v1.0
Published 01/10/24
dreòlan or dreòllan m. [ˈd̪̥ɾ(ɛ)ɔːɫ̪an] and dreolan or dreollan [ˈd̪̥ɾ(ɛ)ɔɫ̪an], gen. -ain -[æɲ], -[ɛɲ]. Henderson (1910, 143, 214) derives SG dreollan, dreòllan
‘[W]ith close o in the Aird [?referring to the area south of the River Beauly and the northern end of Loch Ness], more often with long o elsewhere’ (ibid., 143).
in the sense ‘slow-going old man, carle; loiterer; someone slow on their legs’ from ‘N[orse]’ drjóli m. ‘loiterer’ and drolla vb ‘to loiter’, although the forms drjóli and drolla are unattested in Old Norse and both taken from Cleasby’s (1874) Icelandic dictionary, where they are described as cant words related to OEng. droil vb. ‘to loiter’. Henderson also notes Scots (Shetland) drølin ‘a half-grown coalfish’, which he derives from drøl ‘to dawdle, move indolently and clumsily, walk slowly or feebly’, although Jakobsen (1928) associates the former with Norw. dryl and Ice. drjóli ‘cudgel; fellow etc.’ and the latter with Norw. draula, dryla, drøla vb ‘to bear oneself indolently and stupidly; loiter; idle’. MacBain (1911) suggests SG dreòlan ‘silly person’, Ir. dreólán and W drel ‘clown’ may derive from Eng. droll, but notes that Thurneysen prefers a derivation from Eng. thrall, Old Norse þræl[l].
GPC˄ tentatively derives W drel from OEng. þræl.
MacBain also notes that the Scottish Gaelic word appears as dreòlan, dreallaire and drollaire, and that in the sense ‘loiterer’ these words derive from ‘the Norse drolla “loiter”, Eng. droil’. MacLennan (1925), followed by Stewart (2004, 409), derives dreallaire ‘loiterer’ from ‘ON drolla’, while McDonald (2009, 350) considers it likely that dreòlan, dreallaire and drollaire ‘a silly person, epithet of one who is slow-going, a loiterer’ are all from ‘ON drjóli’. There appears to be a degree of conflation and/or confusion here.
A. SG dreòll, dreòl(l)an, dreol(l)an
A1.
dreòll
Written dreóll in Ó Cuív 1980, 56.
[d̪̥ɾ(ɛ)ɔːɫ̪] (CG VI, 62: dreoll ‘wren’, which rhymes with (len.) chorr (i.e. còrr, with a long vowel), is glossed dreòlan by its editor Angus Matheson);
A2.
(i) dreòlan [d̪̥ɾ(ɛ)ɔːɫ̪an] (HSS 1828: ‘wren; silly person’; McAlpine 1832, s.v. dreolan: [dryôl´-an] ‘wren’; Kennedy 1897, 138: ‘wren’: dreòlain (gen.), (but p. 128) dreolan, Arran; Dwelly 1911: ‘silly, inactive person; dwarf; wren); Mac Farlane 1912: ‘wren’; Clachan 1917, 13: ‘silly trifling person, ninny’; MacLennan 1925, with separate entries for ‘wren’ and ‘silly person; dwarf’; Dieckhoff 1932, s.v. dreolan: [drèòːLan] ‘wren’; Garvie 1999, 64: ‘wren’); also dreôlan (Lhuyd 1700, 133 Item 90: ‘wren’, Argyll), with the circumflex indicating a long vowel;
(ii) dròlan [idem] (Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄: ‘wren’, Islay), with an unhistorical pronunciation spelling;
The initial cluster /dr´/ has to all intents and purposes fallen together with /dr/ in Scottish Gaelic: by the second half of the 20th century, /dr´/ is restricted to St Kilda (SGDS Points 14–15), part of North Uist (17–19), part of Barra (28–30) and part of Islay (56), while extremely weak palatalisation is found within the Skye and Lochalsh area (100–118); see SGDS Items 345–347, similarly for tr-, see Items 863, 865, 867–869.
(iii) dreòllan [idem] (MacLeod and Dewar 1839: ‘wren; silly inactive person’; MacEachen 1842: ‘wren; dwarf’; Clachan 1917, 13: ‘silly trifling person, ninny’), with -ll- perhaps based on droll etc. (B. and C.), but at any rate not phonetically distinct from -l-, above.
A3.
(i) dreolan [d̪̥ɾ(ɛ)ɔɫ̪an]
But note Henderson’s (1910, 143) description with ‘close o’ (fn 1, above).
(Kennedy 1897, 128: ‘wren’: dreolan, (but p. 138) dreòlain (gen.), Arran; Clachan 1917, 13: ‘silly trifling person, ninny’, Perthshire; Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄: ‘wren’, Muasdale in Argyll);
(ii) dreollan [idem] (Mac Farlan 1795: ‘silly person’; MacFarlane 1815: ‘idem’; Armstrong 1825: ‘wren; silly person, ninny’; Forbes 1905, 347: ‘wren’; AFB˄: /drɔLan/, with separate entries for ‘wren’ (Ardnamurchan, Mull, Colonsay, Islay, Jura, Gigha, Kintyre, Arran) and ‘lazy/idle person, sluggard, slouch(er), layabout, idler, lazybones; daydream; silly person’); also Shaw (1780), but who does not use lengthmarks on headwords;
(iii) dreollin (Forbes 1905, 347: ‘wren’): Forbes’s source is unknown; if dreollin really indicates a pronunciation *[d̪̥ɾɔɫ̪in] or *[d̪̥ɾɔlin], cf. SG cailin ‘maiden, young woman’ (EG cailín, with the suffix -ín).
B. SG droll, dreoll
(i) droll [d̪̥ɾɔuɫ̪], (Argyll) [d̪̥ɾɔɫ̪ː] (MacFarlane 1815: ‘sumph’; Armstrong 1825: ‘idle inactive person’; HSS 1828: ‘lazy idiot, sluggard’; MacLeod and Dewar 1839: ‘awkward sluggard’; MacEachen 1842: ‘sluggard’; Dwelly 1911: ‘awkward sluggard, idle inactive person’; Clachan 1917, 13: ‘awkward sluggard’; MacLennan 1925: ‘sluggard’);
(ii) dreoll [idem] (HSS 1828: ‘slubberdegullion, homo torpidus’; MacLeod and Dewar 1839: ‘paltry sorry fellow’; Dwelly 1911: ‘paltry worthless fellow’; Clachan 1917, 13: ‘idem’); cf. similar confusion between dreòlan and dròlan (A2 (ii)).
C. SG drollaire
(HSS 1828: ‘sluggard, saunterer’; MacLeod and Dewar 1839: ‘sluggard, saunterer; awkward clown’; MacEachen 1842: ‘sluggard’; Clachan 1917, 13: ‘awkward sluggard’; MacLennan 1925: ‘lazy fellow, sluggard’).
D. SG dreallaire, dreallan
(i) dreallaire (HSS 1828: ‘idler, saunterer’; McAlpine 1832: ‘loiterer’; MacLeod and Dewar 1839: ‘idler, saunterer, loiterer’; Clachan 1917, 13: ‘idler, lounger’; MacLennan 1925: ‘loiterer’);
(ii) dreallan (MacEachen 1842: ‘dreòllan “a wren, a dwarf”, rather dreallan’; Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄: ‘loiterer’, Skye).
Ir. dreolán, dreoilín (Ó Dónaill 1977), dreóilín (de Bhaldraithe 1977, 134), dreóillín (Mhac an Fhailigh 1980, 72–73, line 121) etc.
For further Irish references, see Ó Baoill 1978, 39–40, and Ó Cuív 1980, 56.
and SG dreòlan, dreolan etc. (A2–A3) ‘wren’ are ultimately from EG deróil adj. ‘mean, lowly, insignificant, small’ (eDIL˄; Vendryes 1996) + the agent (nominally diminutive) suffix -ín, -én or -án, so EG dreol(l)án, dreólan, dreoillín etc. (eDIL˄) (Ó Cuív 1980, 56). SG dreòll (A1) may be a reflex of EG deróil, as Ó Cuív assumes, or a back-formation from SG dreòlan. The short stressed vowel of dreolan etc. (A3) is conceivably the result of confusion with SG dreathan ‘wren’,
SG dreathan (occasionally dreadhan) is from disyllabic EG dreän, dréën, with -th- (-dh-) marking hiatus in the Scottish Gaelic form.
with its short stressed vowel, or perhaps confusion with droll > drollaire (see below). Ir. dreolán etc. has the extended senses ‘diminutive creature; silly person’ (e.g. Ó Dónaill); similarly SG dreòlan etc. has the extended senses ‘silly person; dwarf’.
SND˄ derives Scots drollan ‘half-witted person’ from SG dreòlan.
SG droll (B (i)) ‘sluggard, loiterer’ may derive from Scots drail, dral(l) [dra(:)l] ‘a dawdler over work, a poor, incompetent sort of worker’ (SND˄), which, with a ~ o alternation in Gaelic, would give SG [d̪̥ɾɔuɫ̪], (Argyll) [d̪̥ɾɔɫ̪ː] regularly; so SG drollaire (C.), with the agent suffix -aire. The variant spelling dreoll (B (ii)) may have arisen through confusion similar to dreòlan ~ dròlan (A2 (ii)), as a result of the loss of a distinction between /dr´/ and /dr/ in Scottish Gaelic (fn 4, above).
The stressed vowel of SG dreallaire and dreallan may have arisen through confusion with dreathan, but compare also the alternation in dreòlan-teasbhuidh ~ dreallan-teasbhuidh ‘grasshopper’ and in dreoll ~ dreall ~ droll in the sense ‘door-bar’ (Dwelly 1911).