2000; but, of the fragments that have been preserved as specimens of Norn, those belonging to the island of Foula are kept in quite as distinct remembrance as those belonging to Unst or to any other part of Shetland. The transition from the old to the new, in the case of the language, seems, when one compares the oldest with the youngest generation now living, to have taken place more rapidly in Foula than anywhere else in Shetland. The last man in Unst who is said to have been able to speak Norn, Walter Sutherland from Skaw, died about 1850. In Foula, on the other hand, men who were living much later than the middle of the present (19th) century are said to have been able to speak Norn. The Norn spoken towards the middle of the century and later can hardly have been of much account. The difference between it and the dialect of the oldest people of the present generation probably consisted in little more than the fact that the former contained a greater sprinkling of Norn words which the younger people did not understand. Moreover, the persons mentioned had probably a certain reputation because they could recite fragments of songs, rhymes and modes of expression, etc. in Norn, things that others had forgotten. I wish here to lay stress only on the circumstance that, so late in the present century, a dialect was spoken that bore the name of Norn, and consequently must have been considerably more old-fashioned than the present dialect.
The two islands named are by no means the only places where such a state of matters prevailed. The development in Yell and Fetlar must be said to have proceeded practically at the same time as that in Unst, and there also, in the latter half of the century, a dialect named Norn was spoken by some individuals. The same can be said about some other districts of the country, among which one may name Conningsburgh in S.Sh., a place that in many respects forms a contrast to the surrounding districts, although Norn disappeared there somewhat earlier than in the places mentioned above.
The statement that the Norn died out in the previous century must not, however, be taken too literally. The process has been a steady and gradual one, which is still continuing even at the present day. One must certainly suppose that even at the beginning of the 18th century the dialect was hard hit, and after that time it seems to have degenerated very rapidly. The old Foula crofter who, in 1774, recited to Low the well-known ballad about Hildina and the Orkney Jarl[1] was, it seems, unable to accompany it with any translation, and could give only a general summary of the main contents.
The first portions of the old language to be affected, as one can easily imagine, and as appears from the fragments preserved, were the inflections, the grammatical endings, since assimilations became common, by degrees, as the forms were obliterated; next the minor words frequently recurring in speech, such as: conjunctions, prepositions,
- ↑ Printed in Low’s Tour; also in Barry’s History of the Orkney Islands, and by Munch in Samlinger til det norske Folks Historie, vol. VI.
