Scottish National Dictionary (1700–)
Hide Quotations Hide Etymology
About this entry:
First published 1971 (SND Vol. VIII).
This entry has not been updated since then but may contain minor corrections and revisions.
Quotation dates: 1727, 1800
[0,0,1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0]
SPARSE, adj. Also sparce (Sc. 1799 H. Mitchell Scotticisms 77). Sc. form and usage, of writing: spread-out, widely spaced, loose (Sc. 1782 J. Sinclair Ob. Sc. Dial. 107, 1825 Jam.). Hence adv., sparsely, in phr. sparsely written, covered with loose, widely spaced writing. Obs.Sc. 1727 R. Wodrow Corresp. (1843) III. 288:
Four or five sheets of sparse write.Sc. 1800 Monthly Mag. (April) 237:
When much space is occupied by few words, the Scotch, especially the lawyers, say, "the writing is sparse," or "the paper is sparsely written."
You may wish to vary the format shown below depending on the citation style used.
"Sparse adj.". Dictionary of the Scots Language. 2004. Scottish Language Dictionaries Ltd. Accessed 14 Dec 2025 <http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/sparse>
