v1.0
Published 01/10/24
†callair m. ‘crier, herald’ (Dwelly 1911) is derived by McDonald (2009, 368–69) from ON kallari m. ‘caller, crier; town crier, herald’ (NO); this is on the assumption that SG †callair goes back to EG callaire ‘herald, crier’, which is derived from the same source by Meyer (1890, 493), Craigie (1894, 161) and Marstrander (1915a, 94, 133
So also Vendryes 1996 and eDIL˄.
).
While Dwelly describes †callair as the ‘Gaelic spelling of [Eng.] caller’, his source is likely to have been Armstrong’s (1825) dictionary: ‘†callair m. (Ir. idem [leg. callaire], W calwr [leg. galwr]) “a crier”’, itself adapted from O’Brien’s (1768) Irish dictionary: ‘callaire “bollsaire no fear garma, a cryer”, W calur [leg. galwr] is “one that cries”’. Ir. callaire is listed in both O’Clery’s (1643) and Lhuyd’s (1707) Irish dictionaries, but O’Brien’s seems to have been the first to list the abstract noun calleareacht [sic] ‘constant calling’, hence Shaw’s own (1780) Scottish Gaelic dictionary entries callaire ‘crier’ and callaireachd ‘crying’.
Modern Ir. callaire has the senses ‘crier; bellman; loud talker, ranter; loud-speaker’ (Ó Dónaill 1977).
†Callair (callaire), then, is a ghost word in Scottish Gaelic.