Lancashire dialect and accent
Encyclopedia
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
, one of the counties of England
Counties of England
Counties of England are areas used for the purposes of administrative, geographical and political demarcation. For administrative purposes, England outside Greater London and the Isles of Scilly is divided into 83 counties. The counties may consist of a single district or be divided into several...
. Simon Elmes' book Talking for Britain said that Lancashire dialect is now much less common than it once was, but it is not yet extinct. As the county encompassed what are now Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester
Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 2.6 million. It encompasses one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and comprises ten metropolitan boroughs: Bolton, Bury, Oldham, Rochdale, Stockport, Tameside, Trafford, Wigan, and the...
, Merseyside
Merseyside
Merseyside is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 1,365,900. It encompasses the metropolitan area centred on both banks of the lower reaches of the Mersey Estuary, and comprises five metropolitan boroughs: Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton, Wirral, and the city of Liverpool...
and part of Cumbria
Cumbria
Cumbria , is a non-metropolitan county in North West England. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local authority, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumbria's largest settlement and county town is Carlisle. It consists of six districts, and in...
until 1974, the accents found in these areas are also covered by this article. The historic dialects have received some academic interest, most notably the two-part A grammar of the dialect of the Bolton area by Graham Shorrocks.
Historical changes to the boundaries of Lancashire
Lancashire emerged during the Industrial RevolutionIndustrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times...
as a major commercial and industrial region. The county encompassed several hundred mill town
Mill town
A mill town, also known as factory town or mill village, is typically a settlement that developed around one or more mills or factories .- United Kingdom:...
s and collieries and by the 1830s, approximately 85% of all cotton
Cotton
Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....
manufactured worldwide was processed in Lancashire. Preston, Accrington
Accrington
Accrington is a town in Lancashire, within the borough of Hyndburn. It lies about east of Blackburn, west of Burnley, north of Manchester city centre and is situated on the mostly culverted River Hyndburn...
, Blackburn, Bolton
Bolton
Bolton is a town in Greater Manchester, in the North West of England. Close to the West Pennine Moors, it is north west of the city of Manchester. Bolton is surrounded by several smaller towns and villages which together form the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, of which Bolton is the...
, Chorley
Chorley
Chorley is a market town in Lancashire, in North West England. It is the largest settlement in the Borough of Chorley. The town's wealth came principally from the cotton industry...
, Darwen
Darwen
Darwen is a market town and civil parish located within Lancashire, England. Along with its northerly neighbour, Blackburn, it forms the Borough of Blackburn with Darwen — a unitary authority area...
, Oldham
Oldham
Oldham is a large town in Greater Manchester, England. It lies amid the Pennines on elevated ground between the rivers Irk and Medlock, south-southeast of Rochdale, and northeast of the city of Manchester...
, and Burnley
Burnley
Burnley is a market town in the Burnley borough of Lancashire, England, with a population of around 73,500. It lies north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Brun....
were major cotton mill
Cotton mill
A cotton mill is a factory that houses spinning and weaving machinery. Typically built between 1775 and 1930, mills spun cotton which was an important product during the Industrial Revolution....
towns during this time. Blackpool
Blackpool
Blackpool is a borough, seaside town, and unitary authority area of Lancashire, in North West England. It is situated along England's west coast by the Irish Sea, between the Ribble and Wyre estuaries, northwest of Preston, north of Liverpool, and northwest of Manchester...
was a major centre for tourism for the inhabitants of Lancashire's mill towns, particularly during wakes week
Wakes week
The wakes week is a holiday period in parts of England and Scotland.- History :Wakes were originally religious festivals that commemorated church dedications...
.
The county today comprises a much smaller area as it was subject to a significant boundary reform in 1974, which removed Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
and Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
with most of their surrounding conurbations to form part of the metropolitan counties of Merseyside and Greater Manchester. At this time, the detached Furness Peninsula
Furness
Furness is a peninsula in south Cumbria, England. At its widest extent, it is considered to cover the whole of North Lonsdale, that part of the Lonsdale hundred that is an exclave of the historic county of Lancashire, lying to the north of Morecambe Bay....
and Cartmel (Lancashire over the Sands) were made part of Cumbria
Cumbria
Cumbria , is a non-metropolitan county in North West England. The county and Cumbria County Council, its local authority, came into existence in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972. Cumbria's largest settlement and county town is Carlisle. It consists of six districts, and in...
and Warrington
Warrington
Warrington is a town, borough and unitary authority area of Cheshire, England. It stands on the banks of the River Mersey, which is tidal to the west of the weir at Howley. It lies 16 miles east of Liverpool, 19 miles west of Manchester and 8 miles south of St Helens...
became part of Cheshire. Today the county borders Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Merseyside and North
North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire is a non-metropolitan or shire county located in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England, and a ceremonial county primarily in that region but partly in North East England. Created in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972 it covers an area of , making it the largest...
and West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972....
.
Description
Within historic Lancashire are dialects belonging to two groups of English dialects: West Midland in the south and Northern in the north. The boundary represented originally the boundary between Mercia and Northumbria and in modern times has tended to move further north. The dialects of south Lancashire have been much affected by the development of large urban areas centred on Liverpool and Manchester.There is also some evidence of Scandinavian influence - possibly linked to the medieval Norse settlements of West Lancashire
West Lancashire
West Lancashire is a non-metropolitan district with the status of a borough in Lancashire, England. Its council is based in Ormskirk. The other town in the borough is Skelmersdale....
and neighbouring Wirral Peninsula
Wirral Peninsula
Wirral or the Wirral is a peninsula in North West England. It is bounded by three bodies of water: to the west by the River Dee, forming a boundary with Wales, to the east by the River Mersey and to the north by the Irish Sea. Both terms "Wirral" and "the Wirral" are used locally , although the...
in Cheshire
Cheshire
Cheshire is a ceremonial county in North West England. Cheshire's county town is the city of Chester, although its largest town is Warrington. Other major towns include Widnes, Congleton, Crewe, Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Macclesfield, Winsford, Northwich, and Wilmslow...
. For example - the Lancastrian dialect word 'skrike' (meaning to cry out, to weep or shriek - definition from Crosby (2000)) is found in other places such as Lowland Scotland. Sources link this word to the Old Norse skrika - meaning scream.
The Lancashire Dictionary stated that the Furness
Furness
Furness is a peninsula in south Cumbria, England. At its widest extent, it is considered to cover the whole of North Lonsdale, that part of the Lonsdale hundred that is an exclave of the historic county of Lancashire, lying to the north of Morecambe Bay....
(Barrow
Barrow-in-Furness
Barrow-in-Furness is an industrial town and seaport which forms about half the territory of the wider Borough of Barrow-in-Furness in the county of Cumbria, England. It lies north of Liverpool, northwest of Manchester and southwest from the county town of Carlisle...
, Ulverston
Ulverston
Ulverston is a market town and civil parish in the South Lakeland district of Cumbria in north-west England. Historically part of Lancashire, the town is located in the Furness area, close to the Lake District, and just north of Morecambe Bay....
etc.) had always had more in common with Cumbrian (Cumberland
Cumberland
Cumberland is a historic county of North West England, on the border with Scotland, from the 12th century until 1974. It formed an administrative county from 1889 to 1974 and now forms part of Cumbria....
and Westmorland
Westmorland
Westmorland is an area of North West England and one of the 39 historic counties of England. It formed an administrative county from 1889 to 1974, after which the entirety of the county was absorbed into the new county of Cumbria.-Early history:...
) dialect than with the rest of Lancashire
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
, and so excluded it; with regards to Scouse
Scouse
Scouse is an accent and dialect of English found primarily in the Metropolitan county of Merseyside, and closely associated with the city of Liverpool and the adjoining urban areas such as the boroughs of south Sefton, Knowsley and the Wirral...
, the accent is gradually spreading amongst younger people in Merseyside in certain areas. According to Crosby, the "border" between Scouse and Lancashire dialect is loosely estimated between Garswood
Garswood
Garswood is a village in the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, Merseyside, England, within a civil parish called Seneley Green.-History:Historically within Lancashire, Garswood is from Old English wudu "wood" with an uncertain first element...
and Bryn
Bryn
Bryn is a component ward of the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan, in Greater Manchester, England. It is part of the larger town of Ashton-in-Makerfield and is geographically indistinguishable from it. It forms a separate local council ward...
. However, Lancastrian accents are found west of Garswood, most notably in St Helens as shown in the accents of local celebrities and broadcasters such as Johnny Vegas
Johnny Vegas
Johnny Vegas is an English actor and comedian. He is known for his angry rants, portly figure, high husky voice and support of St Helens rugby league club. More recently he has moved into dramatic acting.-Early life:He was born in St Helens, Lancashire, the youngest of four children of Laurence...
and Ray French
Ray French
Raymond James French MBE is a former rugby union and rugby league player who achieved the rare honour of representing his country at international level in both codes of the game. French won his four caps for the England national rugby union team in 1961 as a lock forward, playing in all four...
. Steven Gerrard
Steven Gerrard
Steven George Gerrard MBE is an English footballer who plays for and captains Premier League club Liverpool. He also has 89 caps for the England national team. He has played much of his career in a centre midfielder role, but he has also been used as a second striker and right winger...
from Whiston, Merseyside
Whiston, Merseyside
Whiston is a large village and civil parish within the Metropolitan Borough of Knowsley on Merseyside, England. At the 2001 Census the population was recorded as 13,629...
sounds notably different to Vegas (originally from Thatto Heath
Thatto Heath
Thatto Heath is an area of St Helens, in Merseyside, England. Historically a part of Lancashire, it lies approximately north-northwest of Widnes and about east of Liverpool city centre...
). This illustrates that the variation between Scouse and St Helens accents occurs within only a few miles.
As in all counties, there is a drift within local speech that shifts towards different borders. For example,
- In those parts of Lancashire that border with YorkshireYorkshireYorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
, similarities with the Yorkshire dialect and accentYorkshire dialect and accentThe Yorkshire dialect refers to the varieties of English used in the Northern England historic county of Yorkshire. Those varieties are often referred to as Broad Yorkshire or Tyke. The dialect has roots in older languages such as Old English and Old Norse; it should not be confused with modern slang...
arise. Words are shortened such as with to wi, in to i, etc. - In north Lancashire, speech sounds more similar to CumbriaCumbrian dialectThe Cumbrian dialect is a local English dialect spoken in Cumbria in northern England, not to be confused with the extinct Celtic language Cumbric that used to be spoken in Cumbria. As in any county, there is a gradual drift in accent towards its neighbours...
. This is also the area in which rhoticityRhotic and non-rhotic accentsEnglish pronunciation can be divided into two main accent groups: a rhotic speaker pronounces a rhotic consonant in words like hard; a non-rhotic speaker does not...
is most common. - In south Lancashire, speech is generally more refined, although WiganWiganWigan is a town in Greater Manchester, England. It stands on the River Douglas, south-west of Bolton, north of Warrington and west-northwest of Manchester. Wigan is the largest settlement in the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan and is its administrative centre. The town of Wigan had a total...
and LeighLeigh, Greater ManchesterLeigh is a town within the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan, in Greater Manchester, England. It is southeast of Wigan, and west of Manchester. Leigh is situated on low lying land to the north west of Chat Moss....
are possibly the last bastions of the traditional dialect where older people, especially in former colliery districts, will still use the pronoun "tha" or "t'" (thou) and "thi" (thee) instead of "you" as the 2nd person singular personal pronoun, subject and non-subject form respectively; "thy" as the 2nd person singular possessive adjective instead of "your"; and "thine" as a second person singular possessive pronoun instead of "yours", e.g. What art t' doin'? Tha must be jestin'! Dost t' see yon mon o'er theer? Si thee! Ah'm talkin' to thee! Wheer's thi jackbit? This is mine an' that's thine! Hast ta geet a fiver tha con lend me? There are also some MidlandsEnglish MidlandsThe Midlands, or the English Midlands, is the traditional name for the area comprising central England that broadly corresponds to the early medieval Kingdom of Mercia. It borders Southern England, Northern England, East Anglia and Wales. Its largest city is Birmingham, and it was an important...
features that become apparent, such as a lack of NG coalescence (therefore, singer rhymes with finger).
This shift also occurs in other counties, therefore, some western border areas of Yorkshire have some Lancastrian features such as rhoticity. In most of Lancashire, this sound is pronounced /ʏː/, a sound completely alien to Yorkshire and to Received Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation , also called the Queen's English, Oxford English or BBC English, is the accent of Standard English in England, with a relationship to regional accents similar to the relationship in other European languages between their standard varieties and their regional forms...
, but which continues almost identically through Cheshire
Cheshire
Cheshire is a ceremonial county in North West England. Cheshire's county town is the city of Chester, although its largest town is Warrington. Other major towns include Widnes, Congleton, Crewe, Ellesmere Port, Runcorn, Macclesfield, Winsford, Northwich, and Wilmslow...
, Staffordshire
Staffordshire
Staffordshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. Part of the National Forest lies within its borders...
, the West Midlands
West Midlands (county)
The West Midlands is a metropolitan county in western central England with a 2009 estimated population of 2,638,700. It came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972, formed from parts of Staffordshire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire. The...
, Worcestershire
Worcestershire
Worcestershire is a non-metropolitan county, established in antiquity, located in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes it is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three counties that comprise the "Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire" NUTS 2 region...
, Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
and down into the West Country
West Country
The West Country is an informal term for the area of south western England roughly corresponding to the modern South West England government region. It is often defined to encompass the historic counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset and the City of Bristol, while the counties of...
(as in the German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
'ü'
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
John C. Wells
John C. Wells
John Christopher Wells is a British phonetician and Esperanto teacher. Wells is a professor emeritus at University College London, where until his retirement in 2006 he held the departmental chair in phonetics....
, one of Britain
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
's most prominent linguists, said in Accents of English Part 2 that a Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
accent is often nearly identical to an accent from West or South Yorkshire
South Yorkshire
South Yorkshire is a metropolitan county in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England. It has a population of 1.29 million. It consists of four metropolitan boroughs: Barnsley, Doncaster, Rotherham, and City of Sheffield...
. His proposed test was that Manchester area residents tend to pronounce a final -ng as /ŋɡ/ without any coalescence, whereas Yorkshiremen rarely do this. Also, he suggested that Yorkshiremen are more likely to glottalise a final /d/ on a word (e.g. could and should lose the /d/), and generally turn voiced consonants at the ends of words into voiceless consonants.
In popular culture
Films from the early part of the 20th century often contain Lancashire dialect: the films of George Formby, Gracie FieldsGracie Fields
Dame Gracie Fields, DBE , was an English-born, later Italian-based actress, singer and comedienne and star of both cinema and music hall.-Early life:...
and Frank Randle
Frank Randle
Frank Randle was an English comedian...
are notable examples. The 1990s sitcom Dinnerladies
Dinnerladies
Dinnerladies is a British sitcom written, co-produced by and starring Victoria Wood. It ran on BBC One for 16 episodes from 1998 to 2000.-Plot:...
, written by comedienne Victoria Wood
Victoria Wood
Victoria Wood CBE is a British comedienne, actress, singer-songwriter, screenwriter and director. Wood has written and starred in sketches, plays, films and sitcoms, and her live stand-up comedy act is interspersed with her own compositions, which she accompanies on piano...
who was brought up near Ramsbottom
Ramsbottom
Ramsbottom is a town in the Metropolitan Borough of Bury, Greater Manchester, England. It is situated on the course of the River Irwell, in the West Pennine Moors. Historically within Lancashire, it is located north-northwest of Bury, and north-northwest of Manchester...
, used Lancashire accents, and the Accrington actress, Mina Anwar
Mina Anwar
Mina Anwar is a British actress.-Early life:Anwar was educated at Accrington Moorhead Sports College, and gained an A level in Theatre in Performance at the Accrington and Rossendale College in 1988 before training at the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts in London.-Acting career:She played Police...
portrayed the Lancastrian police officer Habeeb in The Thin Blue Line
The Thin Blue Line (TV series)
The Thin Blue Line is a British sitcom starring Rowan Atkinson set in a police station that ran for two series on the BBC from 1995 to 1996...
.
The band the Lancashire Hotpots
The Lancashire Hotpots (band)
The Lancashire Hotpots are a comedy folk band from St Helens, Merseyside, England, formed in December 2006. The group record songs about Lancashire, technology and British culture . Their songs make use of Lancashire dialect...
originate from St Helens
St Helens, Merseyside
St Helens is a large town in Merseyside, England. It is the largest settlement and administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens with a population of just over 100,000, part of an urban area with a total population of 176,843 at the time of the 2001 Census...
, and popularise dialect in their humorous songs. The folk song "Poverty Knock" is written to the tune of a Lancashire accent and the rhythm of a loom in a Lancashire cotton mill. It is one of the most famous dialect songs in Britain, and describes life in a textile mill. The song "On Ilkla Moor Baht 'at" (On Ilkley Moor
Ilkley Moor
Ilkley Moor is part of Rombalds Moor, the moorland between Ilkley and Keighley in West Yorkshire, England, United Kingdom. The peat bogs rise to 402 m above sea level...
without a hat) is associated with Yorkshire, but, having been written by natives of Halifax, contains dialect that would be just as typical of Lancashire, including eyt for "eat" and etten for "eaten".
Vowels
| RP English Received Pronunciation Received Pronunciation , also called the Queen's English, Oxford English or BBC English, is the accent of Standard English in England, with a relationship to regional accents similar to the relationship in other European languages between their standard varieties and their regional forms... |
Lancashire |
|---|---|
| /æ/ as in 'bad' | [a] |
| /ɑː/ as in 'bard' | [aːr] |
| /aʊ/ as in 'house' | [əʏ], [aː] or /aʊ/ |
| /eɪ/ as in 'bay' | [eː] |
| /eə/ as in 'bear' | [ɛr] |
| /aɪ/ as in 'bide' | [ɑː] (South), [aɪ] (North) |
| /əʊ/ as in 'boat' | [oː] |
| /ʌ/ as in 'bud' | [ʊ] |
| /uː/ as in 'boo' | [ʏː] (South) or [uː] (North) |
| /ʊə/ as in 'cure' | [uːər] |
Older dialect has some other vowel shifts: for example, speak would be said with a /eɪ/ sound, to rhyme with R.P. break; words ending in -ought (e.g. brought, thought) would rhyme with oat. These pronunciations are now extremely rare but still used in the Preston area.
Grammatical and phonological features
- Definite article reductionDefinite article reductionDefinite Article Reduction is the term used in recent linguistic work to refer to the use of vowel-less forms of the definite article the in Northern dialects of English English, for example in the Yorkshire dialect and accent...
. The is shortened to t or glottalled. - Rhoticity is a key feature of a Lancashire accent, and is often more trilled than in the West CountryWest CountryThe West Country is an informal term for the area of south western England roughly corresponding to the modern South West England government region. It is often defined to encompass the historic counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset and the City of Bristol, while the counties of...
. The closer that one gets to Manchester and Liverpool, rhoticity dies out. Northwards it seems to die out somewhere between Preston and LancasterLancaster, LancashireLancaster is the county town of Lancashire, England. It is situated on the River Lune and has a population of 45,952. Lancaster is a constituent settlement of the wider City of Lancaster, local government district which has a population of 133,914 and encompasses several outlying towns, including...
. - In some words with RP /əʊ/, a sound more like [ɔɪ] may be used, for example, "hole" is pronounced [hɔɪl] "hoil".
- Some areas have the nurse–square merger: for example, Bolton, St. Helens, Widnes and Wigan. Traditionally, both nurse and square would be said with /ɜː/ but the Scouse-like /ɛː/ can also be heard.
- In areas that border Yorkshire, it is more likely for there, where, swear, etc. to be pronounced with /ɪə/, to rhyme with "here".
- Words that end -ight often are pronounced /iː/. For example light, night, right are pronounced /liːt/, /niːt/, /riːt/. Some areas pronounce fight and right with an /ei/ vowel — a split that is also found in the West Riding of Yorkshire.
- An oo in words such as book, look, hook can be pronounced with /uː/. This is a feature of Early Modern EnglishEarly Modern EnglishEarly Modern English is the stage of the English language used from about the end of the Middle English period to 1650. Thus, the first edition of the King James Bible and the works of William Shakespeare both belong to the late phase of Early Modern English...
, and is not unique to Lancashire dialect. - The third person feminine (she) appears to be rendered as "'er" (her) but is in fact an Old English relic which dialect poets of the 19th century would render as Oo - the pronunciation is in fact a schaw (that is, the er in better = "er's a funny un" = she is a funny one/a little strange.
- In the past "open" would have become "oppen", "spoken" becomes "spokken", "broken" becomes "brokken", etc. but these are now uncommon amongst younger generations. They are still fairly common in West Yorkshire.
- Traditionally, a /t/ was replaced with an /r/; for example, "I'm gerring berrer", "a lorra laughs". Amongst the younger generation, it is much more common to replace /t/ with a glottal stop [ʔ].
- Words such as cold and old are pronounced cowd and owd (e.g.: owd mon = old man)
- Rather than a mixed use of was and were such as occurs in Standard English, Lancashire dialects tend to use only one of the words and employ it in all cases. The west coast of Lancashire always uses was, the rest of the county always using were.
- Certain words ending in -ool drop the l. School therefore becomes skoo" and fool becomes foo. eg: th'art a foo - you are a fool.
- Use of a /z/ sound for an /s/ as in bus /bʊz/ for example in DarwenDarwenDarwen is a market town and civil parish located within Lancashire, England. Along with its northerly neighbour, Blackburn, it forms the Borough of Blackburn with Darwen — a unitary authority area...
or even as far south as OldhamOldhamOldham is a large town in Greater Manchester, England. It lies amid the Pennines on elevated ground between the rivers Irk and Medlock, south-southeast of Rochdale, and northeast of the city of Manchester...
, Wigan and Leigh. - The word self is reduced to sen or sel, depending on the part of Lancashire.
- Make and take normally become meck and teck. In older dialect, parts of north and east Lancashire used mack and tack.
- A marker of a traditional Lancashire accent is the frequent replacement of /a/ with /o/. For example, land became lond and man became mon. This is now considered to be old-fashioned.
- As noted above the second person familiar (tha) is used by older speakers to the extent that they will (correctly) inflect the verb. Th'art an owd mon = Thou art/you are an old man, th'as(t) gone owt = thou hast/you have gone out). Also amongst some older speakers a distinction is (or rather was) made between the familiar tha and yo/yer for other circumstances. Even rarer is the (again correct) use of the imperfect subjunctive ending for tha for example: if tha wert owd, tha'dst know = if thou wert/if you were old, thou wouldst/you would know.
It must be noted that for speakers of the Lancashire dialect the accent/dialect from even a neighbouring town is perceived as different as for example Cockney and a Somerset accent. Thus many of those who live in Bury
Bury
Bury is a town in Greater Manchester, England. It lies on the River Irwell, east of Bolton, west-southwest of Rochdale, and north-northwest of the city of Manchester...
pronounce the town name as Burri yet speakers in some of the neighbouring towns would say Berry. To assume, therefore, that all Lancastrians strongly roll the r (in words such as farm) as did Gracie Fields
Gracie Fields
Dame Gracie Fields, DBE , was an English-born, later Italian-based actress, singer and comedienne and star of both cinema and music hall.-Early life:...
(her having a typical Rochdale accent) would be greeted with the same derision as might be visited on those North American actors who assume all English speakers are Cockneys. Older speakers of South Lancashire, for example, could place a person with a remarkable degree of accuracy, with the distinctive accents of Wigan, Bolton, Leigh, Chorley, Westhoughton and Atherton having their own sometimes subtle (but often not) differences in pronunciation.
Several dialect words are also used. Traditional Lancashire dialect often related to the traditional industries of the area, and these words became redundant when those industries disappeared. There are, however, words that relate to everyday life that are still in common use. Words that are popularly associated with Lancashire include "gradely" for excellent and "harping (on)" for talking in a mindless manner.
The word "lunch", now in worldwide usage, actually originates from Lancashire.
The term "moggy" a popular colloquial term for a cat in many parts of the country, means a mouse or insect in many parts of Lancashire, notably in the regions surrounding Wigan
Wigan
Wigan is a town in Greater Manchester, England. It stands on the River Douglas, south-west of Bolton, north of Warrington and west-northwest of Manchester. Wigan is the largest settlement in the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan and is its administrative centre. The town of Wigan had a total...
and Ormskirk
Ormskirk
Ormskirk is a market town in West Lancashire, England. It is situated north of Liverpool city centre, northwest of St Helens, southeast of Southport and southwest of Preston.-Geography and administration:...
. If older dialect speaking residents of these areas are asked what a 'moggy' is, they will say 'owt smo' an' wick ', i.e. anything small and quick. In the same districts, cheese is often referred to as 'moggy meyght' i.e. 'moggy meat', or in other words, food for mice. Many etymological authorities believe that cats were originally referred to as 'moggy catchers' and the term was abbreviated over time.
The word 'maiden' for 'clothes horse' is now used even by people who consider themselves too "proper" to use dialect.
Poetry and other literature
Many poems exist in the dialect, and the Lancashire Society prints such poems regularly. One example of very old-fashioned dialect is the poem Jone o GrinfiltJone o Grinfilt
Jone o Grinfilt is a poem in the Oldham dialect of English. It was written by a man named Joseph Lees from the Glodwick area of the town in 1805. "Grinfilt" is a dialect pronunciation of Greenfield, a village in the neighbouring parish of Saddleworth. The poem was intended to ridicule country folk...
, which was written during the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
. Another is "The Oldham Weaver", which is dated at around 1815:
- Oi'm a poor cotton-weyver, as mony a one knoowas*,
- Oi've nout for t'year, an' oi've word eawt my clooas,
- Yo'ad hardly gi' tuppence for aw as oi've on,
- My clogs are both brosten, an stuckings oi've none,
- Yu'd think it wur hard,
- To be browt into th' warld,
- To be clemmed, an' do th' best as yo' con.
(taken from Kirkpatrick Sale, "Rebels Against the Future", p. 45)
- The word knoowas may have just been used to force a rhyme with clooas. The Oldham area has traditionally pronounced the words knows as knaws.
Samuel Laycock
Samuel Laycock
Samuel Laycock was a dialect poet who recorded in verse the vernacular of the Lancashire cotton workers. He was born on 17 January 1826 at Intake Head, Pule Hill, Marsden, West Yorkshire, the son of John Laycock, a hand-loom weaver. He had no formal education apart from Sunday school and a few...
(1826–1893) was a dialect poet who recorded in verse the vernacular of the Lancashire cotton workers. Another popular 19th Century dialect poet was Edwin Waugh
Edwin Waugh
Edwin Waugh , poet, son of a shoemaker, was born in Rochdale, Lancashire, England, and, after a little schooling, apprenticed to a printer, Thomas Holden, at the age of 12...
whose most famous poem was "Come whoam to thi childer an' me", written in 1856.
Humour
A Lancashire joke is as follows, "A family from Wigan go on holiday to BenidormBenidorm
Benidorm is a coastal town and municipality located in the comarca of Marina Baixa, in the province of Alicante, Valencian community, Spain, by the Western Mediterranean....
and order some food. The father thinking his pie is lacking in gravy calls the waiter over saying " 'ast tha Bisto
Bisto
Bisto is a well-known brand of traditional British foods in the United Kingdom, most famous for its gravy products.-History:The very first Bisto product, in 1908, was a meat-flavoured gravy powder, which rapidly became a bestseller in the UK. It was added to gravies to give a richer taste and aroma...
fort pah?' and the waiter says in a southern English accent, "I'm sorry, mate, I don't speak Spanish."
Survey of English dialect sites
The Survey of English DialectsSurvey of English Dialects
The Survey of English Dialects was undertaken between 1950 and 1961 under the direction of Professor Harold Orton of the English department of the University of Leeds. It aimed to collect the full range of speech in England and Wales before local differences were to disappear...
took recordings from fourteen sites in Lancashire:
- BickerstaffeBickerstaffeBickerstaffe is a village and civil parish in the West Lancashire district of Lancashire, England. According to the 2001 Census the population of the civil parish was 1,196, although the population of the electoral ward was slightly greater at 2,013....
, west Lancashire - CartmelCartmelCartmel is a village in Cumbria, England, situated north-west of Grange-over-Sands and close to the River Eea. Historically it was in Lancashire; boundary changes brought it into the newly created county of Cumbria in 1974, yet keeping it within the boundaries of the traditional County Palatine...
, modern south Cumbria, - ConistonConiston, CumbriaConiston is a village and civil parish in the Furness region of Cumbria, England. It is located in the southern part of the Lake District National Park, between Coniston Water, the third longest lake in the Lake District, and Coniston Old Man; about north east of Barrow-in-Furness.-Geography and...
, modern south Cumbria - DolphinholmeDolphinholme-History:In the 18th and 19th centuries the village played an important part in the industrial revolution. Slave trader Thomas Hinde founded a mill in Lower Dolphinholme in 1795....
, near LancasterLancaster, LancashireLancaster is the county town of Lancashire, England. It is situated on the River Lune and has a population of 45,952. Lancaster is a constituent settlement of the wider City of Lancaster, local government district which has a population of 133,914 and encompasses several outlying towns, including... - EcclestonEccleston, Lancashire-Mr.Asia's Murder:Christopher Marty Johnstone was a New Zealand drug trafficker. The former Takapuna Grammar pupil was dubbed "Mr Asia" by the Auckland Star newspaper in August 1978 in a series of articles by Pat Booth....
. There were two villages in south Lancashire named "Eccleston". The one in the survey is in modern-day Lancashire. - FleetwoodFleetwoodFleetwood is a town within the Wyre district of Lancashire, England, lying at the northwest corner of the Fylde. It had a population of 26,840 people at the 2001 Census. It forms part of the Greater Blackpool conurbation. The town was the first planned community of the Victorian era...
- HalewoodHalewoodHalewood is in Merseyside, England and is located in the Metropolitan Borough of Knowsley. The district lies near Liverpool's southeastern boundary, bordered by the suburbs of Hunts Cross and Woolton....
, near Liverpool. Would usually be classified as ScouseScouseScouse is an accent and dialect of English found primarily in the Metropolitan county of Merseyside, and closely associated with the city of Liverpool and the adjoining urban areas such as the boroughs of south Sefton, Knowsley and the Wirral...
rather than Lancastrian. - HarwoodHarwood, Greater ManchesterHarwood is a suburb to the north-northeast of Bolton, Greater Manchester, bordering Bury in North West England.-History:The township was recorded as Harewode in 1212 and 1302. The manor which included Bradshaw, was part of the Manchester fee held by the Grelleys in the Middle Ages. In 1212 it was...
, near BoltonBoltonBolton is a town in Greater Manchester, in the North West of England. Close to the West Pennine Moors, it is north west of the city of Manchester. Bolton is surrounded by several smaller towns and villages which together form the Metropolitan Borough of Bolton, of which Bolton is the... - MarshsideMarshside, SeftonMarshside is a suburb of the town of Southport, Merseyside, England, ranked by the UN as the 4th most desirable area of the European Union in which to live...
, north of LiverpoolLiverpoolLiverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880... - PillingPillingPilling is a village and civil parish within the Wyre borough of Lancashire, England. It is north-northeast of Poulton-le-Fylde, south-southwest of Lancaster and northwest of Preston, in a part of the Fylde known as Over Wyre....
, Fylde coast - Read, near BurnleyBurnleyBurnley is a market town in the Burnley borough of Lancashire, England, with a population of around 73,500. It lies north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Brun....
- RibchesterRibchesterRibchester is a village and civil parish within the Ribble Valley district of Lancashire, England. It lies on the banks of the River Ribble, northwest of Blackburn and east of Preston.The village has a long history with evidence of Bronze Age beginnings...
, between Blackburn and Preston - Thistleton, on the FyldeThe FyldeThe Fylde ; Scandinavian: "field") is a coastal plain in western Lancashire, England. It is roughly a 13-mile square-shaped peninsula, bounded by Morecambe Bay to the north, the Ribble estuary to the south, the Irish Sea to the west, and the Bowland hills to the east...
near BlackpoolBlackpoolBlackpool is a borough, seaside town, and unitary authority area of Lancashire, in North West England. It is situated along England's west coast by the Irish Sea, between the Ribble and Wyre estuaries, northwest of Preston, north of Liverpool, and northwest of Manchester... - YealandYealand RedmayneYealand Redmayne is a village and civil parish in the English county of Lancashire. It is in the City of Lancaster district.-Community:The civil parish also includes Slack Head near Beetham and is north of its neighbouring village, Yealand Conyers...
, near LancasterLancaster, LancashireLancaster is the county town of Lancashire, England. It is situated on the River Lune and has a population of 45,952. Lancaster is a constituent settlement of the wider City of Lancaster, local government district which has a population of 133,914 and encompasses several outlying towns, including...