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HORE MOMENTA CRAVENÆ,

OR, THE

CRAVEN DIALECT,

EXEMPLIFIED IN TWO DIALOGUES,

BETWEEN

FARMER GILES

AND HIS

NEIGHBOUR BRIDGET.

TO WHICH IS ANNEXED A COPIOUS GLOSSARY.

BY A NATIVE OF CRAVEN.

Williams Carr

"What a feaful girt gauvison mun he be, at frames to larn'th
talk of another country, afore he parfitly knaws his awn."

ANON.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR HURST, ROBINSON AND CO. CHEAPSIDE;
AND ROBINSON AND HERNAMAN, LEEDS.

-1824.

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THE

INTRODUCTION.

"Collections of provincial dialects would often have been extremely useful; many words esteemed peculiar to certain counties, being remnants of the language formerly in general use. But these collections are, unfortunately, few and scanty. County histories, which have long received the most extensive encouragement, should always contain a careful compilation of this kind from certain and correct authorities. From these, digested together, the history of our language might ultimately receive important illustration."

NARES' PREFACE TO HIS GLOSSARY.

It was the remark of the most learned philologist of modern times, that the language of the Northern Counties was not barbarous, though obsolete. Under the sanction of this great authority, the author has been induced to publish the Dialect of the Deanery of Craven, in the West Riding of the County of York.

Pent up by their native mountains, and principally engaged in agricultural pursuits, the inhabitants of this district had no opportunity of corrupting the purity of their language by the adoption of foreign idioms. But it has become a subject of much regret that, since the introduction of commerce, and, in consequence of that, a greater intercourse, the simplicity of the language has, of late years, been much corrupted. Anxious, therefore, to hand it down to posterity unadulterated, the author has attempted to express, in a familiar dialogue, the chaste and nervous language of its unlettered natives.

TO'TH CONNER O'MY BOOK.

AN this lile book'll gi'the onny plezer efter a hard day's wark, I sall be feaful fain on't. Bud sud onny outcumlins ivver awn this outside, staany plat, it may happen gee 'em some inseet into awyer plain mack o' talk; at they may larn, at awyer discowerse hez a meanin in't as weel as theirs; at they mayn't snert an titter at huz, gin we wor hauf rocktons, but may undercumstand, an be insensed by this book, lile as it is, at ya talk's aqual to another, seeabetide it explains yan's thoutes. Sud t❜lads o' Craven yunce git a gliff o' what a seet o' words I've coud togither, it'll happen mack 'em nut so keen, at iv'ry like, o' luggin intoth' country a parcel of outlandish words, er seea shamm'd o' talking their awn. For, o' lat years, young foak are grown seea maachy an see feeafully geen to knackin, at their parents er ill set to knaw what their barns er javverin about.

I'se at thy sarvice,

T'SETTER-OUT O'T BOOK,

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