A long term old couple on the hill above the churchyard having a coffee from a flask.
The Scottish Word:

Brent.

John Anderson, my jo, John,
When we were first acquent;
Your locks were like the raven,
Your bonnie brow was brent;
But now your brow is beld, John,
Your locks are like the snaw;
But blessings on your frosty pow,
John Anderson, my jo.

John Anderson, my jo, John,
We clamb the hill thegither;
And mony a canty day, John,
We’ve had wi’ ane anither:
Now we maun totter down, John,
And hand in hand we’ll go,
And sleep thegither at the foot,
John Anderson, my jo.

John Anderson, my Jo; By Robert Burns.

Translate:

Brent: upright, smooth unwrinkled, springy.

ˈbrɛnt
The Scottish Word: brent with its definition and its meaning illustrated and captioned with the word used in context in the Scots language and in English.

Better men than me needed to translate good poems with justice.

The word jo is a term of endearment meaning sweetheart or dearest or joy.

Hover or tap on any of the underlined words and a translation will appear. You yourself can then apply the poetic license to give the word its true poetic leaning.

The word brent in this case I took to mean smooth skin and loaded with sprung thick hair, the opposite of lank and bald.

2 thoughts on “Brent.

  1. I could have used this site to help me with understanding my own grandfather. He came to Canada around 1906. I was born after the 2nd. World War so he might have lost a lot of his dialect by then but to my ears it was a mystery. Makes me smile to think of these memories.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.