Dictionaries of the Scots Language
Dictionars o the Scots Leid

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

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Wart(h, Ward, n. Also: (wert-). [ON varða.] A beacon. Also attrib. with hill. The forms in -d are by confusion with Ward n.¹ 1, 2. 13… Reg. Episc. Aberd. I 66.
De terra nostra de Werthill 1625 Misc. Maitl. C. II 199.
And sall give ordour for bigging up of all warthis and watching therat baith day and nycht quha salhaue fewall for fyre to warne the cuntrie 1625 Misc. Maitl. C. II 201.
All maner of man sall convine … at Kirkwall … immediatlie efter as they sall sie the warth of Weitfurdhill in fyre 1633 (1711) Sibbald's Orkn. & Shetl. 19.
They use to have upon the top of their highest hills, their ward or wardhill, which is a heap of turfs and peets, placed on the top of the hill, which being fired, gives advertisement 1633 (1711) Sibbald's Orkn. & Shetl. 56.
In Houseness there is a promontoreie with a wart upon the top of it a1688 Wallace Orkney 41-2.
In every isle they have a wart hill, which is the most elevated and conspicuous part of the isle, on which in time of warr they keep ward a1688 Wallace Orkney 112.
Wart, a heap of turffs and peits placed on the top of their highest hills, which being fired, gives advertisement to the countrey people to meet there, this being seen by the adjacent ward c1650-1700 Descr. Zetland 15.
There is also in Qualsey a thing remarkable, a wart, i.e. a little hill in Chaldeseter, on whose top the compass will not stand but N. will turn S. c1650-1700 Descr. Zetland 19.
For better preventing of the hazard of the enemy, on the tops of the highest hills they had their ward or wart-hills, which were … so ordered through the whole countrey, that the ward-hill is always in sight of its adjacent ward