Frae

Part of speech: preposition

Definitions

1. A Scottish form of the word 'from', used to indicate origin, source, or direction away from a place or point
2. The Scottish variant of 'from', expressing separation, removal, or the starting point of an action or movement
3. A Scots English word meaning 'from', denoting the place, time, or condition that something originates or departs

Etymology: In Scots and northern English dialects, "frae" is simply the ordinary word for "from," and it is the same word that survives in the phrase "to and fro." The Old Norse "frá" (meaning "from" or "away from") entered the northern dialects of English as "fra" in Middle English, and that form became "frae" in Scots. The older English "fram" and the Norse "frá" are cognates, so the two come from the same ancestral root. Standard English kept a different branch. "From" descends from Old English "fram" and "fromm," while "fro" in "to and fro" comes from the Norse-influenced Middle English "fra," the same source as the Scots word. The northern form and the southern form thus diverged early and never fully merged, which is why one of them now survives mainly in a fixed phrase and the other is still a living word in Scots.