1976: NORTHUMBERLAND accents | Word of Mouth | Voice of the People | BBC Archive

แชร์
ฝัง
  • เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.ย. 2024
  • Introduced by Melvyn Bragg, Word of Mouth traces the pattern of speech in Britain.
    The speech of Northumberland has proved very resistant to change, and between the Tees and the Tweed, pockets of language can still call for translation. Linguist Stanley Ellis is on hand to explain some of the less common phraseology in this short film about Northumbrian shearers and shepherds.
    Originally broadcast 19 August, 1976.
    You have now entered the BBC Archive, a time machine that will transport you back to the golden age of TV to educate, entertain and enlighten you through our classic clips from the BBC vaults.
    Make sure you subscribe so that you never miss a single stop on our amazing journey through the BBC Archive - www.youtube.co...

ความคิดเห็น • 364

  • @smallbutjustright
    @smallbutjustright 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +9

    I’m from Northumberland. The accents vary quite a lot (to my ear at least) throughout the county. There are very different accents in this video alone, all are mid to north/north west Northumbrian and the older men have a lot more Scottish to their Northumbrian accents than the younger ones. I always think that Northumberland accents from those outside the Borders have gone more Geordie since this time, and Borders folk have taken on more of a Scottish accent, but there’s still a definite difference between relatively close places - there’s a word of difference between Ashington, Cramlington & Blyth accents for instance

    • @garbeal2397
      @garbeal2397 หลายเดือนก่อน +4

      I grew up in Amble and never noticed until I started working in Alnwick at 17 the differences in accent between Amble and Alnwick even though just 9 miles separate them.

  • @hotspurhema5131
    @hotspurhema5131 2 ปีที่แล้ว +48

    I'm from Shilbottle. Understood every word. But this level of dialect is becoming rarer today as the older generation pass.

    • @Avradoorn
      @Avradoorn 2 ปีที่แล้ว +8

      I knew some of those lads from the accordion club days. Played in a band with one of them.

    • @blooter6360
      @blooter6360 2 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      Also. And this dialect is more rothbury upper coquetdale

    • @johno4521
      @johno4521 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      ex Alamooth lad here....

    • @danorthsidemang3834
      @danorthsidemang3834 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      Is your hometown actually called Shilbottle or is it spelled that way but pronounced "Shitbottle" or "Shitebottle"?

    • @hotspurhema5131
      @hotspurhema5131 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      @@danorthsidemang3834 maybe worth asking that question in the Farriers on a Friday night.

  • @PurplePassion332
    @PurplePassion332 2 ปีที่แล้ว +138

    Im from Northumberland as was my parents and most of my family, this is pure nostalgia for me, i have chatted to people who have exactly this accent, it's fantastic x

    • @maxwellarch
      @maxwellarch 2 ปีที่แล้ว +4

      do northumbrians nowadays still speak like that?

    • @PurplePassion332
      @PurplePassion332 2 ปีที่แล้ว +14

      @@maxwellarch sadly, fewer and fewer as the older ones pass on, another dying dialect

    • @heatherboardman7004
      @heatherboardman7004 ปีที่แล้ว +4

      @@maxwellarch some do.

    • @benfisher1376
      @benfisher1376 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      ​@PurplePassion332 It's sad. I'm from Kent and the kentish accent has died, become more London. Alot of english accents and dialects are on the wane unfortunately. Btw I love Northumberland, its beautiful.

    • @OffGridInvestor
      @OffGridInvestor 10 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      It's incredibly fast talking

  • @onlinemusiclessonsadamphil4677
    @onlinemusiclessonsadamphil4677 2 ปีที่แล้ว +24

    I'm from north - east Scotland and it's so similar to some Aberdeenshire accents, very similar

    • @nutyyyy
      @nutyyyy 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      Aye was thinking that. Quite a bit easier to follow for us.

    • @froggy8030
      @froggy8030 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      I say it often. Us lot at the bottom (South West) and you guys up top and to the East have similar dialects. It's The Glaswegian and Ayrshire lot etc in the middle who are most recognised as Scots and sound nothing like the rest of us. I often wondered if it was a working class and rural thing? The Fisher folks etc

    • @Bella-fz9fy
      @Bella-fz9fy 4 หลายเดือนก่อน

      @@froggy8030I agree,I think you can see evidence of this with the rural people from the countryside who emigrated to America,taking with them their rolling rrr’s (rhotic).

  • @frostylunetta
    @frostylunetta ปีที่แล้ว +15

    Love the Northumberland accents most
    I would love to move to the North East (my parents thought I am crazy as all they could think of the UK was London or some parts in the South)

    • @Lat265
      @Lat265 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      I've lived here all of my life, it would be nice to move to a different part of England.

  • @impalaman9707
    @impalaman9707 3 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    Northumbrians are beautiful people---they have a twinkle in their eyes!🥰

  • @jeffmorse645
    @jeffmorse645 ปีที่แล้ว +14

    With the two elderly gentlemen making the walking sticks I had to pay close attention, but could understand them. Same with the last older man - no issues. The sheep shearers were almost impossible for this American to understand though. Could just catch a word here and there. I've been to Northern England, but never had any difficulty if I was standing in front of someone looking at them as they spoke. Those sheep guys though - wow!😮

    • @dragoncaeli
      @dragoncaeli 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +4

      Aye, well see I have the opposite - I understood it all, but the shearers were the easiest, after a childhood spent in the sheep pens in Northumberland XD

  • @chrisd5774
    @chrisd5774 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +8

    If you listen to Swedish/Danish/norse language, the lilt is the same, in the speech patterns.

  • @misterhamez
    @misterhamez ปีที่แล้ว +8

    as an aussie, i picked up maybe 4 words in total from those shearers. that was something else. i love videos like this

  • @1258-Eckhart
    @1258-Eckhart 2 ปีที่แล้ว +8

    The Google subtitling made a dog's dinner out of this.

  • @chrisstucker1813
    @chrisstucker1813 ปีที่แล้ว +4

    4:50 “we had a clipping gang we used to gan away with, gan away on the Monday and come back on the Saturday night. We’d kill a sheep and ya would have mutton for ya breakfast, mutton for ya bloody dinner, mutton for ya tea and mutton for ya supper. After aboot 3 days ya were nearly bleating!”

  • @uofapunk
    @uofapunk 2 ปีที่แล้ว +20

    As an American from Arizona I'm lost

    • @Rick-wk7hr
      @Rick-wk7hr 5 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      Lok😂

    • @StillAliveAndKicking_
      @StillAliveAndKicking_ 4 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

      As an Englishman from the midlands, so am I.

    • @rossco12
      @rossco12 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

      I'm from Northumberland and I'm lost too 😂

    • @rossco12
      @rossco12 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

      But I can say it is a beautiful accent and not this harsh anymore

  • @StillAliveAndKicking_
    @StillAliveAndKicking_ 4 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    I didn’t understand much. They speak fast like the rural French. Quite pleasant to hear though. Not keen on Bragg’s accent though, he has the condescending tone that was so common among the elite of that era.

  • @raymartin7172
    @raymartin7172 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    All gone. Even in Ashington the young ones just sounds like Newcastle Geordies

  • @NorthEastMick
    @NorthEastMick 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    People think Rothbury has a think Northumberland accent? Try going to Red Row and listen to some of the old fellas from there. Unless you’re local you’d be hard pushed to understand them.

  • @paulgerhard5170
    @paulgerhard5170 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Went straight for the comments

  • @celiabarrett2107
    @celiabarrett2107 ปีที่แล้ว

    Gan used in Carlisle and bait too. My dad used those words.

  • @johnmc3862
    @johnmc3862 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

    Melvyn Braggs voice would put me aslee

  • @swaneknoctic9555
    @swaneknoctic9555 2 ปีที่แล้ว +17

    The Northumberland accent is not to be confused with the Geordie accent.....Here man here man, ye ye, how man, how, howay then ye, ah nargh ah nargh - i'll batta ye ya little radgy.....

    • @darkwave9345
      @darkwave9345 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      and the point of you saything this what was exactly?

    • @swaneknoctic9555
      @swaneknoctic9555 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      @@darkwave9345 sorry, can you write this in English please?

    • @brettharter143
      @brettharter143 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      Not really.
      Both use the word gan
      Both use the words oot
      There is alot of crossover, i guess your not a geordie lol

    • @swaneknoctic9555
      @swaneknoctic9555 11 หลายเดือนก่อน

      @@brettharter143 I was being sarcastic, more like the 90s in Newcastle and it’s you’re not your.

  • @guywilliamallison688
    @guywilliamallison688 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    I am from there in Berwick and i can't understand them!

  • @jamesjackson7844
    @jamesjackson7844 หลายเดือนก่อน

    That’s when the BBC was the BBC.

  • @SusanGriffin-gd9ss
    @SusanGriffin-gd9ss 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Holy banana pudding!

  • @72vince27
    @72vince27 ปีที่แล้ว

    Very interesting

  • @minimaxi802
    @minimaxi802 2 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Isn't Northumberland just outside Newcastle so it will be similar to a Geordie accent, but not quite Scottish.

    • @blooter6360
      @blooter6360 2 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      This is about 40 miles north of Newcastle

    • @Subvenio
      @Subvenio ปีที่แล้ว

      Yes Northumberland borders Newcastle. Many Newcastle suburbs used to be part of Northumberland before they were incorporated into Newcastle. Although it’s rare to find strong accents like this anymore.

    • @chrisstucker1813
      @chrisstucker1813 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      They’re some similarities to Geordie for sure.

    • @MofosOfMetal
      @MofosOfMetal ปีที่แล้ว +1

      There's 65 miles between Newcastle and the Scottish border so there is a gradual shift as you go up, it's not like all of a sudden you go from Geordie to Scottish.

    • @Mick_Ts_Chick
      @Mick_Ts_Chick ปีที่แล้ว

      My cousin married a Geordie (we're from the US). He sounds a bit like this but not as broad an accent. I hear what sounds a tad Scottish too. A little mix but not exactly like either one.

  • @here_for_the_popcorn4474
    @here_for_the_popcorn4474 หลายเดือนก่อน

    I'm a proud Northumbrian from Ashington. This culture is what Britian is losing at a fast pace...

  • @petermcdermott3996
    @petermcdermott3996 ปีที่แล้ว

    and sometimes was taken for Welch. the -sheep, Blackfaced Cheviot?

  • @terryross1754
    @terryross1754 28 วันที่ผ่านมา

    I could understand it well and fine, - but not with that horrible vague soundtrack recording.

  • @NeglectedField
    @NeglectedField 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Dem sidies tho

  • @painfulsilence316
    @painfulsilence316 2 ปีที่แล้ว +214

    It makes me sad that the diversity of accents, language and culture seems to be homogenizing in many, if not all, parts of the world. World leaders in Thailand, China, Russia, Angola, etc. dress like American Presidents. We adjust our speech to sound like people in big cities we might never even visit. Things change and I know these accents and ways of life couldn't last forever, but it feels like we've gone from eating well-spiced curry to white bread with unsalted butter. It's all a bit blander than it used to be. It's not all bad, but it would have been nice to see the world before mass media.

    • @j0nnyism
      @j0nnyism 2 ปีที่แล้ว +16

      Had away an shite ye wanna gan up to Blythe like

    • @themadplotter
      @themadplotter 2 ปีที่แล้ว +18

      It’s because we now all have to communicate with many more people with different backgrounds because of the advances of transportation and communications. This farmer never had to zoom call with a major supplier, but that’s not uncommon now.

    • @s.a.l948
      @s.a.l948 2 ปีที่แล้ว +15

      I agree. Smaller, local accents and languages are beeing forgotten forever. I live in Sweden and most young people here wants to pretty much speak English all the time.

    • @themadplotter
      @themadplotter 2 ปีที่แล้ว +11

      I was just thinking about the time Paul McCartneys dad wanted it to be "she loves you yes yes yes" because "yeah" was an Americanism.

    • @snorter9783
      @snorter9783 ปีที่แล้ว +8

      Canada will lose its last Canadian Gaelic speakers within a decade or two. Dozens of indigenous languages are moribund with no L1 speakers under the age of 60. It’s terribly depressing. Any traditional social institution that can’t turn a profit is being discarded in favour of making our culture and society maximally economically efficient.

  • @Ant-Dj0nt
    @Ant-Dj0nt 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +55

    "Sometimes mistaken for Scottish, sometimes for Geordie" Yep, that was our life growing up. This video takes me back!

    • @CuFhoirthe88
      @CuFhoirthe88 3 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      I grew up where the central Scottish dialect was dominant. I percieve it as closer to Welsh accents. Which makes sense it's further south in Yr Hen Ogledd than us. Am I making any sense?

    • @Geordielass1978
      @Geordielass1978 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

      @CuFhoirthe88 - As a Geordie (technically Northumbrian, but from the southern part (Morpeth) which sounds more Geordie, and with actual Tynesider parents) who has lived away from the region for many years, I had to tone the accent down (and speak more slowly) when I needed to be understood, and that led to me being asked a few times if I was Welsh, so I can get why this softer dialect could easily sound a little Welsh.

    • @Shinathen
      @Shinathen หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      @@Geordielass1978we do not have an accent anymore in morpeth, if you listen to how all the school kids talk they all have a generic English accent

    • @Geordielass1978
      @Geordielass1978 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      @@Shinathen Really? I haven't lived there for 30 years (moved away because of my dad's work in my early teens) but we definitely had an accent back then. What a shame the kids are losing it. I have to admit I looked at Morpeth house prices a few years back when I was looking at moving back to the NE and quickly ruled it out as unaffordable, so is the accentlessness a gentrification thing?

    • @Shinathen
      @Shinathen หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      @@Geordielass1978 I’m sure because you lived here 30 years ago you must of been aware of the fact that the A1 was originally within morpeth, and because of that people travelling through the A1 saw Morpeth. So for instance southerners travelling north for holidays and thinking Morpeth was a pretty town and they decide to live there. That is why we don’t have an accent anymore, basically. And those families who had kids and raised them in morpeth obtained their parents accents and influenced other school kids accents. Nowerdays you usually get the same accent between everyone, with a few variations of some people. But sadly it’s so engraved to speak ‘properly’ in Morpeth now that it’s impossible to gain an accent or else you’d be ridiculed. In high school i said ‘bal’ for a ball and got told I’m stupid and should speak correctly. I see no future for an accent in morpeth and we are now mainly only southerners

  • @christopherscott2114
    @christopherscott2114 4 หลายเดือนก่อน +14

    1min 10 seconds in,is Ken armstrong (with large side burns) a true northumbrian,first met him in 1985 when i started as an apprentice mechanic at an Alnwick garage,he was a fence contractor working on some of the most remote farmland in northumberland,he was one of the funniest men i ever met, he had us all in stitches when he used to call into the garage for repair work,he worked in all weather on the cheviot hills a proper grafting canny man !

  • @froggy8030
    @froggy8030 2 ปีที่แล้ว +54

    I'm Scottish and what they are saying makes total sense to me.

    • @connorsmith1797
      @connorsmith1797 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      Aye ahd say we are more Scottish than English

    • @3xx948
      @3xx948 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +14

      Scots and Northumbrian dialect share the same root

    • @brettharter143
      @brettharter143 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +6

      Of course we can understand scots too the border is only a few miles away lol

    • @Leenufc
      @Leenufc 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      As a geordie same

    • @TheGrmany69
      @TheGrmany69 5 หลายเดือนก่อน

      It's because it's anglicized Manx.

  • @froggy8030
    @froggy8030 2 ปีที่แล้ว +31

    In fact being from the South West of Scotland. Weirdly often Northern English accents from that coast seem to be more on par with us and those in the North and East of Scotland. Than the dialects from the mid regions of Scotland like Ayrshire, Glasgow etc. Who are seen as the benchmark of Scots-ness but are barely the tip of the Country's dialects. I mean the guy doing the Northumberland poetry if you compared it to Burns Scots, there are many kinships. I think it proves that especially in working class culture between Northern English and Scotland as people we aren't so different after all.

    • @borderlands6606
      @borderlands6606 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      We're a' Jock Tamson's bairns, and hope to stay so.

    • @chrisstucker1813
      @chrisstucker1813 ปีที่แล้ว +7

      Kingdom of Northumbria went as far north as Edinburgh

    • @Norse-Gael
      @Norse-Gael ปีที่แล้ว +5

      The Danes that is why! The word bairn is not Gaelic. It is old Norse.

    • @JohnKobaRuddy
      @JohnKobaRuddy 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      ​​@@Norse-Gaelwe also have many german words. There is a nice video on TH-cam of a German professor talking about the Geordie accent and its origins.

    • @memofromessex
      @memofromessex 8 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      Aye, Scottish accents are weird. I knew of some crofter from Outer Hebrides spoke very clearly - but then you go to Glasgow and it takes some time to understand - for both of us! I remember trying to speak in my Essex-accent (not Estuary English, more Cockney) and flattening 'o's and not saying my 'h's' and we confused each other!

  • @blooter6360
    @blooter6360 2 ปีที่แล้ว +38

    Brilliant as a proud Northumbrian
    This is class !

  • @MofosOfMetal
    @MofosOfMetal ปีที่แล้ว +30

    I'm from mid-Northumberland, along the coast, and it's a shame that this accent is fading away.
    You can hear a remarkable difference between older generations and younger ones - young people tend to sound more homogenized and Geordie-fied.
    Whereas older generations were more like this - especially in the land between Rothbury and Wooler.
    It's a wonderful accent to hear - and it's a shame that people get the narrow-minded impression that these farmers lack intelligence - listen to what they say and you'll realize how sharp their wit really is!
    I love Geordie and love Scots - but that special unique Northumbrian accent is getting lost generation by generation - I'm glad this video preserves it, and I hope young people make a conscious effort to keep it up too!

    • @connorsmith1797
      @connorsmith1797 ปีที่แล้ว +9

      Aye I hate it inal, am frurm Northumberland and nae wun nahs how te speak proper Northumbrian. Am also a teacher and get told to speak properly. Nah Al keep me dialect and speak how the people of where ah teach and live should tahk

    • @Lat265
      @Lat265 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@connorsmith1797 Speak the Queens English!!!!

    • @Tinker1950
      @Tinker1950 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +3

      ​@@Lat265 Don't you mean, 'the King's'. ☺️

    • @JohnKobaRuddy
      @JohnKobaRuddy 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      Many people around the North Tyneside area now sound like Mackems. It's only Gateshead where geordie exists in large numbers.

    • @Zultzify
      @Zultzify 10 หลายเดือนก่อน

      ppl are quick to cast judgement, but a lot of those they think theyre smarter than have skills and knowledge rarely gained today.

  • @philipusher4282
    @philipusher4282 10 หลายเดือนก่อน +15

    In parts of the clip, it's not the dialect, it's the speed of their delivery that makes it slightly hard to hear every word. I find part of being able to understand an unfamiliar accent is reading people's lips as you follow the sounds they make. The man talking about the walking sticks is easy to understand, for instance as he is speaking slowly. Loved the story about eating mutton for every meal and bleating at the end of the day. Disclaimer: am originally from the North East so maybe have a slight advantage.

  • @paulaparker9577
    @paulaparker9577 ปีที่แล้ว +48

    This filled my heart so much. It was like been back around my granda all over again. The broadness from our accent has been lost and I'm so devastated.

    • @dragoncaeli
      @dragoncaeli 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +3

      Yeah, to me it takes me right back to the sheep pens and helping out with shearing with my neighbours

    • @KD400_
      @KD400_ 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      The men have to maintain their culture if not everything gets lost

    • @minnroo
      @minnroo 5 หลายเดือนก่อน +6

      My family on both sides are from and still live in Northumberland, whereas I live in Cambridge. When I see my relatives they always joke that I sound posh because I lost my accent when moving away from Northumberland as a child. I miss living up north. 😌

  • @micky8127
    @micky8127 ปีที่แล้ว +15

    Love seeing my Great Grandad on this and his son Robert.

  • @jaybenton7716
    @jaybenton7716 2 ปีที่แล้ว +21

    I divern't na wa' they're tarking aboot.

    • @smile768
      @smile768 2 ปีที่แล้ว +4

      There's a translate to English underneath your comment! Google doesn't realise that it is very good old English!

    • @emmanoble5498
      @emmanoble5498 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      Haddaway man!
      He just telt ye.
      I nivvor really knae, either mind.
      The pit taak cannit be aal ower. Can it?

    • @tomwilkinson392
      @tomwilkinson392 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

      @@emmanoble5498 Nur, hinney. Sum o’ wu still taalk like that, like😀.

  • @emmanoble5498
    @emmanoble5498 2 ปีที่แล้ว +24

    My Granda and Gma moved to Australia
    From Morpeth and Ashington after the pit closed in the 70s.
    I've only just discovered how much their accents & dialect they spoke is so localized and dying oot.
    Keeping it alive here
    on the other side of the 🌎
    "Hoy that pinny owa here, it's on the cheble.I'm gaan byek a cyek"
    " I bloody teld ye ! Div'ent clart.
    Haaway man. Div'ent ye bowk mind, or I'll bloody brain yeh."

    • @blooter6360
      @blooter6360 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      Aye that’s propa pit matic crack that

    • @bethanywilson2101
      @bethanywilson2101 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      I was born in the old hospital (Ashington), lived in Morpeth as a child, then now married, and I'm trying to immigrate to america to be with my husband. A lot of Americans think I'm scottish, lol it's just an accident. I don't think they hear very much with it being the mid west of usa (Iowa). I will never get rid of my accident as proud of where I have come from. This makes me so happy to listen to this video. Hearing my dialect can't wait to visit back home like proper miss me sausage rolls and the lovely countryside! ❤

    • @blooter6360
      @blooter6360 ปีที่แล้ว

      @@bethanywilson2101 brilliant !

    • @celiabarrett2107
      @celiabarrett2107 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      Hoy meamss to throw right? Bowk means to vomit? These words I remember from growing up in Carlisle.

    • @JohnHonda101
      @JohnHonda101 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +3

      Ask ya Grandfatha aboot a Scullery, he should still say things like, Berb (Bob) Jern (John) and Derg (Dog)

  • @timhawkins1493
    @timhawkins1493 2 ปีที่แล้ว +23

    North-Westerner here. Not far from Liverpool. This isn't too tricky to understand but I've got an interest in some of the more unique accents of the UK. Northumberland has something special about it in general. Unlike anywhere else in the country.

    • @chrisstucker1813
      @chrisstucker1813 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      It really is a beautiful place, so much land has remained untouched and is bustling with history . God’s land

    • @benfisher1376
      @benfisher1376 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      I love English accents.

  • @northumberlandjo1666
    @northumberlandjo1666 ปีที่แล้ว +9

    I am born & breed Northumberland & understand everything they say. We would call it pitmatic. But the way these men speak is dying out, which is a shame.

  • @rskb1957
    @rskb1957 2 ปีที่แล้ว +55

    This is how my grandparents spoke to each other although with more of the dialect words thrown in. My grandfather was born in 1904 on a farm outside Morpeth and my grandmother was from Belsay. The shearers were harder to follow but the others not so. It's the speed of the speech that makes it hard to follow and you need to be in practice. Sadly, my grandparents are long dead but it's how they sound in my memory. It's always surprised me that people think it sounds like the Scottish accent. My mother's cousin was born on a farm opposite Holy Island and his accent was ever so slightly different; softer but still with the distinctive rolled 'R'.
    As for the Northumbrian 'R' the true test is if someone can say 'Rothbury' with the 'R' rolled in the back of the mouth near the ulvular. As for speed, it is fast, although it may be to do with the shortness of the words.

    • @janetgraham-russell4476
      @janetgraham-russell4476 2 ปีที่แล้ว +4

      My family are from east coast Northumberland. It has changed so much.

    • @emmanoble5498
      @emmanoble5498 2 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      Is there sometimes a bit of a whistle In pronouncing some words? or was that just my grandad?

    • @borderlands6606
      @borderlands6606 2 ปีที่แล้ว +4

      It has been said that one of the Northumbrian rulers was short-tongued (ankyloglossia), and to gain courtly favour it became fashionable to speak with a restricted R sound. This is probably apocryphal but who knows.

    • @jasperD33
      @jasperD33 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      So weird to find people in a comment section from Morpeth. We’re from pegswood!

    • @1paultay
      @1paultay ปีที่แล้ว +3

      @@emmanoble5498 My Gran from Oakwood north of Hexham did just that

  • @OscillatorCollective
    @OscillatorCollective 2 ปีที่แล้ว +75

    Wow, I’m familiar with a lot of British accents…but wow, this one blows me away.
    It’s so cool that a place as small as the British isles can have so much diversity of language, and it actually be the same language. (I’m from Texas by the way, with British ancestry).

    • @matthew-dq8vk
      @matthew-dq8vk 2 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      Kind of weird a Yank is fetishizing our country.

    • @OscillatorCollective
      @OscillatorCollective 2 ปีที่แล้ว +16

      @@matthew-dq8vk far from from being a “Yank”… I’m only second generation American, and I’m southern.

    • @borderlands6606
      @borderlands6606 2 ปีที่แล้ว +6

      The trend is for city accents to take over the surrounding area, and this has accelerated in the past few decades. TV and inward migration have also diluted many accents, which could often be narrowed down to an individual town. For example a 1970s murder case involved an audio tape (which turned out to be a hoax), and the perpetrator was tracked down to a specific area of a town by the way he spoke. The Home Counties (commuter counties surrounding London) had their individual accents, none of which resembled cockney, estuary English or received pronunciation, and these have all but vanished in the last 30 years.

    • @thedemongodvlogs7671
      @thedemongodvlogs7671 ปีที่แล้ว +13

      @@OscillatorCollective In North America yank mean New Yorker, but in everywhere else in the english speaking world yank just means American. Also you can have British ancestry, but being a 2nd gen (presumably sole citizenship) American means you are an American.

    • @chrisstucker1813
      @chrisstucker1813 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      This is a very old English dialect - probably the oldest to exist today. Quite remarkable that it has remained so untouched for so long; we’re talking over a thousand years.

  • @NicUsher
    @NicUsher 2 ปีที่แล้ว +19

    I'm from Sydney and grew up in NZ. I understood the shearers.

    • @NR-st2pr
      @NR-st2pr 2 ปีที่แล้ว +5

      Maybe's they spent three months shearing the NZ flocks:)
      We used to get the lads from your part of the world up here at shearing time till quite recently

    • @berlinocelot
      @berlinocelot 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      @@NR-st2pr I'm from the UK and I got about 10% of it. Something about sheep, right?

  • @johng1216
    @johng1216 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    It's half not known the language and half the speed that are talking at. Apart from that it's Geordie.

  • @videogamebookreviews
    @videogamebookreviews 2 ปีที่แล้ว +15

    If you click the auto-generated subtitles on, you'll see it's not just humans who can have a tough time making out certain words. :-)

    • @benji.B-side
      @benji.B-side ปีที่แล้ว +1

      One line was "Soft ass baptized flavor, it was' WTF? 😅

    • @benmaharaj6854
      @benmaharaj6854 ปีที่แล้ว

      It got at least some of it right. It wasn't until I turned it on that I realized they really were speaking English and I could half follow their words 🤔

  • @OffGridInvestor
    @OffGridInvestor 10 หลายเดือนก่อน +3

    Nice to see the border collie there. The dog of the region. My family originated from down south. Crazy thing is in my area in Australia, MOST FAMILIES come from the same area. There's a family down the hill from me that we were friends with IN ENGLAND for generations.

  • @jdm65
    @jdm65 2 ปีที่แล้ว +9

    Very good. And a moment of appreciation for Mr Bragg's green period, with maximum respect for the velvet jacket. Nice.

  • @iainhardy1312
    @iainhardy1312 8 หลายเดือนก่อน +3

    That is my relative in the video the gentleman smoking is my great grandfather

  • @Geeraffe
    @Geeraffe 4 หลายเดือนก่อน +4

    Brings back memories of working in Wooler and Belford in the 80s thank you 👍

  • @leedobson
    @leedobson 4 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    A lad from Bedlington was in the swimming baths, he saw a nice looking lass and asked "do ye come here often" ?
    She said "eee are yee flirting" ?
    "naa burth me feets touchin the bottom"

  • @Geordielass1978
    @Geordielass1978 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    I know I've lived away from Northumberland too long when I really had to concentrate hard to understand that. 😞

  • @rgarlinyc
    @rgarlinyc 2 ปีที่แล้ว +6

    "Muttin' fer yor BREKkus, muttin' fer your lun', muttin' fer your tee an' muttin' fer yor SUPPah."
    That was the only sentence I understood, until the linguist explained more at the end.👏🏻😀

    • @chrisstucker1813
      @chrisstucker1813 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      What he said afterwards was “by the end of the third day you were nearly bleating!”

  • @1magnit
    @1magnit 2 ปีที่แล้ว +8

    My grandads family were farmers in Teesdale, the accent isn't far off.

  • @johno4521
    @johno4521 2 ปีที่แล้ว +30

    They wrongly refer to it as an accent; it's a dialect.

    • @rskb1957
      @rskb1957 2 ปีที่แล้ว +3

      Indeed, my Northumbrian grandparents always refered to it as a 'dialect'.

    • @ryfr6711
      @ryfr6711 2 ปีที่แล้ว +1

      Is it not both?

    • @Gadavillers-Panoir
      @Gadavillers-Panoir ปีที่แล้ว

      @@ryfr6711 if this is anything like Scots then it’d be written using a different set of words than standard English (Scots is spelled differently to English). The standard English dictionaries wont apply here hence it cant be an accent of English but a dialect if not a distinct language.

    • @ppppppqqqppp
      @ppppppqqqppp ปีที่แล้ว

      it's a bit of both, I grew up in Stockton and we use a lot of the same words, but our accents are a bit different
      so the dialect does have a few accents to it.

    • @bastianodimebag
      @bastianodimebag 11 หลายเดือนก่อน

      ​@@ryfr6711dialect means regional variant. The accent is the intonation.

  • @JimJim-kh8rw
    @JimJim-kh8rw 2 ปีที่แล้ว +7

    This is how the police caught and located the Yorkshire ripper hoaxer by their accent.

    • @borderlands6606
      @borderlands6606 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      @@Tom-uv7ry The point is the police isolated his exact location on Wearside from his accent.

  • @rustledjammies8769
    @rustledjammies8769 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    The Northumberland shearers at the start sound like a Mix of Geordie, Scottish and Irish. The man being interviewed sounds Irish when he does the pronunciations. Northumbrian, Scottish (including Scots) and Hibernic (Hiberno and Ulster Scots) varieties of English all share similar vocabulary, but it seems that pronunciation is also a factor too. I've noticed that many Hebrideans sound very Irish, but this might be a migration thing, such as Manx and North Wales people tend to have mishmash accents of Northern England, Scotland and Ulster.

  • @weebrianful
    @weebrianful 10 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    I'm Scottish. That's quite easy

  • @jamesmoore4397
    @jamesmoore4397 5 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    I don't know how but I understood every word...

  • @janetgraham-russell4476
    @janetgraham-russell4476 3 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    I've always lived on Tyneside, but my family is from Northumberland. I only just followed.

  • @philipscott2025
    @philipscott2025 2 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    This is the accent of the border reviers both side of the borders.

  • @Lyingleyen
    @Lyingleyen 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    Absolutely awesome!!! One of my relatives was from Northumbria, although she moved to work in West London after going to Corden Bleu School of Catering in Paris. That must have been a real culture shock for her!!!

  • @UncleNewy1
    @UncleNewy1 3 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Yorkshireman here, born in 70.
    I had to slow it down to .75 but then I could pretty much understand 90% of it.

  • @kipp1231
    @kipp1231 5 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    I'm a broad speaking Geordie and this sounds like going to my nans house in the 80s.
    I had no problem whatsoever understanding their gib.
    There's something homely and welcoming about those great accents.

  • @JaneSmith-y5c
    @JaneSmith-y5c 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    We used to go out there with our parents in the 60s and 70s into the utter wilds, some of the best parts of the UK, no one around, only sheep and our father would us of the even older language, never mind dialect if we left Northumberland and went to the North York moors- the old Celtic language to count the sheep preserved even then from our Celtic forefathers - Yan tan tether mether pip. All these decades later despite speaking standard English at home even the 1960s I can understand everything the shepherds said.

  • @dawnguy842
    @dawnguy842 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    I'm Scottish and my neighbour is a Northumbrian, this accent is probably the most Scottish "English" accent there is

  • @JohnKobaRuddy
    @JohnKobaRuddy 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +3

    Theirs still a few people near me with the auld Northumbrian burr.

    • @MofosOfMetal
      @MofosOfMetal 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      How old are they and what are of Northumberland are they from? I'd good to hear it's not extinct yet!

  • @wuwie83GT
    @wuwie83GT 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    Real men,great men hail hail

  • @SteveM-ly7oy
    @SteveM-ly7oy 10 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    I'm from Hampshire, and I can't understand a thing they're saying.

  • @FrithonaHrududu02127
    @FrithonaHrududu02127 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    To be honest i had an easier time understanding the sheep. Seriously though even though as an American I only understand one word of five I love how it sounds.

  • @peteratkinson922
    @peteratkinson922 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    My next door neighbour from back in the sixties onwards must have been from this neck of the woods. He rolled his rs and the rreest.

  • @mollysmith1748
    @mollysmith1748 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    My great grandad and uncle are in this video

  • @Peepsuk1234
    @Peepsuk1234 2 ปีที่แล้ว +15

    My grandad moved to Tyneside after serving in the Army during the war. Met my Grandma in the Army and they moved to south Tyneside. I remember him saying that he got a job in the pit and it was like having to learn a new language. Other grandparents born in Northumberland and talked much like the people in this video. Takes me back to being a bairn.

    • @froggy8030
      @froggy8030 2 ปีที่แล้ว

      Bairn, A word people from certain areas of Scotland use instead of Wean, which is more prominent in the mid and west.

    • @AethelwulfOfNordHymbraLand2333
      @AethelwulfOfNordHymbraLand2333 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

      'Bairn' is an Old Norse borrowing. It's not native to the Northumbrian dialect. Understand that Northumbrian has hardly even been influenced by Standard English never mind other languages.

  • @edwardmiessner6502
    @edwardmiessner6502 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    I'm better able to understand this Northumberland accent than I can understand the Okracoke-Tangier-Smith Islands accent. Their ancestors came from the UK's English South-West, I have learned. And I live across the pond!

  • @roy_for_real2674
    @roy_for_real2674 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Sounds very Dutch and French.

  • @hanifleylabi8071
    @hanifleylabi8071 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Id love to know if some of those younger ones are still around and how they talk now

  • @petercannon6906
    @petercannon6906 5 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Superb photography. Me Nan Was from East Bolden. I'm London. I get it.

  • @xxjoeyladxx
    @xxjoeyladxx 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Definitely where a lot of American accents came from

  • @chrisnewman7281
    @chrisnewman7281 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    The accents too thick for me to follow I pick up about half of it.

  • @andyturnbullguitarteacher
    @andyturnbullguitarteacher 3 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Loved this. Proud geordie here

  • @lornaburgess9762
    @lornaburgess9762 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +2

    I'm from Seghill, pitmans doughter and proud of it man.

    • @AcerJones21
      @AcerJones21 5 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      Just saw this! My ancestors (also pitmen) were from Seghill. I was watching this trying to see how much I could understand. My grandmother could apparently put on the accent, but I never knew her (and we are down South now). We have photographs of her grandfather with his fancy waistcoat, pocket watch and so on. It blew my mind when I finally realised that Mr Fancy Coat must have talked with a thick Geordie accent.

  • @steveforster9764
    @steveforster9764 ปีที่แล้ว +2

    Been a Northumberland born (Newbiggin by the Sea) lad living in Canada for 23 years I struggled to understand this

    • @JohnHonda101
      @JohnHonda101 9 หลายเดือนก่อน

      I've drank many pints in the Central Clurd and Ship. Gets canny windy at Church Point in the winta mind.

  • @BCH-hy4gp
    @BCH-hy4gp 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    I feel like this is what English sounds like to non-English speakers

  • @AethelwulfOfNordHymbraLand2333
    @AethelwulfOfNordHymbraLand2333 3 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    It sounds extremely West Germanic.

  • @davidkemp4212
    @davidkemp4212 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Whey man that was champion Born a Geordie but holidaying on a farm in north Northumberland regularly aa understodd ivvory word. The nearest dialect to Old English in the English speaking world . We haven't moved away from proper English pronunciation, it's

  • @cb4883
    @cb4883 10 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    HAS MELVIN BRAGG NOT DONE THE CUMBRIAN ACCENT WITH HIM BEING CUMBRIAN AND FROM WIGTON

  • @inkedbhudda85
    @inkedbhudda85 2 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    I understood every word that was spoken

    • @NorthEastMick
      @NorthEastMick 7 หลายเดือนก่อน

      Same here. Crystal clear.

  • @jamalcayman589
    @jamalcayman589 6 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    The last man sounded almost a bit New York.

  • @JohnHonda101
    @JohnHonda101 9 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    Little known fact: Melvyn Bragg used to do the Vicks Sinus Inhaler voice overs.

  • @SuperJal1979
    @SuperJal1979 2 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    I'm from county Durham and had to listen very closely to understand.

    • @darkwave9345
      @darkwave9345 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

      thats because you speak mackem....the devils tongue

    • @Biggles2666
      @Biggles2666 2 ปีที่แล้ว

      @@darkwave9345 true.

    • @dunelmian-slinger
      @dunelmian-slinger ปีที่แล้ว +1

      I'm from County Durham, the accent is different to ours but the dialect words they use are practically the same. Though it depends on where ye're from, the dialect south o Blackhall is mair wattered-down.

    • @JohnHonda101
      @JohnHonda101 7 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

      Skewl (School) Bwoook (book) Rwlerr (ruler) (You tak em, we'll mak em)

    • @EtherealSunset
      @EtherealSunset 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

      ​@@darkwave9345Mackems don't sound the same as the rest of County Durham. I'm south County Durham and understood pretty much everything that was said in this. I guess age and where exactly you grew up makes a difference.

  • @JohnHonda101
    @JohnHonda101 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

    A divint na wot yees are tarking aboot not understandin them gadgies, it would have been good if they'd had a chebble to sit at when they had their bait.

  • @jibjab351
    @jibjab351 2 ปีที่แล้ว +3

    Its that bloke off Alan Partridge

  • @lewishealey713
    @lewishealey713 2 ปีที่แล้ว +4

    I understand the sheep more than them

  • @brad349miller
    @brad349miller 5 วันที่ผ่านมา

    England does a hell of a good job at suppressing knowledge of these people. You ask about Northern England and they give you information about the lower top third. Rather ashamed are you?

  • @Norse-Gael
    @Norse-Gael ปีที่แล้ว +1

    My Clark family from South Ronaldsay Orkney and The Scottish Highlands were Shepards.

  • @richardmullins1883
    @richardmullins1883 ปีที่แล้ว +1

    Reminds me of Michael Palin's Gumby character LOL

  • @VintageLifeCars
    @VintageLifeCars 2 ปีที่แล้ว +2

    Just listen at the intelligence of these people, and tell me dumbing down isn't real.

  • @DanielMyles-d1y
    @DanielMyles-d1y 11 หลายเดือนก่อน +1

    This sounds very Celtic to me

  • @notmissingout9369
    @notmissingout9369 ปีที่แล้ว +5

    I’m a Yorkshire lad and I go up to amble on holiday when I can I love the Northumberland delict and folk up there like my accent also you should head to upper swaledale if like accents

    • @AethelwulfOfNordHymbraLand2333
      @AethelwulfOfNordHymbraLand2333 3 หลายเดือนก่อน

      The Yorkshire accent, like all English accents subject to the Standard English received pronunciation(except Northumbrian), sounds awful.