sb. and a. Also 6–9 lawland, 8 lawlin, 9 laighland, lawlant. Also LALLAN. [f. LOW a. + LAND.] A. sb.
1. Low or level land; land that is on a lower level than the adjoining districts. Usually pl.
sing. 1855. Kingsley, Heroes, Theseus, II. 205. The lowland grew blue beneath his feet.
1885. Bible (R. V.), Jer. xxxiii. 13. In the cities of the lowland.
pl. 1693. Dryden, Ovid’s Met., I. Poems, 1743, II. 176. No Nat’ral Cause she found from Brooks, or Bogs, Or marshy Lowlands, to produce the Fogs.
1725. De Foe, Voy. round World (1840), 266. So high above the valley that it looked like the lowlands in England do below Box Hill in Surrey.
1870. Yeats, Nat. Hist. Comm., 106. The central lowlands must be the coldest part of North America.
fig. 1864. Lowell, Fireside Trav., 118. The lowlands and levels of ordinary palaver.
2. spec. (Now always pl.) The less mountainous region of Scotland, situated south and east of the Highlands.
1631. in Thanes of Cawdor (Spalding Club), 273. The necessitie of his advis doeth ofttymes invite him to the lowlandis.
a. 1687. Petty, Pol. Arith., iv. (1691), 69. Whether England and the Low-Lands of Scotland, can maintain a fifth part more People than they now do … the said Territories of England, and the Low-Land of Scotland, contain about Thirty Six Millions of Acres.
c. 1730. Burt, Lett. N. Scotl. (1818), I. 37. The Kirk … distinguishes the Lowlands from the Highlands by the language generally spoken by the inhabitants.
1822. Galt, Provost, xiii. 98. Mr. Keg … had come in from the Laighlands … to live among us.
3. Lowlands: the Lowland (Scottish) dialect. (Cf. Lallans s.v. LALLAN.) Sc.
1832–53. Ballantine, Whistle-Binkie (Scot. Songs), Ser. III. 27. My young cousin Peggy cam doun frae Dunkeld, Wi’ nae word o’ lawlants ava, man.
a. 1878. H. Ainslie, Land of Burns (1892), 335. Has gude braid lawlan ’s left the land?
B. attrib. or adj.
1. Of, pertaining to, or inhabiting low land or a level district; occas. pertaining to the ‘nether regions.’
1567. Reg. Privy Council Scot., I. 555. To eschew sic contemptuus oppressioun in a peciabill cuntre and lawland.
1691. Dryden, K. Arthur, I. 7. His Errand was, to draw the Low-land damps … from the foggy Fens.
1717. Shaftesb., Charac. (1737), III. 52. Israel was constrain’d to go down to Egypt, and sue for maintenance to these … low-land states.
1721. Ramsay, Answ. to Burchet, 8. He … Doups down to visit ilka lawland ghaist.
1823. in Hone, Every-day Bk., II. 926. Our lowland vapours … deranged her constitution.
1863. Woolner, My Beautiful Lady, 138. Well coerced by Lowland William’s [i.e., William III.’s] craft.
1865. Whittier, Revisited, 41. Bring down, O lowland river, The joy of the hills to the waiting sea.
1868. W. W. Hunter, Compar. Dict. Lang. India, 2. The English have studied and understand the lowland population as no conquerors ever studied or understood a subject race.
2. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of the Lowlands of Scotland.
1508. Dunbar, Flyting w. Kennedie, 56. Ane lawland ers wald mak a bettir noyis.
1610. Holland, Camden’s Brit., I. 155. The Scots are divided into Hechtlandmen and Lawlandmen.
1752. Fawkes, Descr. May, Pref. The Lowland Scotch language, and the English, at that time, were nearly the same.
1785. Burns, Jolly Beggars, Air iv. A Highland lad my love was born, The Lawlan’ laws he held in scorn.
1896. N. Munro, Lost Pibroch (1902), 88. In her house on the Lowland road Jean Rob starved.
1898. Crockett, Standard Bearer, i. 6. Lambs which had just been brought from a neighbouring lowland farm.
