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Published 01/10/24
fulmair m. [ˈfuɫ̪͡umaɾʲ],
(Harris) [fu̜ɫu̜mɑð] (Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄).
gen. idem, also fulmaire [ˈfuɫ̪͡uməɾʲə],
(Gairloch) [f[uLu]mər̆’ə] (Wentworth 2003, s.v. fulmar); (Tiree) fulmaire (Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄).
’fulmar, Fulmarus glacialis‘. For St Kilda, Macaulay (1764, 145–46) writes tulmer (×3); while Sommerfelt (1952b, 375: fulmar) wonders whether this form is Macaulay’s own or one used by the islanders, he points out that *tulmar could easily derive from fulmair via back-formation; so also Lockwood (1963, 57) and Coates (1988, 18).
Evidently there is some confusion between the bird name fulmair and (1) the fish name falmair m. ‘hake’ (Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄
Recorded in Skye, Harris, Scalpay and Taransay (Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄). Also (South Uist) falmaire (McDonald 1972, s.v. falmair) and (Easter Ross) falmadair (pers. comm. Professor Seòsamh Watson).
), e.g. (Lewis) falmor Hiortach lit. ‘the St Kildan fulmar’ (ibid.), and (2) falmadair m. ‘helm’ (s.v. ailm), e.g. (Lewis) falmadair Hiortach ‘idem’ (ibid.), in both cases the adjective Hiortach emphasising the association of the fulmar with St Kilda (SG Hiort), its traditional breeding ground.
Alternative names include (Uig in Lewis) pollastair [poɫəst̪ɑɾ], pullastair [pu̜ɫəst̪ɑð]
Although the fieldworker indicates pullastair means falmar, the editors assume that fulmar is meant: ‘Notes: falmar [sic] [fulmar?]’.
(Faclan bhon t-Sluagh˄), and (Port Hood in Nova Scotia and Arisaig in Scotland) làir ghlas (ibid.).
Scots (Eng.) fulmar is first recorded in Martin (1698, 104: ‘The Fulmar in bigness equals the Malls of the second rate’) and Buchan (1727, 33: ‘they feed much on fowl ... especially the solan goose, Puffin, and Fulmar’). SG fulmair is first listed in Stewart (1804 II, 595 = p. 3 of the appendix ‘Focalair Gearr’) and HSS (1828), although Macaulay’s tulmer (1764) predates them.
SG fulmair is derived from [Old] Norse fúlmár by Henderson (1910, 124–26
Along with fulmair, Henderson cites HSS’s falmair, leg. fulmair; de Vries (1962, s.v. fúll, for ‘schott.’ leg. Scottish Gaelic) cites Henderson’s fulmair, falmair.
), who compares Ice. fúlmár ‘foul, stinking or lazy mew or gull, commonly known now in Iceland as fýll’; so also Sommerfelt (1952a, 230: ‘a compound of [ON] fúll “foul” and már “sea-mew”’), Coates (1988, 18: Scandinavian fúlmár) and McDonald (2009, 355: ‘likely’), while Christiansen (1938, 14, 16) thinks the word looks Nordic.
P. 16: ‘Ordet ser nordisk ut, men jeg kjenner ikke noget å stille det sammen med.’
Lockwood (1961, 53) also derives the Gaelic word from fúlmár, but notes (1963, 55–57) that the Gaelic word has probably been adapted to Gaelic suffixes (-air -[aɾʲ], or -aire -[əɾʲə]) found commonly in other bird names, e.g. ballair ‘cormorant’ (< ball ‘spot’) and sgrabaire ‘shearwater’, q.v.
MacBain (1896), on the other hand, derives SG fulmair from Scots and Eng. fulmar. No doubt this is because stressed epenthesis (svarabhakti) would not result from an original long vowel, e.g. ON ármann, acc. of ármaðr m. ‘hero’, yields SG àrmann, not *armann, q.v. This epenthesis is indicated in non-standard Gaelic spellings in MacKenzie (1841, 375: fulamair, fulmair) and Ross (c. 1890: fulamar). However, SND˄ derives Scots fulmar from Gaelic, adapted from ON fúlmár. The ≈OED˄ is marginally more circumspect: ‘[a]pparently < SG fulmair (although this is first attested later: 1804 or earlier) < early Scandinavian (cf. OIce. fúlmár, in an apparently isolated attestation < fúll “foul” adj. (probably on account of its smell) and már “mew”; cf. Ice. fýll “fulmar” (19th c.)).’
ON fúlmár
So OIce. fúlmár (Cleasby 1874, Addenda).
contains the stem form of fúll adj. ‘foul, stinking’ + már m. ‘gull’; Ice. fýll m. ‘the stinker’ is a nominal derivative of fúll;
Cf. Ice. fýla f. ‘stench’.
the bird acquiring its names from its spitting a foul-smelling oil in defence.
RSPB˄: ‘Almost gull-like, this grey and white seabird is related to the albatrosses. The fulmar flies low over the sea on stiff wings, with shallow wingbeats, gliding and banking to show its white underparts then grey upperparts. At its breeding sites it will fly high up the cliff face, riding the updraughts. They will feed in flocks out at sea. They defend their nests from intruders by spitting out a foul-smelling oil.’
In spite of the absence of early attestations, it seems plausible that Scots fulmar (> Eng. fulmar) derives directly from ON fúlmár. MScots foul, fowl etc. adj. itself had the senses ‘loathsome, repulsive, very ugly or unclean, filthy, in bad condition’, and, while modern Scots foul etc. is described phonetically as [fu:l, fʌul] (SND˄), Jakobsen (1928, s.v. ful ‘foul, unclean’) gives both long [fūl] and short [ful] for Shetland. Potentially, then, ON fúlmár may have been borrowed into Scots, but with the vowel of its first syllable shortened in at least one dialect. Scots fulmar (*foulmar) would yield SG fulmair(e) regularly, with its final syllable adapted to familiar Gaelic suffixes. MScots fulmart, foumart ‘polecat’ (lit. ‘foul marten’), however, shows forms both with and without a lateral, which begs the question whether Scots fulmar may in fact have earlier been *foumar. It has been noted that Martin (1698, 104: Mall, 108–09: Sea-mall) uses mall for Scots maw ‘gull’;
As does Buchan 1727, 21: Sea-malls.
was this a case of hypercorrection by ‘reverse spelling’ (Macafee and Aitken˄, §§3.2.3 and 6.23)?
Sommerfelt (1952a, 231) sees mall as a Norse form besides már (besides other forms yielding Norw. måk(e), måse and Far. måsi); Lockwood (1963, 54–55) suggests a development of r > l in Scottish Gaelic itself; Coates (1988, 3) sees Martin’s usage as a ‘hyperanglicism’.
If so, is Martin’s fulmar for *foumar? SG fulmair(e), however, would have been borrowed while Scots fulmar still retained its lateral.
There may be a parallel for ON and OIce. fúlmár, Scots *foumar, fulmar and SG fulmair(e). In addition to fýll, the term múkki m. is used in Iceland. This seems to be a shortened form of Dan. mallemok, itself from Old West Frisian, cf. West Frisian mâllemok.
Which is thought to have been borrowed as Greenlandic malamuk from Frisian and Dutch whaling crews during the 17th and 18th centuries (Bakker and van der Voort 2011, 265, 270). Cf. Scots mallimoke ‘fulmar’, from Dut. mallemok ‘idem’ (SND˄).
While West Frisian -mok is cognate with ON már ‘gull’, the initial element in mâllemok is generally considered to mean ‘silly, foolish’ (as in the English borrowing mollymawk), apparently referring to the ease with which fulmars can be caught – for example, for a short time the young are too fat to fly. However, the range of senses of the West Frisian word includes the figurative ‘nauseous, lousy’ (WFT˄, s.v. mâl), with the possibility that mâllemok originally had a sense equivalent to ‘foul gull’.
SG pollastair, pullastair (cf. Dwelly 1911: bulastair) is probably a loan-word from Scots bullister ‘bullace, wild plum’ and may have been used of the fulmar because the bird’s vomit was reminiscent of the dry, face-contorting taste of bullace berries.
It may also have been used as a noa term (see Lockwood 1966). For Ir. b(o)láiste < Eng. bullace, see O’Rahilly 1913, 284.
For Easter Ross, Watson (2022, 131) records (pl.) buileastairean /buləsdərnː/ and bollastairean /bɔLəsdərnː/ in the sense ‘tonsils’.
For SG làir ghlas ‘grey mare’, compare Norw. havhest ‘fulmar, lit. seahorse’.
Compare also the etymology of Ice. fúlmár given in ≈Jamieson 1808, s.v. fulmar: ‘The term [Scots fulmar] would seem to have some analogy to its Danish name havhest ..., i.e. “seahorse”; for Ice. fula [leg. foli m.] signifies a “foal”, and mar [leg. marr m.] “the sea”, q[uasi] “the colt of the sea”.’