Wee words - 'stoon'

Spending time with folk and talking with them always makes great oul Ulster-Scots & Scots vocabulary rise to the surface. My mother has been wracked by deteriorating health for many years now; she was talking this evening about pains in her legs and described them as 'stoons'.

• James Fenton's The Hamely Tongue has 'stoon' as 'a sudden sharp spasm of pain'.

• The Chambers Scots Dictionary has the words 'stound', 'stoun' and 'stund' meaning 'to ache, throb', 'an intermittent throbbing pain' and 'a sharp, sudden pang'.