Apologetic apostrophe

The apologetic apostrophe is the name gien tae a wey o writin Scots for tae mak the seemilarities atween Scots an Inglis gey appearent. It is the uiss o an apostrophe (') for tae shaw letters wantin frae Scots wirds but's aye tae the fore in Inglis, for tae gie the impression that Scots is nocht but orra Inglis.

Aften thae wirds haes niver haed thir letters "wantin". Ae example in this seestem is the wird taen; it wad be spelt ta'en (frae Inglis taken); but the wird wis spelt tane in the 14t century, sae the apostrophe here coud be cawed specious.

Robert Burns, awtho a Scot his ain sel, wis the maist weel-kent uiser o the apologetic apostrophe, but its uiss bides in written Scots the day.

Examples
{| class="wikitable"
! RRSSC !! Apologetic apostrophe !! Inglis
|-
| gien || gi'en  || given
|-
| mak || mak || make
|-
| o || o''' || of|-
| fitbaw || fitba || football|-
| awbodie || a'body || In thir cases thare's nae direct Inglis marrae—the Inglis wird is everybody—but the aw in awbodie is cognate wi Inglis all, sae is spelt wi apologetic a'.
|}

Legeetimate uiss o the apostrophe in Scots

Antrin wirds in Scots haes a cutty form an a lang form; for ordinar an apostrophe is uised for tae shaw the wantin letters in the cutty form. Some examples:

{| class="wikitable"
! Cutty !! Lang
|-
| e'en || even  
|-
| e'er || iver|-
| eneu' || eneuch 
|-
| lea' || leave 
|-
| ne'er || nivver 
|-
| ne'er's day || new year's day|-
| nor'land || northland  
|}

Thare's an apostrophe forby in the bygane mak o wirds endin wi ee for tae evite haein three eee's in a wird:dee > dee'd, gree > gree'd etc.

Apostrophes is for ordinar uised in Scots the selsame wey as in Inglis an aw, in the rinnin thegither o twa wirds sic as A'm, the're, it's'' an sae on.

Category:Scots leid