Re: agony column...

At 08:02:42 on Wed, 15 Aug 2007, Paul Burke <paul@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote in <5ifmvsF3p84tvU1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:

Molly Mockford wrote in uk.culture.language.english

In English English, it is "grey". In Scots, it is "gray".
Scots-English / English-Scots Dictionary, Lomond Books (1998 / 2001), ISBN 0-947782-26-5. The word is (unlike some) included in both sections, from one spelling to the other and back again.

1998 sounds very 'late' for a citation for a cultural spelling variation

It's not the date of a citation - it's the publication date of the dictionary (first published 1998, reprinted 2001), as I would have hoped would be clear from the context. It's just a wee pocket dictionary, with no etymological detail at all; but it firmly draws a distinction between gray and grey. I don't own a super-duper all-singing all-dancing Scots dictionary - although I would love to.

I'd like to see evidence of a consistent difference between Scots and English from the later 18th C (when the English spelling probably standardised) to the 20th.

So would I - but there would always have been people who used the English variant of any word because they have been led to believe it was "correct", although the Scots spelling was in perfectly common use at the time. So it's probable that both versions would be found in different sources over the identical period.
--
Molly Mockford
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety
deserve neither liberty nor safety - Benjamin Franklin
(My Reply-To address *is* valid, though may not remain so for ever.)
.

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