Hastings Dialect

In the Sussex Archaeological Collections Vol. 14 (1863), Alderman James Rock Jun. gave the following examples of the possibly unique 'Hastings Vernacular';

"...it may not be out of place here to mention a few peculiarities which I have noticed in the language of the ‘natives,’ I mean more especially the seafaring part of the population.

One is the general use of the ‘v’ for ‘w,’ another is the use of ‘d’ for ‘th.’ The following examples were probably fabricated by “young Hastings” in ridicule of its progenitors, but are nevertheless true specimens of the vernacular.

“Vill Vhite an’ I vent to Vinchelsea, and de horse vood vaak; ve kep on vip, vip, vip, but the horse vood vaak; last ov all, he vaaks agin a vaall and breaks a vinder.”

“Var b’ze gwain?” “To de Vite Rock, vill you goo?” “No I vaunt.” “Vy vaunt ye?” “Cos I vaunt, and dat’s vy.”

I do not remember to have seen the word “Queeve” in any vocabulary; I have heard it several times in Hastings. It seems to mean to twist or cant. A boy playing at marbles will say to his antagonist don’t queeve,” meaning I suppose, some peculiar twist of the wrist not quite in accordance with the laws of the game. Again, when the ‘Great Eastern’ stuck fast on the ways by getting across them while being launched, Theard a Hastings man say, “They'd have got her off all right if she hadn’t queeved.”

‘When a carpenter finds a board warped in drying, he says it is “shawled.”

‘A man who has got rid of something that he thinks he is better without than with, says he has got “shet” (shot) of it.

To “holl” is to throw: I heard the word used thus not long since in the Hastings Town Hall—"I holl’d him down in the grass.”

The letter ‘a’ is pronounced ‘aa’ or ‘ah,’ as in French. Law is ‘laa,’ shaw (a small wood) is ‘sha.’ Boys used to say when I was a boy too, “ A Gringer daa (daw) is worth a haapenny more den a Castle daa,” — being the jackdaw which haunts that portion of the cliffs eastward of the town, known as “Gringer;” a place where at some former time, before the sea had eaten away so much of the shore, there probably was a village or hamlet.

A curious misapplication of a word is in common use at Hastings. When a gale rises,suddenly from south or south-west, of limited area, and lasting only a few hours, it is called a “planet.” Such gales frequently follow a thunderstorm on this coast. I think the same word is used to denote the pillary clouds which rise in the south-west some hours or days before the gale actually arrives. It is a common saying among the fishermen, “ Ven de planets poke up in-de vess-vard, and the clouds come up agin de vind, it’s sure to raain.”

‘A few words of French origin are in use among the fishermen, derived probably from intercourse with French fishermen at sea, or in smuggling. “Boco” (beaucoup) is a word in common use thus, “ Dere’s boco’s of feesh dis morning.” Sometimes it is “Boco de feesh.” “Frapper,” to strike or beat, is also used: one boy will say to another “ I'll frap you.” I have met with several fishermen who had a considerable knowledge of French, acquired, as I was told, in French prisons in the old war time."

The Hastings of my earliest recollections, nearly forty years since, was a very different place from the Hastings of the present day. George Street, now near the centre of the old town, was then called the suburbs, and there were few houses westward of the castle cliffs, which at that time overhung the road where Breeds Place now stands. The character and language of the population have changed with the external appearance and extent of the town, speaking of it as a whole, but All Saints Street, Bourne Street, and nearly the whole of the old town, are but little altered, and their inhabitants remain almost unchanged, either in speech or habits, The language of the native Hastinger is full-mouthed, and not very intelligible to the stranger. It has little refinement about it, either in style or pronunciation, as may be inferred from the specimens which I have given, but it is generally forcible and expressive, and possesses a rude manliness of character, which I prefer to the less rugged, but more finnikin, provincialisms which are to be found within 100 miles both eastward and westward.

I have not observed here any tendency to the use of the ‘a‘ for ‘o,’ thus, ‘marning,’ ‘farty,’ for, morning and forty; as is done in the western part of the county, and still more in Hampshire, nor any approach to the ‘tip-tongue’ pronunciation of the Eastern Counties"