# Dracula-to-English Translation, Anyone? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 20, 2005, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805 "2005-01-20T22:25:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2005, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/1 "2005-01-20T22:25:28Z")
There is a passage in Dracula, where a minor character is speaking in some unrecognizable dialect. He is an old man, who sits with his buddies in the graveyard where Dracula first bites Lucy. I have puzzled out most of what he is saying, but not all, and I would appreciate anyone being able to clear up the rest for me. The passage that puzzles is as follows: (from [here,](http://www.online-literature.com/stoker/dracula/6/) if you would like to read it in context): > [@](#): > > He is a funny old man. He must be awfully old, for his face is gnarled and twisted like the bark of a tree. He tells me that he is nearly a hundred, and that he was a sailor in the Greenland fishing fleet when Waterloo was fought. He is, I am afraid, a very sceptical person, for when I asked him about the bells at sea and the White Lady at the abbey he said very brusquely, > > “I wouldn’t fash masel’ about them, miss. Them things be all wore out. Mind, I don’t say that they never was, but I do say that they wasn’t in my time. They be all very well for comers and trippers, an’ the like, but not for a nice young lady like you. Them feet-folks from York and Leeds that be always eatin’cured herrin’s and drinkin’ tea an’ lookin’ out to buy cheap jet would creed aught. I wonder masel’ who’d be bothered tellin’ lies to them, even the newspapers, which is full of fool-talk.” \*\*(OK, I got most of this. “Fash” means “bother”, which I picked up from Kidnapped by RL Stevenson. Thus the dialect is Scottish, perhaps? > > “Comers” and “trippers” must be tourists and day-trippers. “Feet-folks” - walkers? “Creed aught” = believe anything. “Cheap jet” must be trinkets made of jet.) \*\* > > I thought he would be a good person to learn interesting things from, so I asked him if he would mind telling me something about the whale fishing in the old days. He was just settling himself to begin when the clock struck six, whereupon he laboured to get up, and said, > > “I must gang ageeanwards home now, miss. My grand-daughter doesn’t like to be kept waitin’ when the tea is ready, for it takes me time to crammle aboon the grees, for there be a many of `em, and miss, I lack belly-timber sairly by the clock.” > **"Crammle aboon" = scramble over. “Grees” must be either graves or steps, which are mentioned immediately.)** > > He hobbled away, and I could see him hurrying, as well as he could, down the steps. The steps are a great feature on the place. They lead from the town to the church, there are hundreds of them, I do not know how many, and they wind up in a delicate curve. The slope is so gentle that a horse could easily walk up and down them. > > _snip_ > > Lucy was looking sweetly pretty in her white lawn frock. She has got a beautiful colour since she has been here. > > I noticed that the old men did not lose any time in coming and sitting near her when we sat down. She is so sweet with old people, I think they all fell in love with her on the spot. Even my old man succumbed and did not contradict her, but gave me double share instead. I got him on the subject of the legends , and he went off at once into a sort of sermon. I must try to remember it and put it down. > > "It be all fool-talk, lock, stock, and barrel, that’s what it be and nowt else. These bans an’ wafts an’ boh-ghosts an’ bar-guests an’ bogles an’ all anent them is only fit to set bairns an’ dizzy women a’belderin’. They be nowt but air-blebs. > **(Bans and wafts? Some kind of ghost, no doubt. Boh-ghosts - no idea. Bar-guests? Bogles = bogies. But he is saying that ghost stories are just to set children and women crying. I think.)** > > They, an’ all grims an’ signs an’ warnin’s, be all invented by parsons an’ illsome berk-bodies an’ railway touters to skeer an’ scunner hafflin’s, an’ to get folks to do somethin’ that they don’t other incline to. > \*\*(Berk-bodies = busybodies? Or is this a name for clergy? Railway touters = people telling stories to draw in a tourist trade?) \*\* There’s a lot more to the speech, but that might do for a start. If any Doper is familiar with Scottish dialect, a translation is appreciated. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2005, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/2 "2005-01-20T22:39:36Z")
‘Cheap jet’ is one of the clues - Whitby Jet, from Yorkshire, was a fashionable fad in Victorian Britain. It’s a (rather clumsy and generic, IMO) transcription of a Yorkshire accent and dialect. …and clicking on the link you gave, I see it’s set in Whitby. _Feels smug_. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2005, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/3 "2005-01-20T23:04:43Z")
> [@](#): > > "It be all fool-talk, lock, stock, and barrel, that’s what it be and nowt else. These bans an’ wafts an’ boh-ghosts an’ bar-guests an’ bogles an’ all anent them is only fit to set bairns an’ dizzy women a’belderin’. They be nowt but air-blebs. > > “They, an’ all grims an’ signs an’ warnin’s, be all invented by parsons an’ illsome berk-bodies an’ railway touters to skeer an’ scunner hafflin’s, an’ to get folks to do somethin’ that they don’t other incline to.” _nowt[/] = nothing. ban = a curse having, or supposed to have, supernatural sanction, and baleful influence. boh-ghosts, bar-guests, bogles = boggards = specters, goblins, or bogies. [i[bairn_ = child. _air-blebs_ = air bubbles. _railway touters_ = tramps? _hafflin’_ = halfling, one not fully grown. ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2005, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/4 "2005-01-20T23:43:27Z")
> [@](#): > > They, an’ all grims an’ signs an’ warnin’s, be all invented by parsons an’ illsome berk-bodies an’ railway touters to skeer an’ scunner hafflin’s, an’ to get folks to do somethin’ that they don’t other incline to. grim = grimoire = book illsome = gruelling, laborious, up to no good berk-bodies = not sure. You’re probably right with busy-bodies railway touter. Touter is a hawker, unlicencsed salesman. So, railway touter is presumably someone who sells their wares to railway passangers, either on the platform or by hopping on and off trains. skeer = scare scunner = poor, working class It’s deifinitely a weird mix of Yorkshire and Scottish dialects. ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2005, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/5 "2005-01-20T23:52:45Z")
[quote] Them feet-folks from York and Leeds feet-folks = effete people. They are described as eating cured herring, drinking tea and buying jewellery, which could be seen as over-indulgent or refined. ---
**Author:** ![Julius\_Henry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8797f3/32.png) [@Julius\_Henry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Julius_Henry)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/6 "2005-01-21T00:31:03Z")
The following information comes from the notes to an edition of Dracula edited by Marjorie Howes and published by Everyman. Stoker got the dialect from an 1876 book by F. K. Robinson called _A Glossary of Words Used in the Neighborhood of Witby_. **fash masel’** : worry myself **feet-folks** : foot passengers, as opposed to higher class carriage passengers **jet** : a hard, black form of coal, polished and used for making toys, buttons, and jewelry **gang ageeanwards** : go towards **crammle aboon the grees** : hobble up the stairs **belly-timber** : food \*\*bans \*\* : curses \*\*wafts \*\* : ghosts **boh-ghosts an’ barguests and bogles** : ghosts and hobgoblins \*\*bairns \*\* : children **a-belderin’** : blubbering **air-blebs** : bubbles \*\*grims \*\* : ghosts or skeletons **beuk-bodies** : learned people **skeer an’ scunner** : scare \*\*hafflin’s \*\* : half-wits \*\*airt \*\* : direction \*\*steans \*\* : tombstones \*\*acant \*\* : leaning to one side **quare scowderment** : queer confusion **death-sarks** : shrouds \*\*jouped \*\* : jumbled **timmlin’ and ditherin’** : trembling \*\*dozzened \*\* : shrivelled \*\*Yabblins \*\* : possibly **balm-bowl** : chamber pot **kirk-garth** : church yard \*\*consate \*\* : imagine **be happed here** : are buried here **snod an’ snog** : smooth and compact **lay-beds** : graves \*\*toom \*\* : empty **aftest abaft** : hindmost, near stern **bier-bank** : churchyard path \*\*antherums \*\* : doubts \*\*thruffstean \*\* : a table-like tombstone covering the entire body \*\*gawm \*\* : understand \*\*acrewk’d \*\* : twisted \*\*lamiter \*\* : a deformed person **the clegs and the dowps** : the flies and the crows \*\*addle \*\* : to work or earn ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/7 "2005-01-21T15:36:39Z")
Thanks for all your responses! Any idea what “I lack belly-timber sairly by the clock” mean? If “belly-timber” is food, what is “sairly”, and what does a clock have to do with it? Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![LifeOnWry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/96bed5/32.png) [@LifeOnWry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LifeOnWry)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/8 "2005-01-21T15:41:57Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Thanks for all your responses! > > Any idea what “I lack belly-timber sairly by the clock” mean? If “belly-timber” is food, what is “sairly”, and what does a clock have to do with it? > > Regards, > Shodan “Sairly” is sorely, but I’m not sure “belly-timber” is food - if it IS, it sounds like “It’s way past my lunchtime.” BTW, I only really popped in here to say that this is my favorite thread title ever. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/9 "2005-01-21T17:26:28Z")
For some reason in Victorian Era literature there’s a lot of use of dialect in writing – to some extent it was supposed to add realism to the story, but a lot of humor from the period depends on this device. I think Stoker wanted the reader to be impressed by the way he captured the Whitby dialect but also to have a hearty chuckle at the funny speech of people from the area. Readers of the time apparently loved that kind of thing. **Dracula** always struck me as a particularly ridiculous example of this fad, because it requires us to believe that Mina sat down later and transcribed the old man’s exact words in dialect, that Dr. Seward imitated Van Helsing’s accent when making his phonograph diary, etc. ---
**Author:** ![cher3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@cher3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cher3)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/10 "2005-01-21T18:08:41Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > **Dracula** always struck me as a particularly ridiculous example of this fad, because it requires us to believe that Mina sat down later and transcribed the old man’s exact words in dialect, that Dr. Seward imitated Van Helsing’s accent when making his phonograph diary, etc. I’d have to go back and look, but I think at some point Mina says that she is transcribing it (for whomever she is writing to) because is it so quaint. ---
**Author:** ![Madd\_Maxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Madd\_Maxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Madd_Maxx)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/11 "2005-01-21T19:20:42Z")
“I vant to suk your blud.” = I want to suck your blood. The pointy teeth get in the way of proper annunciation. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/12 "2005-01-21T21:38:14Z")
> [@cher3](#): > > I’d have to go back and look, but I think at some point Mina says that she is transcribing it (for whomever she is writing to) because is it so quaint. I think you’re right. I do remember that when she starts her journal she says she wants to be like a “lady journalist” and keep an accurate record of interesting things that happen. So maybe I can give that a pass. But I still think the idea of Dr. Seward imitating Dr. Van Helsing’s speech for the phonograph is pretty silly! A little of this I could see, but every time he wanted to talk about what the man said? ---
**Author:** ![cher3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/da6949/32.png) [@cher3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cher3)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2005, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/13 "2005-01-21T23:35:13Z")
Actually, I should have read the OP more carefully, because the part I was thinking of is right there where she says she must try to remember his “sermon” and put it down. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2005, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/14 "2005-01-22T00:06:19Z")
> [@Lamia](#): > > For some reason in Victorian Era literature there’s a lot of use of dialect in writing – to some extent it was supposed to add realism to the story, but a lot of humor from the period depends on this device. I think Stoker wanted the reader to be impressed by the way he captured the Whitby dialect but also to have a hearty chuckle at the funny speech of people from the area. Readers of the time apparently loved that kind of thing. > > **Dracula** always struck me as a particularly ridiculous example of this fad, because it requires us to believe that Mina sat down later and transcribed the old man’s exact words in dialect, that Dr. Seward imitated Van Helsing’s accent when making his phonograph diary, etc. This is all true. But it’s easy to ridicule the Victorian attitude to accents - don’t forget, that before the expansion of the railways, only a minority of people would ever hear ‘unusual’ accents. The ‘exoticism’ of a North Yorkshire dialect to Londoners would be significant. Plus, it’s also easy for us to comment on inaccuracies or unlikely situations - these aren’t things that would concern the contemporary audience at all. As a slight aside, regarding the earlier suggestion that some of the written dialect seems Scottish as much as Yorkshire, it wouldn’t surprise me if there were aspects of Scottish accent & dialects that influenced fishing communities in particular, and which have since disappeared. ---
**Author:** ![Mirror\_Image\_egamI\_rorriM](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e56c9b/32.png) [@Mirror\_Image\_egamI\_rorriM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mirror_Image_egamI_rorriM)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2005, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/15 "2005-01-22T03:07:16Z")
Has anyone else noticed that _Dracula_ reads like it’s been translated from Latin? Seriously, there were some odd bits of grammar in there that I’ve only ever seen or used in Latin translations. Things like “The knife having been sharpened,” for example. It’s just not standard English, but it is a pretty usual constuction in Latin to English translations. ---
**Author:** ![violacrane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/c57346/32.png) [@violacrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/violacrane)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2005, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/16 "2005-01-22T04:16:28Z")
The [**barguest**](http://www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/folklore/cgrim_barguest.html) is specific kind of supernatural creature, a black dog and death portent. **Bogles** cause fright or dread and are closely related to bogey men. According to [this site](http://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/celt/bof/bof07.htm) a waft in Yorkshire is a wraith or double. A \*\*ban \*\* may well be a curse but could also be related to the banshee – which seems more appropriate in a list of creatures. I suspect **bohghost** may also have a specific meaning but it has defeated my google skills, aside from a suggestion that **boh** is a word for a tree branch (bough) making it a perhaps a treespirit. While it’s true the dialect of Whitby has some features in common with Scottish I feel they may well have come via the Geordie or Newcastle dialect. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2005, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/17 "2005-01-22T15:47:29Z")
I’d bet Leonard Wolf’s THE ANNOTATED DRACULA has a full translation. It was republished under a slightly altered title a few years ago when the Coppola film came out (he was technical advisor- btw, social commentator & author Naomi Wolf is his daughter). ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [January 22, 2005, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/18 "2005-01-22T18:09:22Z")
Thanks again for all the responses, and I will hie me off to the library and try to find the annotated Dracula that **FriarTed** mentions. I asked a Scottish guy at work about “lack belly-timber sairly by the clock”, and he thinks it means that the guy was saying “I get real hungry at this time every day”. It seems to have been more common for Brits not to be able to understand each other if they spoke different dialects, before the advent of TV and mass communication. Mina even mentions it in the same passage quoted above. Thanks again to all. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2005, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/19 "2005-01-23T13:51:55Z")
> [@violacrane](#): > > While it’s true the dialect of Whitby has some features in common with Scottish I feel they may well have come via the Geordie or Newcastle dialect. Almost certainly. The fishermen of Scotland and Northumberland used to follow the herring shoals down the east coast of England every year – they certainly went further south than Whitby – and many would have settled at various places along the way. The dialect as presented doesn’t look much like Yorkshire (or Scots) to me, but it’s very like contemporary transcriptions of Geordie/Northumbrian dialect. In fact if I hadn’t known that it was set in Whitby, that’s what I would have said it was. “Barguest” and “bohghost” look to me like alternative transcriptions of the same word – it may seem strange to Americans, but in England there can easily be that much variation in pronunciation within five miles (or even less). To my mind, as well, a construction like “The knife having been sharpened” would be perfectly standard English at the time – in literature at any rate. Whether people actually would have _said_ that is something I couldn‘t possibly say ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2005, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805/20 "2005-01-23T14:00:48Z")
Oh, :smack: … I meant to add that I think a closer translation of “I lack belly-timber sairly by the clock”, would be “Judging by the time, I’m overdue for my meal”. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/dracula-to-english-translation-anyone/285805.md?page=2)