God's Bostin' Rules: Translating the Bible into 'Black Country' Dialect [funny]
GOD’S BOSTIN’ RULES:1. “Ar bin the Lord yaar God, yow cor ave ova daft un’s befower me”
2. “Dow put stuff befower God”
3. “Yow cor tek the naame o’ the Lord yaah God in vain”
4. “Git yaself to Sunday meeting ay it”
5. “Honor ya dad un ya mom”
6. “Yow cor kill con ya”
7. “Yow woe av it off with sumone elses missus/bloke”
8. “No pinchin’”
9. “Dow mek out ya muckers dun it”
10. “Dow get jealous of ya maates stuff”
And a little background:
Apparently there is a Black Country Bible which starts along the lines of “In the beginning there was the Word. And the Word was Bostin”
The Black Country is an area of the English West Midlands conurbation, to the north and west of Birmingham, and to the south and east of Wolverhampton, around the South Staffordshire coalfield. It has a combined population of around one million.
By the late 19th century, this area had become one of the most intensely industrialised in the nation. The South Staffordshire coal mines, the coal coking operations, and the iron foundries and steel mills that used the local coal to fire their furnaces, produced a level of air pollution that had few equals anywhere in the world.
It is popularly believed that The Black Country got its name because of pollution from these heavy industries that covered the area in black soot. There is an anecdote (of dubious authenticity) about Queen Victoria ordering the blinds lowered on her carriage as the royal train passed through. However, historians suggest that it is more likely that the name existed even before the Industrial Revolution; outcroppings of black coal scarred the surface of the local heath, and the presence of coal so near the surface rendered the local soil very black.
The Black Country is also known for its distinctive dialect, which differs slightly in various parts of the region.
"Bostin" has become a slang-term of the Black Country. What was it before it was a slang term? That's for another time. Enough history for today.
Cheers,
Bostin
