List of Cornish dialect words

A

• Abroad – *Abroad – 1. open: en-cornu 2. in pieces: en-cornu
• Addled – 1. spoilt, rotten 2. empty, cracked or broken; e.g. en-cornu
• Ager – ugly
• Agerever – pollack
• Aglets – hawthorn berries
• Agone – ago; as in 'a week agone'
• Airymouse - a bat
• Ake – a groove made on the stone of a killick
• All-overish – slightly out of sorts, nervous
• Allycumpooster - all right
• Ancient - to describe someone who is a real character, "he's an ancient man".
• Anker - a small barrel
• Ansome - lovely ; Me ansome
• Anvon - a hard stone on which large stones are broken )
• Areah, Arear, Aree faa - an exclamation of surprise
• Arish - arable field
• Arish mow – a stack of sheaves
• Are 'em – aren't they
• Awn – a cove / haven
• Aye? – I beg your pardon?; Yes? What was that?
• Ayes – yes. Perhaps from Old Norse ei + Old English sī, like "yes". Alternatively, a modification of "aye" based on "yes". Further, possibly a conflation of any of the previous, and "ess", which may represent a dialectal form of "yes".

  B

• Backalong – in former times
• Backsyfore – the wrong side first
• Bal – a mine
• Bal maiden – a woman working at a mine, at smashing ore &c.
• Ball – a pest, used figuratively
• Bamfer – to worry, harass, or torment
• Bamfoozle – deceive, confuse, especially by trickery
• Bannal – the broom plant
• Barker – a whetstone
• Begrumpled – displeased, affronted
• Belong – 1. live or work – "where do 'ee belong to" 2. denotes habit or custom – "she belong to go shopping Fridays"
• Belving – load roaring/bellowing especially by a cow
• Berrin – funeral
• Better fit/better way – it would be better if...
• Bettle – mallet
• Betwattled – confused, bewildered
• Big-pattern – a show-off, "big-pattern he is"
• Big-sea – rough sea / swell
• Bilders – cow parsley
• Bimper – a peeping tom
• Biskan – a finger-stall
• Bits – spinach-beet, green beet-leaves, Chard
• Black-Annie – a black backed gull
• Bladder – blister
• Bleddy – local pronunciation of 'bloody' as an emphasising adjective
• Blowed – surprised "well I'm blowed"
• Bobber lip – bruised and swollen lip
• Brake – thicket / rough woodland
• Borbas – a rockling
• Bothel – a blister
• Bothack – the bib, or pouting
• Bothack – a hunchback
• Boughten – bought
• Bowjy – a cattle-house
• Brae / brer – quite a lot
• Brandis – trivet
• Brave – much/many
• Breal – a mackerel
• Brink – the gills of a fish
• Brock – a badger, from
• Browjans – small fragments
• Browse – undergrowth
• Browse – pulped bait
• Broze – a blaze, a great heat
• Brummal Mow – an arish mow of domed form
• Bruyans, Brewions – crumbs, fragments
• Bucca – an imp, hobgoblin, scarecrow
• Buddy – a cluster, a clump
• Buffon – a bruise
• Buldering – threatening, thundery, sultry
• Bulgranack – the smooth blenny
• Bulorn – a snail
• Bully – large pebble
• Bulugen – an earthworm
• Bun-fight – the wake after a funeral
• Bunny - a bunch of ore, an unusual concentration of ore
• Burd – bud as in "buddy"
• Burgam – a jocular term of reproach
• Burn – a load, as much turf, furze, etc., as one can carry; of hake or pollack, twenty-one fish.
• Burrow – heap of mining related waste, but sometimes used simply to mean "pile"
• Buster – someone full of fun and mischief..
• Buzgut – a great eater or drinker
• Buzza, Bussa – large salting pot or bread-bin, also found in phrase "dafter than a buzza" very daft
• B'y – boy, like sir

  C

• Cabby – sticky, dirty, muddy
• Cabester, Cobesta – the part of a fishing tackle connecting the hook with the lead
• Cabobble – to mystify, puzzle or confuse
• Caboolen, Cabooly-stone – a holed stone, tied to a rope, and used to drive pilchards or mackerel back from the opening of a seine
• Cack – filth
• Caggle, Gaggle – to cover in filth
• Cakey – soft, feeble minded
• Cal – tungstate of iron
• Calamajeena, Calavajina – a thornback
• Calcar – the lesser weever
• Calken, Calican – the father-lasher
• Callan – a hard layer on the face of a rock
• Cand, Cam – fluorspar
• Canker – a harbour crab
• Cannikeeper – a spider crab
• Canter – a frame for a fishing-line, originally a peg was used
• Captain – the manager of a mine or similar enterprise
• Care – the mountain ash, or rowan
• Carn – a pile of rocks
• Carn tyer – quartz
• Carrack – a stone composed of quartz, schorl and hornblende
• Cassabully – winter cress
• Casteeg – to flog
• Catched – caught
• Catchpit – a place in the home where everything is dropped
• Cauch – a mess
• Caunse – paved way
• Chacking – thirsty
• Chacks – cheeks
• Chaffering – haggling over a bargain
• Chea chaunter, Cheechonter – stop your chatter!
• Cheel – child especially girl "a boy or a cheel"
• Cheldern – children
• Chewidden Thursday – a miners' festival
• Chill – lamp
• Chilth – chilliness of the atmosphere
• Chimley – chimney
• Chirks – remnants of fire, embers; "chirk" burrows where used coal was found near mines
• Chopper - someone from Redruth, usually how a Camborne native would describe someone from Redruth
• Chuggypig – woodlouse
• Churchtown – the settlement where the parish church is located
• Clacky – sticky and chewy food
• Clidgy – sticky, muddy
• Clim – climb
• Clip – sharp in speaking, curt, having taken offence
• Cloam – crockery, pottery, earthenware
• Cloam oven – earthenware built-in oven
• Clunk – swallow; clunker – windpipe
• Coffen stile – a coffen stile is a type of stile consisting of rectangular bars of granite laid side by side with gaps between

• Condiddle, Kindiddle – to entice, take away clandestinely
• Confloption – flurry or confusion)
• Coose – to hunt or chase game out of woodland/covert, from the Cornish word for woodland 'koes'. I.e. a command given to encourage a hunting dog "coose him out then dog!".
• Cornish diamonds – quartz
• Corrosy – an old grudge handed down from father to son; an annoyance
• Cousin Jack – a Cornish emigrant miner; "Cousin Jacks" is a nickname for the overseas Cornish, thought to derive from the practice of Cornishmen asking if job vacancies could be filled by their cousin named Jack in Cornwall.
• Cramble – to walk with difficulty
• Crease – children's truce term
• Crib – a mid-morning break for a snack
• Croust – a mid-morning break for a snack
• Cummas 'zon – come on, hurry up
• Cundard – a drain
• Cuss – curse
• Cutting of it up – speaking in a fake posh accent

  D

• Daft – silly
• Dag – short hatchet or axe ; also in phrase "Face like a dag"; sheep tailings
• Dappered – dirty / covered in mud
• Dashel – thistle
• Denner – dinner, evening meal
• Devoner – someone from Devon
• Didikoy – gypsy
• Didnus – Didn't we
• Dilley – wheeled play trolley made from wood and pram wheels
• Dishwasher – water-wagtail
• Do – auxiliary verb – "the pasties mother do make" or even "that's what we d' do"
• Dobeck – somebody stupid
• Dram – swath
• Drang – narrow passage or lane
• Drash – thresh; "drasher" = thresher
• Dreckley / Dreckly – at some point in the future; soon, but not immediately; like "mañana", but less urgent
• Dreckzel – threshold of a doorway
• Dry – a dry is where the sludge gets processed
• Dryth – drying power, "There's no dryth in the wind today"
• Dummity – low light level, overcast
• Durns – door frame
• Dwam – a swoon, faint or sudden feeling of faintness

  E

• 'e – contraction of "he" but used in place of "it"
• Easy – slightly simple mentally
• Ee – contraction of thee
• Eeval – farmer's fork implement
• Emmet – ant or more recently tourist ; four-legged emmet - newt
• Ellen – a slate that has fallen from a roof
• 'er – she
• Ess – yes
• Ess coss – yes of course
• Ewe – she cat
• Exactly – as in "'e edn exactly", meaning he is not right mentally

  F

• Fains – children's truce term
• Fall – autumn, Fall
• Ferns – bracken "the hounds lost the fox in the ferns"
• Figgy hobbin – lump of dough, cooked with a handful of raisins
• Fitty – proper, properly
• Fizzogg – face
• Flam-new – brand new
• Fly, Flies – hands of a dial or clock
• Folks – people
• Fossick – to search for something by rummaging, to prospect for minerals
• Fradge – repair
• Fuggan – pastry dinner-cake
• Furze, furzy – gorse, covered with gorse, as in the local saying at Stratton "Stratton was a market town when Bude was just a furzy down", meaning Stratton was long established when Bude was just gorse-covered downland.

  G

• Gad – a pick, especially a miner's pick; this kind of pick is a small pointed chisel used with a hammer, e.g. a hammer and gad
• Gashly – terrible, dismal, hideous
• Gawky – stupid; from the Cornish language "gocki"
• Gazooly, Gazol – gazoolying / gazoling means "to be constantly uttering laments"
• Geeking – gaping
• Geddon – good show / well done
• Girt licker – very large object, as in "That fish you caught is a girt licker"
• Giss on! – don't talk rubbish!
• Glance – bounce
• Gook – bonnet
• Gossan – a term for the loose mixture of quartz, iron oxide and other minerals often found on the "back" of a lode; decomposed rock
• Grammersow – woodlouse
• Granfer – grandfather
• Griglans – heather
• Grisly, Grizzly – a grating used to catch and throw out large stones from the sluices
• Growan - 'decomposed granite'
• Grushans, Groushans – dregs, especially in bottom of tea cup
• Guag, Gwag – emptiness, hollow space in a mine
• Gug – a coastal feature/cave, esp. North Cornwall; e.g St Illickswell Gug
• Gunnis – an underground excavation left where a lode has been worked out
• Gurgoe – warren
• Gwidgee-gwee – a blister, often caused by a misdirected hammer blow