Doon thu flouw funny floi wid be more correct. Try gaan tae Shetland fur a few days tae maak yur spikkan broader than Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device -----Original Message----- From: James Thompson <[email protected]> Date: Mon, 27 Aug 2007 05:01:35 To:[email protected] Subject: Re: [ORCADIA] How now Scapa Flow? In 22 years of coming to Orkney, I've never heard it rhymed with how, whether as part of Scape Flow or just as the Flow. Jim --------------------------------------------- This message was sent using the UIA Web Mail Server. ULTIMATE Internet Access, Inc http://www.uia.net/ ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message

Well, it originates from Old Norse "flói" (such as today's Faxaflói). There's an interesting entry about the word in Etymological Dictionary of Shetland Norn: flo - 1) the sea (tabu); 2) swampy place, morass, Ork. flow (floe) occasionally denotes a) (orig) a wide mouth of a firth or widening of a bay, a sea-basin, as in "Scapa Flow"; b) occas. a bog; morass. "flow (occas. floe)" is found in Eng. dial. and in Low Scots in the sense of "bog, morass", but sense 1 of Shetl. 'flo' and Ork. 'flow (floe)' indicate tha tthe word is originally Shetl. and Ork. Norn. < Old Norse flói. <...> "*fluu" ought to have been the development in Shetl., but the Shetl. form of pronunc. (floo) has doubtless been influenced by Ork. and L.Sc. flow, floe. So it means the "flow" version is more original. Hence I wonder where the pronunciation "flow = how" comes from, could it be a consequence of a wrong spelling influenced by the words like "how, now" etc., i.e. something that wouldn't have been possible without the written language? Andrei 2007/8/27, Charles Tait <[email protected]>: > > Doon thu flouw funny floi wid be more correct. Try gaan tae Shetland fur a > few days tae maak yur spikkan broader than > Sent from my BlackBerry(r) wireless device > >