard of Arran". Finnart rose to a powerful place as head of the Hamilton family, and was appointed to a series of high positions by King James V of Scotland . In 1540 Finnart abruptly fell from favour with
7080-521: The book" or Standard Scots, once again gave Scots an orthography of its own, lacking neither "authority nor author". This literary language used throughout Lowland Scotland and Ulster, embodied by writers such as Allan Ramsay, Robert Fergusson, Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott, Charles Murray , David Herbison , James Orr, James Hogg and William Laidlaw among others, is well described in the 1921 Manual of Modern Scots . Other authors developed dialect writing, preferring to represent their own speech in
7198-435: The border between English and Scots dialects. Scots was studied alongside English and Scots Gaelic in the Linguistic Survey of Scotland at the University of Edinburgh , which began in 1949 and began to publish results in the 1970s. Also beginning in the 1970s, the Atlas Linguarum Europae studied the Scots language used at 15 sites in Scotland, each with its own dialect. From the mid-sixteenth century, written Scots
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#17330861108257316-449: The boundary being "the Hole or West-burn": the burn is culverted under the modern town centre at Westburn Street, immediately to the west of The Oak Mall indoor shopping centre, and from there flows into the River Clyde which formed the northern boundary. The southern boundary was the glen leading to Inverkip ; the West Burn flows down this valley, close to the line of the A78 trunk road. The area now includes Greenock West , as well as
7434-513: The building. Greenock Telegraph estimated that £4.1 million has been spent over five-year period for the renovation works. Greenock became a centre of industry, with water power being used to process imported goods. In 1827 Loch Thom was constructed as a reservoir with The Cut aqueduct , bringing water to two lines of falls for water mills to power a paper mill, cotton and woollen mills, sugar refineries and shipbuilding Greenock Central railway station at Cathcart Street opened in 1841, for
7552-443: The century. The land to the west of this was common ground for inhabitants of the town, but in 1907 the Admiralty compulsorily purchased part of this land for a torpedo factory. The remaining space was handed over to Greenock Corporation in 1914 as a public park. The Clyde Torpedo Factory opened in 1910, with 700 workers transferred from the Royal Arsenal , Woolwich . The site was tasked with designing and testing of torpedoes ,
7670-508: The complementary decline of French made Scots the prestige dialect of most of eastern Scotland. By the sixteenth century, Middle Scots had established orthographic and literary norms largely independent of those developing in England. From 1610 to the 1690s during the Plantation of Ulster , some 200,000 Scots-speaking Lowlanders settled as colonists in Ulster in Ireland. In the core areas of Scots settlement, Scots outnumbered English settlers by five or six to one. The name Modern Scots
7788-403: The creation of Scottish Standard English . Scots remained the vernacular of many rural communities and the growing number of urban working-class Scots. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the use of Scots as a literary language was revived by several prominent Scotsmen such as Robert Burns . Such writers established a new cross-dialect literary norm. Scots terms were included in
7906-449: The cuttings and tunnels was used to build an embankment out from the shore to a long timber wharf at Gourock railway station , providing space for railway sidings. The railway bought Wester Greenock castle and its extension, the Mansion House, and demolished them before constructing the tunnel immediately west of Greenock Central station, running under the castle grounds which now form Well Park. Greenock's increasing importance and wealth
8024-435: The development of the Clydeport container port as Ocean Terminal, a passenger terminal for cruise ships touring the Atlantic. Students who do not travel further afield for study often attend the Greenock campus of West College (formerly known as James Watt College of Further and Higher Education). Greenock reached its population peak in 1921 (81,123) and was once the sixth largest town in Scotland. Until 1974, Greenock
8142-434: The earlier i-mutated version Scyttisc . Before the end of the fifteenth century, English speech in Scotland was known as "English" (written Ynglis or Inglis at the time), whereas "Scottish" ( Scottis ) referred to Gaelic . By the beginning of the fifteenth century, the English language used in Scotland had arguably become a distinct language, albeit one lacking a name which clearly distinguished it from all
8260-694: The early twentieth century, a renaissance in the use of Scots occurred, its most vocal figure being Hugh MacDiarmid whose benchmark poem " A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle " (1926) did much to demonstrate the power of Scots as a modern idiom. Other contemporaries were Douglas Young , John Buchan , Sydney Goodsir Smith , Robert Garioch , Edith Anne Robertson and Robert McLellan . The revival extended to verse and other literature. In 1955, three Ayrshire men – Sandy MacMillan, an English teacher at Ayr Academy ; Thomas Limond, noted town chamberlain of Ayr ; and A. L. "Ross" Taylor, rector of Cumnock Academy – collaborated to write Bairnsangs ("Child Songs"),
8378-403: The eldest inherited Easter Greenock and married a Crawfurd, while Wester Greenock went to the younger daughter who married Schaw of Sauchie. Around 1540 the adjoining barony of Finnart was passed to the Schaw family, extending their holdings westward to the boundary of Gourock , and in 1542 Sir John Schaw founded Wester Greenock castle. The Scottish Reformation of 1560 closed the chapels in
8496-505: The fifteenth century, much literature based on the Royal Court in Edinburgh and the University of St Andrews was produced by writers such as Robert Henryson , William Dunbar , Gavin Douglas and David Lyndsay . The Complaynt of Scotland was an early printed work in Scots. The Eneados is a Middle Scots translation of Virgil 's Aeneid , completed by Gavin Douglas in 1513. After
8614-481: The first time providing a fast route from Glasgow to the coast linking up with Clyde steamer services. The provision of this new line meant there was no need to take the steamer all the way down river from Glasgow. In 1869 the Caledonian Railway was bypassed by the rival Greenock and Ayrshire Railway which opened a station on the waterfront at its Albert Harbour station (later renamed Princes Pier), served by
8732-548: The following high schools as of 2023: Greenock has the following other educational establishments: The Greenock Infirmary , later the Royal Infirmary, was established in 1809, when a building was erected at an expense of £1815, on a site of land given by Sir John Shaw Stewart. Today, the town is served by the Inverclyde Royal Hospital which is located in Greenock serving the population of Inverclyde , Largs ,
8850-613: The gun battery of Fort Beauclerc near the West Burn was extended to guard against the threat of privateers , but the emphasis shifted to wider markets including imports of rum and sugar from the Caribbean , wines from Spain, and fish from North America. A whaling business operated for about 40 years. Greenock "was mainly a trading port for goods such as sugar and cotton, but also dispatched ships to West Africa to take people to be enslaved " in Britain's American colonies. In 1868, in what became
8968-489: The ill-fated Darien Scheme set out from this pier in 1697. Its town was named Cartsburn. The fishing trade grew prosperous, with barrels of salted herring exported widely, and shipping trade developed. As seagoing ships could not go further up the River Clyde , the Glasgow merchants including the Tobacco Lords wanted harbour access but were in disputes with Greenock over harbour dues and warehouses. They tried to buy
9086-493: The image has frequently been used as an emblem or logo, carved on public buildings, used on banners and badges, and was once emblazoned on the local Co-operative Society emblem. It reappeared in 1992 as the new shopping centre's name, the Oak Mall, which uses a green tree as its logo. The name is also recalled in a local song ("The Green Oak Tree"). Significantly, no green oak appears on the former burgh coat of arms , which features
9204-489: The king and was executed, with his lands forfeit to the crown. King James V then bestowed the lands of Finnart on Alexander Shaw of Sauchie and Greenock, who passed them together with the barony of Wester Greenock on to his son John Shaw in 1542. In 1669 his descendant John Shaw bought the barony of Easter Greenock from the Crawfords, and the conjoined baronies were inherited in 1752 by John Shaw Stewart. The lands remain under
9322-603: The language in Scots. In September 2024, experts of the Council of Europe called on the UK Government to "boost support for regional and minority languages", including the Scots Language. The serious use of the Scots language for news, encyclopaediae, documentaries, etc., remains rare. It is reportedly reserved for niches where it is deemed acceptable, e.g. comedy, Burns Night or traditions' representations. Since 2016,
9440-567: The language used in different situations. Such an approach would be inappropriate for a Census." Thus, although it was acknowledged that the "inclusion of such a Census question would undoubtedly raise the profile of Scots", no question about Scots was, in the end, included in the 2001 Census. The Scottish Government's Pupils in Scotland Census 2008 found that 306 pupils spoke Scots as their main home language. A Scottish Government study in 2010 found that 85% of around 1000 respondents (being
9558-571: The local dialect. Much of the material used was often Standard English disguised as Scots, which caused upset among proponents of Standard English and proponents of Scots alike. One example of the educational establishment's approach to Scots is, "Write a poem in Scots. (It is important not to be worried about spelling in this – write as you hear the sounds in your head.)", whereas guidelines for English require teaching pupils to be "writing fluently and legibly with accurate spelling and punctuation". A course in Scots language and culture delivered through
9676-487: The medieval Brittonic languages of Northern England and Scotland, are the suspected source of a small number of Scots words, such as lum (derived from Cumbric) meaning "chimney". From the thirteenth century, the Early Scots language spread further into Scotland via the burghs , which were proto-urban institutions first established by King David I . In fourteenth-century Scotland, the growth in prestige of Early Scots and
9794-591: The medium of Standard English and produced by the Open University (OU) in Scotland, the Open University's School of Languages and Applied Linguistics as well as Education Scotland became available online for the first time in December 2019. In the 2011 Scottish census , a question on Scots language ability was featured In the 2022 census conducted by the Scottish Government , a question in relation to
9912-557: The nave of the church. Opposite it, above the front entrance, is the Crawfurdsburn or Choir Gallery. At the south end of the nave, the Sailor's Loft gallery was built in 1698 and features a 19th-century model frigate, which replaced earlier models. At the north end, the Farmer's Gallery is above the main seating area. A tower was added in the mid 19th century. In 1926, to make way for expansion of
10030-656: The newly formed Admiralty Underwater Weapons Establishment (AUWE), Portland. A church which became known as the Old West Kirk had been established in Greenock in 1591 under the patronage of John Schaw, the first built in Scotland since the Reformation . It was extended over the years, at an early stage the Schaw aisle provided pews for the Laird of the Barony, built as a gallery to the east of
10148-420: The newspaper The National has regularly published articles in the language. The 2010s also saw an increasing number of English books translated in Scots and becoming widely available, particularly those in popular children's fiction series such as The Gruffalo , Harry Potter , Diary of a Wimpy Kid , and several by Roald Dahl and David Walliams . In 2021, the music streaming service Spotify created
10266-401: The old court Scots, but with an orthography that had abandoned some of the more distinctive old Scots spellings and adopted many standard English spellings. Despite the updated spelling, however, the rhymes make it clear that a Scots pronunciation was intended. These writings also introduced what came to be known as the apologetic apostrophe , generally occurring where a consonant exists in
10384-453: The opposite true in midwinter . On the summer solstice, usually observed on the 21 June, the sun rises at 04:31 and sets at 22:07. On the winter solstice, usually 21 December, the sun rises at 08:46 and sets at 15:44. The Highlanders academy was built in 1837, partly by subscription, and partly by grant from government, on a site given by the late Sir Michael Shaw Stewart. Greenock has the following primary schools as of 2023: Greenock has
10502-405: The original foreshore. Johnston (1934) notes that "some Gaels call the seaport Ghónait , and that a possible derivation may be greannach , meaning 'rough, gravelly'. The name of the town has had various spellings over time. It was printed in early Acts of Parliament as Grinok , Greenhok , Grinock , Greenhoke , Greinnock , and later as Greinok . Old Presbyterial records used Grenok ,
10620-403: The other English variants and dialects spoken in Britain. From 1495, the term Scottis was increasingly used to refer to the Lowland vernacular and Erse , meaning "Irish", was used as a name for Gaelic. For example, towards the end of the fifteenth century, William Dunbar was using Erse to refer to Gaelic and, in the early sixteenth century, Gavin Douglas was using Scottis as
10738-399: The parish, and as the parish church was some 6 miles (10 kilometres) distant at Inverkip over a difficult route which was impassable in winter, in 1589 John Schaw obtained a charter from King James VI to build a kirk for the "poor people upon his lands who were all fishers and of a reasonable number". Later known as the Old Kirk or the Old West Kirk , it was constructed on the west bank of
10856-497: The past (e.g. Corby or the former mining areas of Kent ). In the 2022 census conducted by the Scottish Government , it was found that 1,508,540 people reported that they could speak Scots, with 2,444,659 reporting that they could speak, read, write or understand Scots, approximately 45% of Scotland's 2022 population. Among the earliest Scots literature is John Barbour's Brus (fourteenth century), Wyntoun 's Cronykil and Blind Harry 's The Wallace (fifteenth century). From
10974-446: The pier became known as Steamboat Quay. The custom house needed larger premises and in May 1817 the foundation stone was laid at Steamboat Quay for a Custom House building designed by William Burn , which was completed in 1818. Its gracious neoclassical architecture features a Grecian Doric portico looking out over the quay, which would eventually be renamed Custom House Quay. In 1828
11092-520: The principal Clyde custom house . In 1696 and 1700 Schaw and residents of the town made unsuccessful bids to the Scottish Parliament for grants for a Greenock harbour, then when the Act of Union 1707 opened up involvement in colonial trade, they raised their own funds. The work was completed in 1710, with quays extended out into Sir John's Bay to enclose the harbour. In 1711 the shipbuilding industry
11210-515: The rebuilt kirk. It then came into use as the church hall. The church is notable for stained glass by artists such as Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Sir Edward Burne-Jones . The Church has a website. Greenock suffered badly during the Second World War and its anchorage at the Tail of the Bank became the base for the Home Fleet as well as the main assembly point for Atlantic convoys. On 30 April 1940
11328-413: The remainder had some degree of skill, such as understanding Scots (0.27 million, 5.2%) or being able to speak it but not read or write it (0.18 million, 3.5%). There were also small numbers of Scots speakers recorded in England and Wales on the 2011 Census, with the largest numbers being either in bordering areas (e.g. Carlisle ) or in areas that had recruited large numbers of Scottish workers in
11446-524: The same latitude, such as Moscow. Anecdotally Greenock has a reputation for receiving higher than average rainfall (the song The Green Oak Tree comments on this). Whilst the rainfall is indeed higher than the average recorded at Scottish weather stations, the greatest rainfall in Scotland occurs on the west (ocean) facing mountain slopes of Lochaber , near Fort William in the Highlands . Greenock's latitude means long hours of daylight in midsummer with
11564-515: The seventeenth century, anglicisation increased. At the time, many of the oral ballads from the borders and the North East were written down. Writers of the period were Robert Sempill , Robert Sempill the younger , Francis Sempill , Lady Wardlaw and Lady Grizel Baillie . In the eighteenth century, writers such as Allan Ramsay , Robert Burns , James Orr , Robert Fergusson and Walter Scott continued to use Scots – Burns's " Auld Lang Syne "
11682-660: The testing taking place in Loch Long . During the Second World War the site switched entirely to manufacturing torpedoes. The original gun battery site was occupied by the Navy Buildings , the main offices, just to the east of the torpedo factory buildings. Following WW2, in 1947, the site became fully committed to R&D as the Torpedo Experimental Establishment (TEE). TEE was closed in 1959, when all torpedo research, development and design were concentrated at
11800-525: The thirteenth century. The succeeding variety of Northern Early Middle English spoken in southeastern Scotland is also known as Early Scots . It began to further diverge from the Middle English of Northumbria due to twelfth- and thirteenth-century immigration of Scandinavian-influenced Middle English–speakers from the North and Midlands of England . Later influences on the development of Scots came from
11918-481: The three chalices of the Shaw Stewarts, a sailing ship in full sail, and two herring above the motto "God Speed Greenock". Hugh de Grenock was created a Scottish Baron in 1296, and the seat of the feudal barony of Greenock was apparently what became Easter Greenock Castle . Around 1400 his successor Malcolm Galbraith died with no sons, and his estate was divided between his two daughters to become two baronies:
12036-419: The town relied heavily on electronics manufacture. However, this has given way mostly to: call centre business, insurance, banking and shipping export. The Fleming and Reid merino wool mill employed 500 people – mostly women and produced wool garments spun and woven at the mill. This mill was at the corner of Drumfrochar Road and Mill Road. As of October 2012 Greenock has an unemployment rate of 5.3%, above
12154-590: The town. On the nights of 6 May and 7 May 1941 around 300 Luftwaffe aircraft attacked the town in the Greenock Blitz . On 10 October 1940, RAF Greenock was created as a maintenance base for RAF flying boats. The base was hit on 7 May 1941 during the Greenock Blitz. A large building housing a drapery business constructed on Cowan's property at the corner of the Municipal Buildings was badly damaged and
12272-564: The trauma and emergency medical departments at Inverclyde Royal Hospital and submitted this proposal to the Scottish Government for approval. Langhill Clinic situated behind Inverclyde Royal Hospital is now the main psychiatric hospital with an IPCU unit and Day hospital alongside the main psychiatric ward. Historically, the town relied on shipbuilding , sugar refining and wool manufacturing for employment, but none of these industries are today part of Greenock's economy. More recently
12390-807: The twentieth-century biographer of James Boswell (1740–1795), described James's view of the use of Scots by his father Alexander Boswell (1706–1782) in the eighteenth century while serving as a judge of the Supreme Courts of Scotland : He scorned modern literature, spoke broad Scots from the bench, and even in writing took no pains to avoid the Scotticisms which most of his colleagues were coming to regard as vulgar. However, others did scorn Scots, such as Scottish Enlightenment intellectuals David Hume and Adam Smith , who went to great lengths to get rid of every Scotticism from their writings. Following such examples, many well-off Scots took to learning English through
12508-646: The varieties of Scots are dialects of Scottish English or constitute a separate language in their own right. The UK government now accepts Scots as a regional language and has recognised it as such under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages . Notwithstanding the UK government's and the Scottish Executive's obligations under part II of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages,
12626-410: The west of Aughmead Road which runs north from Inverkip Road, and were in the area of the modern south-west Greenock housing estates of Larkfield and Braeside , which both lie to the south of the current boundary with Gourock itself. The Rev. Macrae's Notes About Gourock of 1880 includes a rough map showing the boundaries of Gourock estate including Auchneagh, Aughmead and Braeside, and extending over
12744-408: Was a parliamentary burgh in its own right. It was merged with Port Glasgow to form Greenock and Port Glasgow constituency. In 1997, it became Greenock and Inverclyde . After the redistribution of Scottish seats, it was merged into an enlarged Inverclyde constituency – the first time in political history that Greenock has not been named in a parliamentary seat. Greenock and Inverclyde remains
12862-477: Was a "quite modern mistake". During the first half of the twentieth century, knowledge of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literary norms waned, and as of 2006 , there is no institutionalised standard literary form. By the 1940s, the Scottish Education Department 's language policy was that Scots had no value: "it is not the language of 'educated' people anywhere, and could not be described as
12980-457: Was beheaded and his estates forfeited, with his Finnart lands going to Shaw of Sauchie and Greenock. These estates subsequently became the west end of Greenock . The northern part of the Finnart-Stewart estates forms the main part of modern Gourock, while the remainder now accommodates the housing estates of south-west Greenock. The Douglas lands of Finnart lay west of the barony of Greenock,
13098-479: Was demolished, leaving the blank brick corner area still known as "Cowan's Corner". This was later landscaped and used as a garden. Greenock thrived in the post-war years but as the heavy industries declined in the 1970s and 1980s unemployment became a major problem, and it has only been in the last ten years with reinvestment and the redevelopment of large sections of the town that the local economy has started to revive. Tourism has appeared as an unexpected bonus with
13216-528: Was established the following year. It gained numerous contracts with the Royal Navy from 1806, building ships such as Glasgow . In 1967 Scott's was merged with Lithgows (founded 1874, later the largest privately owned yard in the world) the same year becoming Scott Lithgow , which was later nationalised as part of British Shipbuilders in 1977. From 1800 to 1980 many thousands of people worked to design, build and repair ships. The reduction in shipbuilding in
13334-584: Was founded when Scotts leased ground between the harbour and the West Burn to build fishing boats. Greenock rapidly became a major port and shipbuilding centre, and though tobacco imported from the colonies was taken to Glasgow by pack horse, the more bulky imports of sugar were processed locally. From 1774 the dredging of the River Clyde increasingly allowed ships to take merchandise directly to Glasgow, but merchants continued to use Greenock harbour. The American Revolutionary War temporarily interrupted trade, and
13452-652: Was increasingly influenced by the developing Standard English of Southern England due to developments in royal and political interactions with England. When William Flower , an English herald , spoke with Mary of Guise and her councillors in 1560, they first used the "Scottyshe toung" . As he found this hard to understand, they switched into her native French. King James VI , who in 1603 became James I of England , observed in his work Some Reulis and Cautelis to Be Observit and Eschewit in Scottis Poesie that "For albeit sindrie hes written of it in English, quhilk
13570-409: Was manifested in the construction of the Greenock Municipal Buildings , whose Victoria Tower, completed in 1886, stands 245 feet (75 metres) tall. The War of 1812 reawakened fears of American raids against Britain's ports. Earlier gun batteries had been dismantled and in 1813 ground was granted for a battery at Whitefarland Point. Fort Matilda was completed in 1818 and was sporadically modified over
13688-466: Was not enough linguistic self-awareness amongst the Scottish populace, with people still thinking of themselves as speaking badly pronounced, grammatically inferior English rather than Scots, for an accurate census to be taken. The GRO research concluded that "[a] more precise estimate of genuine Scots language ability would require a more in-depth interview survey and may involve asking various questions about
13806-432: Was the notion of "Scottishness" itself. Many leading Scots of the period, such as David Hume , defined themselves as Northern British rather than Scottish. They attempted to rid themselves of their Scots in a bid to establish standard English as the official language of the newly formed union. Nevertheless, Scots was still spoken across a wide range of domains until the end of the eighteenth century. Frederick Pottle ,
13924-491: Was translated into Scots by Rab Wilson and published in 2004. Alexander Hutchison has translated the poetry of Catullus into Scots, and in the 1980s, Liz Lochhead produced a Scots translation of Tartuffe by Molière . J. K. Annand translated poetry and fiction from German and Medieval Latin into Scots. The strip cartoons Oor Wullie and The Broons in the Sunday Post use some Scots. In 2018, Harry Potter and
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