Scutter verb to botch, make mess; noun a mess, a shambles
‘“Christ, did ye see ‘em scutter like wee mousies wi’ a cat on their tails?”’ (Dragonfly in Amber)
The origin of scutter is obscure but we think that it is an alteration of skitter and, perhaps, also influenced by English scutter, to scurry. There’s a lovely usage by Ezra Pound, for example, here: ‘The turn of the wave and the scutter of receding pebbles.’ (Selected Letters, 1935).
In Scotland, it is a word very much associated with Aberdeen and the surrounding district of the North East of Scotland. It was first noted as being from this area in John Jamieson’s 1825 supplement to his Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish Language.
The first written example we have comes from Poems, chiefly in the Buchan Dialect by William Scott (1832) and describes spattering or splashing: ‘Tak’ aff their milk, an’ leave their edders [udders] teem [empty]. An’ trail the raip, an’ scutter a’ the reem [cream].’
Scutter also means to engage in time-wasting activities: ‘Fat [what] an awfu’ scutterin’ wauy o’ daen’ it is hae’n tae flit [relocate]?’ from Bon-Accord of 12 November 1887.
An example of the noun meaning something troublesome and irritating is illustrated by the following (not very politically correct) example from William H L Tester’s Poems (1870): ‘Auld maiden ladies - a scunner an’ scutter.’
People or animals who work in an ineffective, muddled or dirty manner are described as scutters. A sloppy worker is described here: ‘Benjie, although but a scutter through life.’ (William Anderson, Rhymes, Reveries and Reminiscences, 1867.)
And who doesn’t like to mess about in water. From the Aberdeen Evening Express of June 2004: ‘Saturday morning was a scorcher, so we grabbed our swimming cozzies, a picnic and headed for one of the tiny beaches round the loch, surrounded by thick trees. We scuttered about in the water then lay down on the sand.’
Finally, it can also mean a state of excitement or a flurry. ‘It’s ma hairt that’s geen a’ tae a scutter, flutterin’ up an’ doon in my breist like a railway seegnal.’ (Donald Campbell, Uncle Andie, 1931.)