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Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)

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First published 1976 (SND Vol. X). Includes material from the 2005 supplement.
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

CEILIDH, n., v.

I. n.
1. A social evening with music, singing, story-telling, etc. (see Kailie). The Gaelic spelling was readopted when the word became popular again in the Lowlands c.1930 (Rs. 1924 N. Macrae Dingwall 180). [′keli]Arg. 1918 Neil Munro Jaunty Jock and Other Stories (1926) 290:
'It was in that season that the two men of my story met at a ceilidh, as we call a night gossiping, in a tacksman's house in Maam.' Fif. 1985 Christopher Rush A Twelvemonth and a Day 241:
Leebie presided over these last day ceilidhs from her creepie-stool at the side of the fire, threading her own snippets of old rhyme into the warp and woof of the stories and songs. ne.Sc. 1992 Sheila Douglas ed. The Sang's the Thing: Voices from Lowland Scotland 243:
It wis a kind o' haufway hoose, haufway between Elgin and Miltonduff, where I belonged tae, an aa the Miltonduff boys came in aboot, ye see, intae the wee hoose. We'd some great ceilidhs there! Ma brothers aa sing, Bob and Alan and Gordon. They're aa musical. Abd. 1996 Sheena Blackhall Wittgenstein's Web 1:
He likit a ceilidh on a Setterday nicht, wi the heid aff the bottle an the hoose hotchin wi fowk. wm.Sc. 1998 Alan Warner The Sopranos (1999) 46:
It's cause they post-natal lassies are aye taking the ends of their wee wet tits and dipping them into the sugar bowls so's their babies'll sook away at them quiet-like and they can get on having a smoke and a good ceilidh. w.Lth. 2000 Davie Kerr A Puckle Poems 31:
Then up sprang an old bodach, (who'd been dying almost daily).
"Come in", he beamed a welcome, "and we'll haff an early Ceilidh".

2. An organized evening entertainment (in a hall, hotel etc) of Scottish music, dancing etc, with at least some of the performers engaged in advance.  Also vbl. n.Ork. 2000 Orcadian 1 June 14:
They joined cubs and scouts throughout the United Kingdom, who were attending Millennium Camps in their own areas. Unfortunately, a ceilidh they had planned for the occasion had to be abandoned due to heavy rain.

Combs.: (1) ceilidh band, a band which plays traditional Scottish dance music. (2)ceilidh house, a house which is much visited, where ceilidhs are held.
(1)) Sc. 1994 Herald 16 Aug 15:
You don't expect to find fat men in false moustaches, a London gangster and his moll, and a ceilidh band fiddling furiously at God's House. But stumbling into the Mansfield Place Church, there they are.
(2)Cai. 1940 Neil M. Gunn Second Sight (1986) 304-5:
"... I probed him about what happened when he was a boy. They used to gather in what he called a kailee-house or something like that. They would talk and gossip an sing and tell stories. Sometimes, he said, the ghost stories would be so terrifying that grown men would be afraid to go home in the dark. They believed in them." ... "The ceilidh-house was quite an institution in those days," Sir John explained. "Their sort of school or college." "And a very good one, too," said Lady Marway. "For work was done there, real work, like spinning and cloth-making - not all talk."Hebr 1968 Iain Crichton Smith Consider the Lilies (1987) 122:
She would come into the ceilidh house with her feet and her clothes wet.Per. 1990 Peter Cook and Ian Gould in Betsy Whyte Red Rowans and Wild Honey (1991) 5:
But a traveller home is no haven for a writer: hers was a 'ceilidh hoose', where friends and neighbours dropped in for a 'crack', at any time of the day and night.Hebr 1995 Angus Duncan Hebridean Island: Memories of Scarp 49:
On this account, an islander home on holiday from the south was almost sure to ask, as he recalled his own life on the island, Dè 'n taigh-ceilidh a th'agaibh a-nis?- 'What visiting-house have you now?' using the compound word taigh-ceilidh, or 'ceilidh-house', a fact which in itself conveys, as far as this practice is concerned, a sense of popularity and general recognition.

II v. To hold, attend or take part in a ceilidh. Also fig.Hebr 1968 Iain Crichton Smith Consider the Lilies (1987) 52:
My man doesn't like me to do a lot of ceilidhing. m.Sc. 1992 Sheila Douglas ed. The Sang's the Thing: Voices from Lowland Scotland viii:
We have sung together, ceilidhed together, taken part in concerts and festivals, visited one another, laughed and cried and talked endlessly. Sc. 1994 Herald 1 Feb 11:
It was all my own fault. I had been ceilidhing, a night or two earlier, with the Fisherman, and he had asked - offhand - if I had a taste for shellfish. Sc. 1995 Scotsman 9 Dec 12:
There was no attempt to discourage the boys from consorting with their contemporaries of going ceilidhing to the house of the crofter next door, Lachlan MacDonald, a fine storyteller. Sc. 1995 James S. Adam New Verses for an Auld Sang 31:
birds across the treetops ceilidhing,
blackies musical cascades fluting,
starlings restless thieving sparring em.Sc. 1996 Hamish Henderson in Timothy Neat The Summer Walkers: Travelling People and Pearl-Fishers in the Highlands of Scotland 74:
We hawked, traded, tinsmithed and ceilidhed our way through Sutherland to Janetstown - where we turned back. Sc. 2000 Sunday Mail 12 Nov 21:
He came to learn, helping out with sheep dipping and gathering potatoes and ceilidhing with crofter Splash MacKillop and his friends.