According to a report I found today in the Herald Scotland, the last fluent speaker of the Cromarty fisher dialect of Scots, Bobby Hogg, died recently. It was a dialect spoken by fisherfolk in the northeast of Scotland. According to experts, it was “the first ever linguistic demise to be so exactly recorded in Scotland.” While there are still a few people who know bits of the dialect, nobody speaks it anymore.

There are some recordings and examples of the dialect on Am Baile an interview from 2007 with Bobby Hogg and his brother Gordon.

There is a book, The Cromarty Fisherfolk Dialect, which contains words and phrases in and information about the dialect.

Here are a few examples:
– At wid be scekan tiln ken? = What do you want to know?
– Am fair sconfished wi hayreen; gie’s fur brakwast lashins o am and heggs. = I’m so fed up with herring, give me plenty of ham and eggs for breakfast.
– Foamin for want = Desperate for tea
– Theer nae tae big fi a sclaffert yet! = You’re not too big for a slap!

The dialect appears to include a number of words from Scottish Gaelic, though the spelling disguises them.