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Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)

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First published 1968 (SND Vol. VII). Includes material from the 2005 supplement.
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

PINE, n., v. Also pyne, pein(e); ¶pinn (Ags. 1790 D. Morison Poems 140). [pəin]

I. n. 1. Suffering, distress, pain, either physical or mental (Wgt. 1804 R. Couper Poems I. 274; Sc. 1808 Jam.; I. and ne.Sc. 1965). Obs. or arch. in Eng.Peb. 1715 A. Pennecuik Tweeddale (1815) 331:
[They] vow'd the poor should be put out of pine.Sc. 1728 Ramsay Poems (S.T.S.) II. 21:
Wha cou'd, like him, in a short Sang define The bonny Lass, and her young Lover's Pine.Sc. a.1776 D. Herd Sc. Songs II. 209:
The wren scho lyes in care's bed, In meikle dule and pyne.Sc. a.1783 Child Waters in Child Ballads No. 63. B. xxiii.:
O I canna eat nor drink, master, My heart's sae full of pine.Ayr. 1786 Burns Scotch Drink v.:
When heavy-dragg'd wi' pine an' grievin'.Sc. 1812 The Scotchman 62:
Keepin me frae langor — baith lessenin the pleasour o guid, an the pine o ill companie.Sc. 1827 G. R. Kinloch Ballads 268:
Bid him mind the lady's love That ance did lowse him out o' pyne.Rnf. 1851 R. Skimming Lays 31:
Far better to be shot at ance, Than live in pine frae a' that.Abd. 1880 W. Robbie Glendornie xv.:
It wid hae been a lamiter a' its days; an' maybe it was jist as weel t' pit it oot o' pine.Ags. 1920 A. Gray Songs from Heine 18:
They wad greet me wi' their dewdraps To sane me o' my pein.Sc. 1950 Scots Mag. (July) 264:
An she faulded her petals tae heild her pine.ne.Sc. 1979 Alexander Scott in Joy Hendry Chapman 23-4 (1985) 70:
And Scots sinsyne
hae tholed the pyne
whaur richt-wey roun
means upside-doun. em.Sc. 1999 James Robertson The Day O Judgement 23:
"Ma malisoun an curse gang wi ye:
I lay upon ye pyne an gloom.
In hellfire ye sall roast for aye:
An this I dae pronoonce for doom."

Specif. (1) the pains of punishment, torture, torment, the pains of Hell. Only in ballads. Obs. in Eng.; (2) the pangs of childbirth.(1) Sc. a.1828 Lady Isabel in Child Ballads No. 261. xxiii.:
But yours is in the lowest hell, To drie torment and pine.(2) Sc. a.1783 Rose the Red in Child Ballads No. 103. xxvi.:
“'Twas never my mither's fashion,” she says, “Nor sall it ever be mine, That belted knights shold eer remain Where ladies dreed their pine.”

2. A disease of sheep or cows (w.Sc. 1825 Jam.), = pining s.v. II. 4., now known to be due to mineral deficiency and curable by cobalt licks. Also in comb. Solway pine (Kcb. 1965).Sc. 1807 Trans. Highl. Soc. 405:
In the pine . . . the condition of the animal is too high, its blood too thick, and its pasture too arid.Rxb. 1847 J. Halliday Rustic Bard 318:
The sheep for miles roond are a' deid i' the pine.Sc. 1947 Scotsman (17 July):
Diseases like pine, milk fever, and lactation tetany had been largely solved in so far as a specific means of prevention or cure had been obtained.

II. v. 1. tr. To cause pain and suffering, to torment, torture (Sc. 1825 Jam.). Obs. in Eng. in 17th c. Comb. pine-bauks, properly -bank [Mid. Du. pijnbanck] lit., an instrument of torture, the rack, now only fig. as in 1864 quot. Ppl.adj. pynit, in pain, tortured (Sc. 1710 T. Ruddiman Gl. to Douglas Aeneis).Sc. 1724 Ramsay Poems (S.T.S.) III. 37:
Hence frae my Breast, contentious Care, Ye've tint the Power to pine.Bnff. 1787 W. Taylor Poems 88:
My love-sick mind with anguish pin'd, Is dead to pleasure.Rnf. 1813 E. Picken Poems I. 130:
It pangs their entrails fu' o' win', Whilk pines them sair.Kcb. 1814 W. Nicholson Poems 117:
Few spleens or vapours pine them.Sc. 1818 Scott Bride of Lamm. xxiii.:
They prick us and they pine us, and they pit us on the pinny-winkles for witches.Fif. 1864 W. D. Latto T. Bodkin xxix.:
I was on the pyne bauks o' perplexity.Ags. 1878 A. Laing Wayside Flowers 32:
Mary, her mither, a' broken an' pin'd Wi' trouble o' body, wi' trouble o' mind.

2. refl. To put oneself to trouble, take pains, exert oneself at some task (Sc. 1825 Jam.). Obs. in Eng. in 14th c.Rxb. 1802 J. Sibbald Chron. Sc. Poetry Gl.:
He pyned himself, he used his best endeavours.

3. intr. To suffer pain or sorrow. Obs. or rare in Eng.Edb. 1821 W. Liddle Poems 149:
If from paunching Bacchus' wine, Then they should a' be made to pine.

4. To languish, become thin and shrunken, to waste away, in Eng. now gen. from grief or distress: (1) in Sc. still referring to emaciation from disease and now chiefly applied to animals or fig. of inanimate things (Ork., n.Sc., Per., Kcb. 1965). See I. 2. Ppl.adj. pined, pyn(i)t (Sc. 1710 T. Ruddiman Gl. to Douglas Aeneis), emaciated, reduced to skin and bone; vbl.n. pining, a disease of sheep, described as tabes mesenterica, Vanquish, Daising (w.Sc. 1825 Jam.). Deriv. piner, an animal suffering from pine, more gen. any animal that is not thriving, also of human beings. Gen.Sc. Also in Eng. dial.Slk. a.1830 Gay Goshawk in Child Ballads (1956) IV. 484:
The surgeon-lad reply'd again, She's nouther pin'd nor lien.(1) Slk. 1845 Stat. Acc.² III. 52:
The ground, it is said, has been overgrown with harsher grasses or insipid fog, and the pining in consequence introduced.Sc. 1857–9 Trans. Highl. Soc. 84–5:
Pining occasionally depends on the parent. I have heard of cows breeding several piners in succession. Animals that pine cannot appropriate or assimilate to themselves nutritive substances.Slk. 1875 Border Treasury (17 July) 585:
“Mother,” said Jack, when he went to get his money in the morning early, and found only the smaller coin, “Does siller pyne? Do shillings turn to sixpences in the oven?”Rxb. 1879 Sc. Naturalist (April) 81:
The great majority of those that I have dissected have been in excellent condition; “pined” birds are the exception.Sc. 1889 H. Stephens Bk. of Farm I. 201:
We have lost by death, or otherwise, 11 Cheviot ewes (5 from inflammation of the lungs, 2 drowned, 1 disease in the head, 1 hanged in the hay-heck, 1 pined, 1 sturdy).ne.Sc. 1893 in Dunbar Works (S.T.S.) III. 44:
He's a peer pynt ablach; he wid just scraap hell for a bawbee, gehn he wisna flyet for burnin's fingers.Sh. 1895 Williamson MSS. (21 Feb.):
Dis faan [of snow] at wis aleng da dek is pined away. Der harly a pel ta be seen.Bnff. 1924 Swatches o' Hamespun 12:
Ay, an' I notice fermers never breed piners.

(2) specif. of salted fish, meat, hay or the like: to shrink in drying from exposure to the weather, to dwindle in size and weight (Sh. 1914 Angus Gl.); also used tr., to treat fish, meat, etc. so as to cause it to shrink, to dry fish in the open air (Sh. 1866 Edm. Gl. Sh. 1965).Sc. 1705 Acts Parl. Scot. XI. 296:
That the beef and pork be well salted and pyned.Sc. 1733 P. Lindsay Interest Scot. 211:
To direct the right Manner of salting and pinning them, and to sort the full from the spawn Herrings, to be pinn'd in different Fats or Casks.Sh. 1822 S. Hibbert Descr. Shet. (1891) 229:
When the drying, or pining, as it is called, has been completed, which is indicated by a white efflorescence appearing on the surface named the bloom, the fish are transported to a dry cellar lined with wood, and there piled up closely, or shipped off immediately to a market.Sh. 1845 Stat. Acc.² XV. 170:
The art of fish-curing in this manner is well understood, and the essential principle of pining or pressure is in general duly and even scientifically applied.Abd.¹⁶ 1936:
A quantity of herring which shrinks in a barrel is said to pine.

(3) of weather conditions: to decrease in intensity, to abate, e.g. of a sea mist (Kcd. 1921 T.S.D.C.). Deriv. piner, a strong wind from the north or north-east (Bnff. 1866 Gregor D. Bnff. 124) that dies away by degrees (ne.Sc. 1965). Also piner wind, sea piner, id. (Abd. 1921 T.S.D.C.; ne.Sc. 1965). Also in Nhb. dial.Kcd. 1948 People's Jnl. (27 March):
An invitation to spend an evening in the hall on a real “cauld nicht”, or when there is a “sea piner”.