Dictionaries of the Scots Language
Dictionars o the Scots Leid

A Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (up to 1700)

Hide Quotations Hide Etymology

Abbreviations Cite this entry

About this entry:
First published 1986 (DOST Vol. VI).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.

Potage, Pottage, -aig(e, n. Also: potache, (puttage). [ME and e.m.E. potage (Ancr. R.), pottage (1530), -adge, orig. with stress on the second syll., F. potage lit. ‘that which is put in a pot.’] Pottage.A dish composed of vegetables, pulses or meal, sometimes with meat, cooked in water, also in milk; a broth; ? latterly, as in mod. Sc., oatmeal porridge.Latterly, as in mod. Sc., construed as a plur.Also watter- and, as in later Sc., milk-pottage.(1) c1420 Wynt. ii 197.
Esawe … off the potage walde hawe hade That Jacob tyll hys dynare made Ib. 207.
Than Esaw … For a dysfulle off potage, Gawe wpe alle hale hys herytage c 1420 Liber Calchou II 451.
Than it is gud to ete potage of almundis 1533 Boece 323 b.
This pure cell, vestiment & potage … to me ar eneuch sufficient c1554 Makeson Genesis fol. 8.
Bot Esaw … to him sald his airchip … For appetyt he haid to ane potache 1558-66 Knox I 263 (see Potingar n.²⁾. 1567–8 Mar & Kellie MSS. 19.
To my ladie and hir servandis … ane kyd … with potagis after thair discretioun … kiching to the wiolaris … ij quarteris of muttoun ij poultrie with potagis and fische 1587 Carmichael Etym. 10.
Puls, potage 1597 Misc. Spald. C. I 128.
The said Agnes Woobster brocht ane dische off develische potage, alleging it to be bram and geill 1653 Laing MSS. I 277.
And living upon butterd sound potage and ailbery(b) c 1572 Mar & Kellie MSS. 31.
Ane mekle poitt for the salt beiff with vij uther small pottis for pottages 1602 Colville Paraenese 159.
Lyik Esau you los your birthrycht for a meas of pottage 1665–7 Lauder Jrnl. 43.
[They] makes a kind of pottages with it [the blood of fat geese] and bread Ib.
That which they [the French] call their pottage differ exceidingly from ours, with which they serve themselfes instead of our pottage, as also our broth, neither of which they know. It seems to diffir little from our soups when we make them with loaves Ib. 148. a 1700 Blythsome Wedding in Sempill P. 67/5.
There will be lang-kail and pottage And bannocks of barley-meal 1684 Insh Colonial Schemes 243.
The Indian corn is an excellent grain, I have eat it and like it very well in pottage and bread 1685 Sinclair Satan's Inv. World 93.
The good-wife one morning making pottage for the childrens' break-fast, had the tree-plate wherein the meal lay, snatched from her quickly 1688 Reg. Privy C. 3 Ser. XIII 257.
That the pannall came to the Knowes … and gott pottage and some small aill wpon them in the pan, and the pannall said they war werch, they mistered salt 1698 Marchmont 183.
Pottaig Ib.
Pottaige(c) 1684 Oliphants 287.
[For the funeral:] For 2 puttages £6; for a large dish of tonge and louer £2.08.00(2) a1400 Leg. S. xviii 150.
Sume tuk daittis, sum fygis dry, Sume vattir potage al-anerly a1568 Gyre-carling 11 (see Milk n.¹ e (2)).
Off milk pottage(3) proverb. a1628 Carmichael Prov. No. 1489.
They may ken be his nose quhat potage he loves Ib. No. 1768.
Ye ken how manie huted neifuls maks a patful of plum peis potage