Dictionaries of the Scots Language
Dictionars o the Scots Leid

Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)

Hide Quotations Hide Etymology

Abbreviations Cite this entry

About this entry:
First published 1960 (SND Vol. V). Includes material from the 1976 supplement.
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

-IN(G), suff. Also -een.

1. Used as in Eng. to form the vbl.n. and, in writing since the 16th c., the pr.ppl., in place of O.Sc. -and. The distinction between the two forms however is preserved in Sh., Ork., Cai. and s.Sc. in pronunciation, the pr.ppl. sounding [-ɪn, -ən], the vbl.n. [-in] (Sh. 1952 Graham and Robertson Sh. Dial. § 43; Ork. 1929 Marw. Intro. xxxi.; M.M.Sc. Grammar § 49; s.Sc. 1873 D.S.C.S. 211; Rxb. 1942 Zai § 204). Hence the spelling -een (e.g. Rxb. 1927 E. C. Smith Braid Haaick 7, and in some Sh. writers). Speakers of two generations ago indicate traces of the distinction in ne. and m.Sc. in older speakers of their own time, e.g. Ellis E.E.P. V. 753, Gregor D. Bnff. 6, who however confuses pr.ppl. and vbl.n. Cf. also Burns's note to the Gl. of the Kilmarnock edition, 1786.

2. As in Eng. = “one of a certain kind, having certain characteristics ”, as in Eil(d)ins, Litlin; with dim. force added to nouns, as in Emmerteen, Loanin, Roadin, or to form a collective n., as in Easin, Steadan.

3. In advs., deriv. from O.E. adv. suff. -inga, orig. the dative of a fem. noun, and surviving in North.Mid.Eng. as -ing, to which the masc. gen. -s is freq. added on analogy with O.Sc. anes, Aince, -wards, etc. Hence Etherin, Neitherin, Senlins. An extended form of the suff. is -Lin(g)s, q.v.