tystien.
/ˈtʌɪsti//ˈtiːsti/ local.
The Black Guillemot.
ΚΠ
a1795 G. Low Fauna Orcadensis (1813) 106 The taisté build in holes of the earth: lay but one egg.
1837 R. Dunn Ornithol. Orkney & Shetl. 102 Uria Grylle…Tystie. Black Guillemot. Greenland Dove.
1847 Zoologist 5 1909 The black guillemot..or the testie.
1876 D. Gorrie Summers & Winters in Orkneys v. 153 Bevies of teisties were disporting themselves in front and rear.
1892 G. Stewart Shetland Fireside Tales (ed. 2) iv. 27 He turned as fat as a tiestie.
1893 H. T. Cozens-Hardy Broad Norfolk (Eastern Daily Press) 50 Sometimes there is quite a family of similar names..of the same origin. Thus the Black Guillemot is..the tyste, taiste, toyst, and tysty.
1952 U. Venables Tempestuous Eden iii. 50 This was an ideal nesting-ground for black guillemots or tysties.
1964 A. L. Thomson New Dict. Birds 69/1 The Tystie (or Black Guillemot)..and its congeners constitute the tribe Cepphini.
1980 Birds Summer 51/2 There is a small brackish loch near the shore where tysties display in spring.
This entry has not yet been fully updated (first published 1986; most recently modified version published online December 2020).
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