Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- A nutritious article of food made from the farina remaining among the husks of oats, much used in Scotland and formerly in Northumberland.
- A kind of paste employed by weavers for stiffening their yarn in working.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun plural A nutritious article of food, much used in Scotland, made from the husk of the oat by a process not unlike that by which common starch is made; -- called
flummery in England.
Etymologies
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Examples
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But you might lie round among grandmother's feet for days, and, except for a stray cuff in passing if she actually walked into you -- a cuff given in the purest spirit of love and good-will, and merely as a warning of the worse thing that might happen to you if you made her spill the dinner "sowens" -- you might spend your days in reading anything from the _Arabian Nights_ in Uncle Eben's old tattered edition to the mighty _Josephus_, all complete with plans and plates -- over which on
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Hieland sowens by Mr. Duncan MacDonought, the last minister, who began the morning duly, Sunday and Saturday, with a mutchkin of usquebaugh.
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‘Gae hame, and be d — (that I should say sae), and put on the sowens for supper.’
Waverley 2004
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They have commonly pottage for dinner, composed of cale or cole, leeks, barley or big, and butter; and this is reinforced with bread and cheese, made of skimmed-milk — At night they sup on sowens or flummery of oat-meal — In a scarcity of oats, they use the meal of barley and pease, which is both nourishing and palatable.
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Just before breaking up, the crowd of young people partook of sowens, oatmeal porridge cakes with butter, and strunt, a liquor, as they hoped for good luck throughout the year.
The Book of Hallowe'en Ruth Edna Kelley
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In the Highlands of Scotland, among those who observed Christmas, a characteristic dish was new sowens (the husks and siftings of oatmeal), given to the family early on Christmas Day in their beds.
Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan Clement A. Miles
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Hallowe'en customs in, 197-8; sowens eaten in, 285;
Christmas in Ritual and Tradition, Christian and Pagan Clement A. Miles
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The _haggis_, a kind of pudding, made of the offals or interior of a sheep, and boiled in the integument of its stomach; this dish, both in odour and flavour, is usually excessively offensive to the stranger; the singed sheep's head, water-souchie, Scotch soup, (an _olla podrida_ of meats and vegetables,) chicken-broth and sowens.
The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 14, No. 380, July 11, 1829 Various
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If you had no teeth and no digestion, you were allowed a pint and a half of sowens porridge instead; and thus helped your portion of exhausted cavalry mount or your bit of tough mule-meat down.
The Dop Doctor Richard Dehan 1897
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He can read ony language back or forrit, up or doon, as easy as suppin 'sowens.
The Lilac Sunbonnet 1887
hernesheir commented on the word sowens
(n) (English dialect and Scots) 1. a type of porridge made from oatmeal screenings.
2. a paste formerly used by weavers to stiffen yarn.
January 7, 2009