Your Scottish Archives Glossary

The Your Scottish Archives Glossary defines archaic words and phrases, mostly Scots law terminology, commonly found in documents and records in Scotland’s archives. If you think a word or phrase should be added to the glossary, or an existing entry could be defined better, please contact us at your@scottisharchives.org.uk.

You can also use the Dictionary of the Scots Language as a further resource at https://dsl.ac.uk/ for Scots words and phrases (including legal terminology).

To find a term within the glossary, click on the initial letter of the word you are looking for, then select the relevant syllable segment displayed below.

Example: to find the term “roup” select section “R” then sub-section “Ro”

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W Y

Ab Ac Ad Ag Ai Al Am An Ap Ar As At Au Av Aw

Arb Arc Arl Arr Art

arbiter

a person chosen to resolve a dispute. In England, the term arbitrator was used instead.

archival

describes records of enduring value; can also be used to describe the quality of materials achieving recognised standards for preserving archives, e.g. archival quality boxes.

archival arrangement

the process of organising archival records by provenance, to maintain the context and reflect (where possible) the original order, so that the relationship of records to each other can be more easily understood.

archival description

contextual and content information about archival records, arranged hierarchically and generally consisting of standard elements appropriate to the different hierarchical levels of description (item, file, series, fonds)

archive service

An organisation which purposefully retains and preserves a collection or collections of archival records. This service may, in addition, provide access to these archival materials. See also Archival Repository

archiving

(1) used by archivists to indicate all activities involved in selecting, caring for and making accessible records of enduring value; (2) in general use, frequently used to refer to the storage of data or documents which are inactive and will eventually be destroyed when they are no longer of use.

archivist

a professional with expertise in the management of records of enduring value. Entry to the profession normally requires a post-graduate diploma in archive studies, or equivalent specialised training; continuing professional development is recognised by the award of Foundation Member, Registered Member or Fellowship of the Archives and Records Association (UK & Ireland).