Why are dwarves scottish?

[thorgrim29]

Basically what it says, in the overwhelming majority of english language fantasy works dealing with dwarves they speak with a scottish accent. Why? Who started it? I don't recall Gimli being described as rolling his rs in the books after all.

[Kitten Champion]

I've been led to believe it was started by Poul Anderson's Three Hearts and Three Lions which had a Dwarf character that spoke in-universe with an archaic and rustic dialect of French which manifested - when translated by the protagonist/author - into a very accented form of English that has some feel of Scottish to it. As these ideas tend to drift, that French Dwarf with a kinda-Scottish accent was the seed for an explicitly Scottish Dwarf at some point.

I strongly suspect Dungeons & Dragons is the main source of the now-popular image in this case.

[t209]

Well, there's Warhammer Fantasy but the Dwarves spoke Northern English accent.
Consider the inability for non-British audience to differentiate Scottish and Northern English accent.

[Olinser]

Basically what it says, in the overwhelming majority of english language fantasy works dealing with dwarves they speak with a scottish accent. Why? Who started it? I don't recall Gimli being described as rolling his rs in the books after all.

Same reason that Elves sound high-class English, leprechauns sound Irish, vampires sound Eastern European, etc. - because they've sounded like that for long enough that its become 'standard'.

[hamishspence]

Same reason that Elves sound high-class English, leprechauns sound Irish, vampires sound Eastern European, etc. - because they've sounded like that for long enough that its become 'standard'.

The question sounds more like "What source first gave a dwarf a Scottish accent" though.

At a guess, I would say, a The Hobbit or LOTR animated movie or audio cassette.

Possibly a very early computer game like Warcraft 2? It had dwarves in 1995, but I don't know if they had overt accents.

After looking it up on TV Tropes - Arcanum, back in 2001, is called out as having "one of the earliest examples of Dwarves with Scottish accents" around the time Fellowship of the Ring came out.

Book 3 in the Gotrek & Felix series - Daemonslayer - was in 1999 and had Malakai Makaisson - with an accurate (if slightly extreme) Scottish accent - but he was very much an exception when it came to Warhammer Dwarf accents.

[Rodin]

While I'm no more enlightened on an initial source, I suspect the reasons for it come down to Dwarvish culture matching that of stereotypical Scottish culture. Burly guys that live in the mountains with big beards that love quaffing beers and enjoy nothing more than a good scrap. Dwarves developing a Scottish accent was probably inevitable.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

While I'm no more enlightened on an initial source, I suspect the reasons for it come down to Dwarvish culture matching that of stereotypical Scottish culture. Burly guys that live in the mountains with big beards that love quaffing beers and enjoy nothing more than a good scrap. Dwarves developing a Scottish accent was probably inevitable.

You can make that kind of argument several ways, and honestly "Scottish" is not the one that I assumed when I started reading about dwarves and elves.

For example, blond braided beer drinkers with horned helmets and berserker fighters sounds far more Nordic/Germanic than Scottish to me, and indeed this was my assumption way back before the Internet.

Alternatively, armoured infantry with large shields, over reliance on infantry & siege engines over cavalry and famed for massive construction projects in stone? Clearly Romans.

Or you can split the difference, note their passion for living in mountains and accumulating gold, and their reluctance to join wars that don't concern them and say they are Swiss.

In any case, relevant article from atlas obscura.

Grey Wolf

[Eldan]

True, but our local dwarves here in Switzerland are quite small, never noted to be burly, never seem to carry weapons in any story and mostly rely on illusions and curses. I've also never seen alcohol mentioned in any of the stories.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

True, but our local dwarves here in Switzerland are quite small, never noted to be burly, never seem to carry weapons in any story and mostly rely on illusions and curses. I've also never seen alcohol mentioned in any of the stories.

I honestly only came up with the "reasoning" for "dwarves are swiss" as I was writing the post, because I realised that geographically between the other two reasonings there are big mountains and banks. It was a stretch, and I don't pretend otherwise.

I learnt all my cliches about European nations from a single source, Asterix. So to my mind, the swiss are this:


GW

[Telonius]

For what it's worth:

Tolkien also commented of the Dwarves that "their words are Semitic obviously, constructed to be Semitic."

The original Hobbit and LOTR cartoons didn't have any particularly Scottish-sounding dwarves. Thorin was played by Hans Conried (an American also famous for voicing Captain Hook). Gimli had about two lines in the Bakshi cartoon.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

"their words are Semitic obviously, constructed to be Semitic."

For futher what is worth, in Pratchett, there are strong parallels between the Dwarven culture and the RL Jewish culture, especially in how the humans react to their presence. Similar parallels are done (probably independently) in Edding's Belgariad with the Ulgos, who are technically not Dwarves, but might as well be.

GW

[John Campbell]

I've always played my dwarves as Norse, and find the "Scottish dwarves" trope kind of baffling.

[Velaryon]

You can make that kind of argument several ways, and honestly "Scottish" is not the one that I assumed when I started reading about dwarves and elves.

For example, blond braided beer drinkers with horned helmets and berserker fighters sounds far more Nordic/Germanic than Scottish to me, and indeed this was my assumption way back before the Internet.

Alternatively, armoured infantry with large shields, over reliance on infantry & siege engines over cavalry and famed for massive construction projects in stone? Clearly Romans.

Or you can split the difference, note their passion for living in mountains and accumulating gold, and their reluctance to join wars that don't concern them and say they are Swiss.

In any case, relevant article from atlas obscura.

Grey Wolf

It definitely makes more sense for dwarves to be associated with Scandinavian cultures than Scottish, but I wonder if it just ended up being Scottish because there isn't really a stereotypical Viking accent in American pop culture.

I mean, the closest thing I can think of is the Swedish Chef, and no one could take dwarves even remotely seriously if they used that accent.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

It definitely makes more sense for dwarves to be associated with Scandinavian cultures than Scottish, but I wonder if it just ended up being Scottish because there isn't really a stereotypical Viking accent in American pop culture.

I mean, the closest thing I can think of is the Swedish Chef, and no one could take dwarves even remotely seriously if they used that accent.

That merely begs the question of why dwarves need a RL regional accent in the first place.

GW

[Eldan]

Well, they need to speak something if voice acted, and training entire teams of voice actors in a fictional dialect is probably a bit much unnecessary work.

[Serenity]

Norse accents would be the closest to the mythical inspiration, but most people don't know what a Viking would have actually sounded like. Why Germanic accents and culture is rarely used for dwarves I'm less certain about, as there is a lot of cultural overlap there, and Dwarven tendency towards lawfulness could fit with the stereotype of German efficiency. But Scotsmen and Vikings certainly get associated with each other in popular consciousness, even if it was mostly in the form of a state of war IRL. Scottish accents are distinctive, thick, and aggressive, and associated with hairy, hard-drinking, hard fighting men who live in a clan structure.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Well, they need to speak something if voice acted, and training entire teams of voice actors in a fictional dialect is probably a bit much unnecessary work.

This really does not follow. Merry and Pippin in LotR film managed to pronounce "pint" in two different ways ("This my friend, is a paint" "It comes in peints?"), despite being from the same town* and practically attached at the hip. The elves don't seem to have any particular accent. You can have the dwarves equally speaking generic English.

I'm struggling to think of any other fantasy race in film or TV that "has" a regional accent like the dwarves have. I don't know enough about Star Trek, but do Klingons/Romulans/Vulcans have an accent? Because I believe most just happen to be allowed to speak English in the manner of their actor's choosing (as the joke goes, Picard is the most British French person in history). There is no rule that says that fantasy races need to have a specific RL regional accent.

Grey Wolf

*In the film

[Keltest]

This really does not follow. Merry and Pippin in LotR film managed to pronounce "pint" in two different ways ("This my friend, is a paint" "It comes in peints?"), despite being from the same town* and practically attached at the hip. The elves don't seem to have any particular accent. You can have the dwarves equally speaking generic English.

I'm struggling to think of any other fantasy race in film or TV that "has" a regional accent like the dwarves have. I don't know enough about Star Trek, but do Klingons/Romulans/Vulcans have an accent? Because I believe most just happen to be allowed to speak English in the manner of their actor's choosing (as the joke goes, Picard is the most British French person in history). There is no rule that says that fantasy races need to have a specific RL regional accent.

Grey Wolf

*In the film

Actually, Merry and Pippin don't come from the same town. Merry is from Buckland, across the river Brandywine, which the hobbits of Hobbiton consider to be practically a foreign country. The maps included don't make it especially clear, but the Shire isn't just one giant town, its a country to itself. More than one, depending on who you ask.

Yes, even in the film.

[Ramza00]

Actually, Merry and Pippin don't come from the same town. Merry is from Buckland, across the river Brandywine, which the hobbits of Hobbiton consider to be practically a foreign country. The maps included don't make it especially clear, but the Shire isn't just one giant town, its a country to itself. More than one, depending on who you ask.

Yes, even in the film.

Thank of the Shire as Pennsylvania or New York from the 1700 or 1800s, Pittsburgh is not Philadelphia, which is not Erie and so on...yet they all belong to the same state.

[Keltest]

Thank of the Shire as Pennsylvania or New York from the 1700 or 1800s, Pittsburgh is not Philadelphia, which is not Erie and so on...yet they all belong to the same state.

I live in PA. I'm not convinced that the people who live across state even speak English.

[Joran]

It definitely makes more sense for dwarves to be associated with Scandinavian cultures than Scottish, but I wonder if it just ended up being Scottish because there isn't really a stereotypical Viking accent in American pop culture.

I mean, the closest thing I can think of is the Swedish Chef, and no one could take dwarves even remotely seriously if they used that accent.

I thought Vikings also get Scottish accents; at least they did in How to Train Your Dragon. In the Capital One Viking commercials, they seem to have English/British accents, but I'm not an expert in all the British regional accents.

Ancient Romans or Greeks get British accents.

[Ramza00]

I live in PA. I'm not convinced that the people who live across state even speak English.

Just like the hobbits who are from the Shire think Buckland are so quaint and vice versa.

[Telonius]

I live in PA. I'm not convinced that the people who live across state even speak English.

From Erie originally. One of my classmates put it this way: "Erie and Pittsburgh are like Han and Chewie. We're probably the only ones who understand what they're saying, but we can't speak it."

(I usually followed up in my head, "... and they've been known to rip people's arms off if you make fun of them for it.")

[Keltest]

Just like the hobbits who are from the Shire think Buckland are so quaint and vice versa.

Yes? Whats your point? Are you trying to suggest that since the Shire has so many different accents, it would make sense that Dwarves... have the same accent as elves and humans?

[georgie_leech]

Yes? Whats your point? Are you trying to suggest that since the Shire has so many different accents, it would make sense that Dwarves... have the same accent as elves and humans?

Alternatively, it's weird that Dwarves generally sound Scottish when Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin all have distinct accents despite living in geographically close areas, when dwarven kingdoms are somewhat scattered.

[Keltest]

Alternatively, it's weird that Dwarves generally sound Scottish when Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin all have distinct accents despite living in geographically close areas, when dwarven kingdoms are somewhat scattered.

In the Hobbit movies, all the dwarves actually have different accents. In the LOTR movies, as far as I'm aware, Gimli is the only dwarf with a speaking role.

They actually had Gloin's accent match Gimli's even. And Oin's as well, I think, but its harder to tell who's speaking.

[FreddyNoNose]

Basically what it says, in the overwhelming majority of english language fantasy works dealing with dwarves they speak with a scottish accent. Why? Who started it? I don't recall Gimli being described as rolling his rs in the books after all.

I think this is your perception.

[dps]

Why Germanic accents and culture is rarely used for dwarves I'm less certain about.

Because dwarves are usually portrayed as being among the good guys, and no on wants to here them talk and think of the Third Reich.

[Scarlet Knight]

The question sounds more like "What source first gave a dwarf a Scottish accent" though.

At a guess, I would say, a The Hobbit or LOTR animated movie or audio cassette.

Because dwarves are usually portrayed as being among the good guys, and no on wants to here them talk and think of the Third Reich.

You made me think back to The Hobbit cartoon I saw back in the 70's. None of the characters had strong accents with the exception of the Elven King who was played by Otto Preminger and thus an Austrian accent.

[Green Elf]

Gimli is everyone's favorite dwarf (or should be) and he is Scottish. Everyone looks up (or down) to him.