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Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)

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First published 1960 (SND Vol. V).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

HOG, Hogg, n.¹, v.¹ Also †hoge. †hogue; hug(g) and misreading hagg (Abd. 1733 Monymusk Papers (S.H.S.) 54); and dims. hoggie, huggie; hogrel (Teviotd. 1825 Jam.), hogget (both found in Eng. local use). Sc. usages of Eng. hog, a pig. The spelling hogg in sense 1. is now gen. in agric. usage, prob. to distinguish it from the Eng. sense. [hɔg, hʌg]

I. n. 1. A young sheep from the time when it is weaned until it is shorn of its first fleece. Gen.Sc. Also used attrib. Common also in many Eng. dials.Gall. 1701 Session Bk. Minnigaff (1939) 58:
Have yow not a wife of your oun? to which he replyed he would rather ly by a hoggs skin than her.Lnk. 1709 Minutes J.P.s (S.H.S.) 59:
Walter Carmichaell . . . slandered the said John Hutchisone in saying he had stollen . . . and disposed upon ane hoge sheep.Per. 1738 Ochtertyre House Bk. (S.H.S.) 188:
Dinner . . . mutton of the hoge quarters for thae [sic] servants.Abd. 1768 A. Ross Helenore (S.T.S.) 20:
Besides they hae nae either ew or hogg.Ayr. 1788 Burns My Hoggie i.:
What will I do gin my hoggie die? My joy, my pride, my hoggie!e.Lth. 1794 G. B. Hepburn Agric. e.Lth. 102:
All store farmers . . . have a stock of what is called hogs; that is, lambs one year old.Slk. 1829 Hogg Shep. Cal. (1874) xvi.:
The lamb lived and throve, became a hogg and a gimmer, and never offered to leave home.Kcb. 1845 Stat. Acc.² IV. 177:
There are seven fairs . . . at Castle-Douglas for the sale of hoggets, on the first Monday of April.Cai. 1869 M. Maclennan Peasant Life 3:
To tend the hoggets in the home-park.Sh. 1897 Shetland News (24 July):
Da grey huggie lamb, an' dy shaela ane wis as nakid is da back o' my haand.s.Sc. 1897 E. Hamilton Outlaws i.:
Half a score or so o' your cattle i' swarth of some o' thae braxie hogrels up at the Redheuch.w.Sc. 1949 Scots Mag. (Sept.) 465:
The hoggets and yeld ewes, having no lambs to suckle, therefore come into good condition first and are ready to be clipped at the end of June or early in July.w.Lth. 1956 Scotsman (19 Jan.):
Bathgate Hogg Sale. Hoggets were shown in excellent condition. Cross Hoggs sold to 139/-.

Combs. and Phrs.: (1) ewe-hogg, a young female sheep. Gen.Sc.; (2) harvest hog, see Hairst; †(3) hog and score, “a phrase formerly used in buying sheep . . . one being allowed in addition to every score” (Teviotd. 1825 Jam.); (4) hog and tatoe, see quot.; (5) hog-fence, a fence for enclosing the pasture saved for the hogs' winter keep (Sc. 1825 Jam.); the pasture thus enclosed (Rxb. 1957); (6) hog-ham, hung mutton from a hog which has died from natural causes (Twd. 1825 Jam.); (7) hog in harst, see Hairst; (8) hog-lamb, a young sheep (Rxb. 1957); (9) hogue-mark, a sheep-mark; (10) to ca one's hogs to a puir (or ironically bonny) market, to make a bad bargain, to come off badly (Fif. 1957). See also Huilie, II. 2.; (11) to make a hog or dog of something, to impose a definite design upon something, to give it its final form. See also under Dog, III. 1. (29); (12) tup hog, a young male sheep, a young ram. Gen.Sc. See quot. under (1); (13) wedder-hog, wether-, a young castrated male sheep (Rxb. 1801 J. Leyden Compl. Scot. 343; Sc. 1844 H. Stephens Bk. Farm II. 38). Gen.Sc. Also †hog-wedder.(1) Sc. 1844 H. Stephens Bk. Farm II. 38:
After a lamb has been weaned, until the first fleece is shorn, . . . it receives the name of hogg, which . . . is modified according to the sex and condition . . . a female is called a ewe-hogg, a male a tup-hogg, and a castrated male a wether-hogg.(4) s.Sc. 1825 Jam.:
Hog and Tatoe. It is customary with those who have store-farms to salt the “fa'en meat,” (i.e. the sheep that have died of “the sickness,”) for the use of the servants through the winter. This is stewed with onions, salt, pepper and potatoes; whence the name.(5) Sc. 1761 Caled. Mercury (24 Aug.):
The Farm of Crunzean . . . containing about 700 acres, mostly pasture ground, and part of which is esteemed the best hog-fence in Gala water.e.Lth. 1794 G. B. Hepburn Agric. e.Lth. 103:
They remain until the end of August, when they are moved down to the best low pasture, called the hog-fence, which has been saved from the weanings, and here they remain during the winter.Per. 1795 Stat. Acc.¹ X. 231:
If they would reserve their hog-fence for the winter.Slk. 1818 Hogg B. of Bodsbeck vii.:
It's our hogg-fence, that's the hained grund like.Peb. 1829 Trans. Highl. Soc. I. 53:
This low lying sheep walk to which they afterwards withdraw, is denominated the Hog Fence.(8) Sc. 1818 Scott H. Midlothian xxviii.:
The bairns' rime says, the warst blast of the borrowing days couldna kill the three silly poor hog-lams.(9) Ayr. 1824 A. Crawfurd Tales Grandmother (1825) II. 230:
You, doubtless, ken your ain hogue-mark, . . . an eel-stab and twa slits on the fore-quarter.(10) Abd. 1746 W. Forbes Dominie Deposed (1765) ii. xxv.:
Faith you ha'e ca'd Your hogs unto a bonny market, Indeed, my lad!(11) Sc. 1818 Scott Letters (Cent. ed.) 149:
I will revise the drama very carefully and try to make a hog or dog of it.(13) Kcd. 1720 Urie Court Bk. (S.H.S.) 117:
The said John had medled with and crav'd right and title to a wedder hog pertaining to him.Sc. 1728 Ramsay Poems (S.T.S.) II. 3:
Upon a Borrowing-day, when Sleet Made Twinters, and Hog-wedders bleet, And quake with Cauld.Abd. 1881 W. Paul Past & Present 122:
I widna gie my bonnie doggie for a wedder hoggie.

2. In Curling: a stone which does not pass over the distance line or hog-score (see below) (Sc. 1808 Jam.; Gall. 1824 MacTaggart Gallov. Encycl. 274). Gen.Sc. Also hogger, id. (Abd. 1957). Hence applied to the line itself as a shortened form of hog-score, and to the player of such a shot; also used similarly of a bowl in carpet bowls (Kcb. 1957).Lnk. 1771 Weekly Mag. (Feb.) 180:
When wand'ring wide the stone neglects the rank, And stops mid-way — his opponent is glad, But fears a similar fate, while ev'ry mouth Cries off the Hog, and Tinto joins the cry.Sc. 1833 J. Cairnie Curling 138:
The term Hog in Curling, it is supposed, has been taken from that of Sheep that are one year old, and called Hogs — at this age they are often ill, and apt to lag behind the flock.Lnk. 1853 W. Watson Poems 63:
Stan' back at the hog wi' a besom, Soop, soop, for the ice is but new.Abd. 1886 Banffshire Jnl. (12 Jan.) 13:
May those who practise makin hogs Get pointed nails within their brogues.Ags. 1892 Arbroath Guide (23 Jan.) 2:
Humbug! he's no up — Gauld's a hog!Sc. 1953 Sc. Carpet-Bowling Assoc. Hand-book 12:
The bowl . . . must be over the Hog, but must not touch the Bowl to be guarded.

Comb.: hog-score, one of the two distance lines drawn across a curling rink at a point five-sixths of the way from the delivery mark to the tee, over which every scoring shot has to pass. Also hogging-score (Sc. 1902 E.D.D.). Also used fig. as in phr. to lie at the hog-score, not to be able to get over some difficulty in an undertaking (Cld. 1825 Jam.).Ayr. 1786 Burns T. Samson's Elegy v.:
But now he lags on Death's hog-score: Tam Samson's dead!m.Lth. 1811 J. Ramsay Curling 41:
And birks and brooms ply hard before, Whan o'er the hog-score moving.Gall. 1824 MacTaggart Gallov. Encycl. 274:
Distance-lines in the game of curling. They are made in the form of a wave, and are placed one-fifth part of the whole rink from either witter; that is to say if the rink be fifty yards long, from tee to tee, the hog-scores of that rink are thirty yards distant from other.Sc. 1833 J. Cairnie Curling 60:
The hogscore to be one sixth part of the length of the entire rink, and every stone to be deemed a hog, the sole of which does not completely clear the score.Ags. 1883 J. Kennedy Poems 98:
Ne'er ahint the hog-score droopin' — Ne'er gaed skitin past the tee.Lth. 1885 J. Strathesk Blinkbonny 271:
Allan's first stone was a “Hog,” i.e. did not cross a line called the “hog-score,” which lay about seven yards back from the Tee.Dmf. 1920 D. J. Bell-Irving Tally-Ho 17:
We stood twenty all, with one of my stones on the “pot lid” with a narrow port to run just over the hog score.Sc. 1940 Royal Caled. Curling Club Annual xxviii.:
Every Stone which does not clear the Hog Score shall be a Hog, and must be removed from the ice.

II. v. 1. To make a hog of a lamb, to keep a lamb on winter pasture during its first year. Vbl.n. hogging, a pasture reserved for one-year-old sheep (s.Sc. 1825 Jam.; Per., Gall., Rxb. 1957).Sc. 1807 Farmer's Mag. (May) 202:
Our lambs were handled last week . . . twenty score were sold and . . . the remainder are to be weaned and hogged.Sth. 1831 Edb. Ev. Courant (10 Nov.) 3:
It [sheep farm] is of easy management, and has not only great command of wintering, but a sufficiency of excellent hogging.Sc. 1853 Jnl. R. Agric. Soc. XIV. i. 298:
A good many of the lambs usually sold fat have been hogged, and kept on to be sold when fat.Sc. 1865 H. H. Dixon Field & Fern IV. 183:
Hundreds of acres are now let for hogging black-faces off the Grampians.

2. In Curling: to play a stone which fails to cross the hog-score. Used sim. in carpet bowls. To hog off, to put such a stone off the rink. Fig. in ppl.adj. hogged, stuck, at a standstill, far short of one's purpose (Rnf. 1825 Jam.; Dmf. 1957).Ayr. 1823 Galt Gathering of the West 274:
There's no a merchant amang us that's no hogged mair or less.Clc. 1866 Royal Caled. Curling Club Annual 277:
I declare if his stone benna hoggit!Dmf. 1888 G. Sproat Dalma Linn 115:
And to tell the woeful story, I was “hogging” every stone.Sc. 1914 J. G. Grant Complete Curler 19:
'Tis “Hog it off,” with laughter much and loud.Lnk. 1922 T. S. Cairncross Scot at Hame 17:
And on life's rink their stanes are hogged And no' hauf up.