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Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)

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First published 1956 (SND Vol. IV). Includes material from the 2005 supplement.
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

GRALLOCH, n., v. Also †groilach; gral(l)ock (Sc. 1882 J. Ogilvie Imperial Dict.), grealoch. [′grɑlɔx, ‡′grɛl-]

I. n. 1. (1) The entrails of a dead deer. Gen.Sc.Per. 1838 W. Scrope Deer-stalking 9:
The late Glengarry killed a hart, which weighed twenty-six stone after the gralloch or offal was taken out.Abd. 1872 J. G. Michie Deeside Tales 209:
The deer's “groilach” might have by some chance been discovered by the keepers who would then be doubly on the alert.Inv. 1931 E. C. Ellice Place-Names 142:
Eagles . . . feed on the remains of the stags' gralloch.wm.Sc. 1989 Scotsman 15 Jul 3:
The buzzard ... is a considerable carrion eater, and will feed on dead lambs, ewe placentae and deer grallochs.

(2) The disembowelling of a dead deer. Gen.Sc.Sc. 1893 Scots Mag. (Aug.) 231:
Joyful, the slaughtered hinds they see, The gralloch they begin with glee.m.Sc. 1925 J. Buchan John Macnab 106:
There lay the dead stag [with] . . . the miscreant calmly proceeding to the gralloch.Sc. 1946 Scots Mag. (Sept.) 432:
We'd “observed” during many a stalk, and had been in at the gralloch of many a fine stag.

2. Any small residue, such as cinders, chips of wood, miscellaneous rubbish (Per.² 1928). Rare.

II. v. To disembowel a dead deer (Sc. 1848 Fraser's Mag. XXXVIII. 313, misprinted garlock). Gen.Sc. Also fig. Per. 1838 W. Scrope Deer-stalking 64:
The deer, after having been thus bled, was opened and gralloched.Arg. 1896 N. Munro Lost Pibroch 44:
A hand's as easy to cut as a finger for a man who has gralloched deer with a keen sgian-dubh.n.Sc. 1904 W. M. Smith Romance Poaching 44:
He . . . had succeeded in bringing down a stag, when, just as he was to go forward to decapitate and gralloch him, he observed three men.Fif. 1982 Hamish Brown in Hamish Brown Poems of the Scottish Hills 32:
He has power to gralloch our past
and remind us of heathery origins
and cave man doubts. Sc. 1991 T. S. Law in Tom Hubbard The New Makars 33:
A whylsin back that wasnae faur
as haednae seen the furst new caur,
whuin monie coals were gy nearhaun
the surface o the grallocht grun. Sc. 2000 Herald 9 Dec 6:
The education committee report was always going to be the big one. Now it's out and ministers didn't entirely escape criticism. The HMI was, at last, deemed partly culpable. The SQA was predictably gralloched.