According to the Dictionaries of the Scots Language, if one is sweirt to do something one is “lazy, sluggish, loath, reluctant”.

EB Ramsay gave this wonderful description of a suspect preacher in Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character (1908). When a neighbour was asked “what he thought of John … and of his doctrine… he replied, ‘I’m no verra sure o’ Jock. I never ken’t a man sae sure o’ Heaven, and sae sweert to be gaing tae’t.’”

There’s also the lovely ballad (The Road and the Miles to Dundee): “So here’s to the lassie, I ne’er can forget her, And ilka young laddie that’s listenin’ to me, O never be sweirt to convoy [escort] a young lassie Though it’s only to show her the road to Dundee.”

The following, however, (from E H Strain’s Elmslie’s Drag-net, 1900) is somewhat less gallant: “She’s slack, an she’s sweerd”.

In the Scotsman (1985), David Stephen recalled a kindly gamekeeper: “A wyce man, and willing, and trilingual forby, having the Gaelic on top of the Scots and the English … a darling man, never sweirt to part with a few hours sleep tae help a freen.”

Finally, Billy Kay, writing for the National in 2023 about his Ayrshire childhood and his decision to campaign for the SNP, recorded: “My faither wis auld, auld Labour … I forewarned him ower the phone whit I wis gaun tae dae, an ye cuid tell by his sweirt reluctance tae react tae whit he wis bein tellt that he jist wantit tae thole it in silence…”

Scots Word of the Week comes from Dictionaries of the Scots Language. Visit DSL Online at https://dsl.ac.uk.