Auld Clootie
October 31st 2026
As we see in the Dictionaries of the Scots Language (DSL), Scots has many names for the Devil. Both Auld Clootie and Auld Cloots refer to his feet. A cloot is, “one of the divisions in the hoof of cloven-footed animals”.
Robert Burns immortalised these names in Address to the Deil (1785). First in the poem’s opening lines, “O Thou, whatever title suit thee! Auld Hornie, Satan, Nick, or Clootie” and then in its penultimate stanza, “An’ now, auld Cloots, I ken ye’re thinkan, A certain Bardie’s rantin, drinkin, Some luckless hour will send him linkan, To your black pit”.
The devil is a fearsome figure in John Nicholson’s Historical and Traditional Tales (1843): “Ye little thocht ye had to flee … Through chaos’ bounds to meet auld Cloot”. A similar portrayal appears in James Robertson’s Joseph Knight (2003): “‘Auld Clootie!’ … ‘The Deil! How no jist come oot and say it if that’s whit ye think? Dae ye want tae see his cloven feet? Awa an hide ahint a dyke if ye’re feart frae him”.
However, not every example is serious. In April 2000, amidst teachers’ fears that pupils might access Satanist materials online, a writer in the Scotsman remarked that, “there is less evidence that children of school age will try to arrange a bridge evening with Auld Clootie or spend the summer holidays in Port Seton with Beezle Bub and all his little imps than there is that some professional folk would believe anything an opinion poll told them”.
Dictionaries of the Scots Language would like to thank Bob Dewar for illustrating our Scots Word of the Week feature.
