Stoke-on-Trent - Dialect

Dialect

The Potteries has a distinctive local dialect. Whilst it contains many non-standard words (e.g. nesh meaning “soft, tender, or to easily get cold”; and slat meaning “to throw”), the best known word is duck, which is used as a greeting to either men or women. It is believed to be derived from the Saxon word ducas, used to indicate respect; in Middle English this became duc or duk, which denotes a leader; in turn, it became the title Duke and the Old French word ducheé, which indicates the territory ruled by a Duke.

Another common variation on the standard English dialect is the use of the word shug for sugar. This is usually used as a term of endearment when closing a sentence, as in “Ta Shug” (thank you, sugar).

A local cartoon called May un Mar Lady, published in the newspaper The Sentinel and written in Potteries dialect, first appeared on 8 July 1986 and ran for over 20 years. Since the death of cartoonist Dave Follows in 2003, the full twenty-year run (7,000) of May un Mar Lady strips are being republished in The Sentinel as May un Mar Lady Revisited, keeping the dialect alive for another twenty years.

Alan Povey's Owd Grandad Piggott stories which have aired on BBC Radio Stoke for a number of years are recited in the Potteries dialect by the author.