Written in Black and Wight: H
Created | Updated Aug 13, 2017
Welcome to the eighth entry in the quiz series dedicated to the Isle of Wight's dialect, preserved in publications including A Dictionary of Isle of Wight Dialect by WH Long (1886) and Isle of Wight Dialect by Jack Lavers (1988)1.
H
This week is words beginning with H. We've had 101 words to date and we're a third of the way through the alphabet2 already.
To quote Percy Goddard Stone in his Legends and Lays of the Isle of Wight (1911), 'An Islander never leaves out his h's,' though he puts them in before words beginning with r'. This meant that traditionally words like 'rough rabbit' would become 'hrough hrabbit', although this trend is dying out today.
Quick-Fire Round
This round has examples of words and phrases, but the correct meaning isn't next to the right word. Can You correctly identify the correct meanings of each of the words below?
| Word | Definition |
|---|---|
| Hacker | To spit |
| Halped | To be tangled up or confused |
| Hard Does | To stammer |
| Harl | Bad times |
| Hawk | Sentinels watching for invasion |
| Hoblers | Crippled |
| Hoppers | Dragonfly |
| Hoss Stinger | Small maggots found in bread or cheese. |
Main Round
Identify which of the three meanings is the correct one for the words below:
Haglets
- Icicles
- Small crones.
- Knots tied at the end of shoelaces.
Hang-Gallus
- V-shaped frame covered in fabric that is a small, basic glider.
- A villainous rascal.
- The sort of hangover experienced the night after drinking a gallon of beer.
Hapeth
- Someone who hides needles in haystacks.
- A worthless person
- Using straw to create a path over a muddy field.
Heeltaps
- Feeling that there's no place like home, there's no place like home.
- Women's high-heeled shoes.
- Small amount of drink left in the bottom of a glass.
Hillier
- What Ventnor is compared to Newport.
- A garden centre.
- A roofer who does not use thatch.
Holystoning
- Punishment given to someone who says Jehovah – not to be carried out by women wearing fake beards.
- Scrubbing the deck of a man 'o war.
- Using stone from the dissolved monastery of Quarr Abbey as a building material.
Hugger-Mugger
- Something done carelessly.
- Seductress who uses her charms to pick gentlemen's pockets.
- Someone in a pub who makes his pint last twice as long as everyone else.
Hurdleshell
- Gate or fence made out of oysters.
- Tortoiseshell colour.
- Falling off slippery rocks when crabbing.
Click on the picture for the answers!
