Apologetic apostrophes

The Shaetlan words for 'wool', 'all', 'of', 'full' are oo, aa, o and foo. Because they differ from StE they are sometimes written with a so-called apologetic apostrophe, such as

'oo'

a'

o'

fu'

because the writer thinks something is missing in the Shaetlan word. This practice only started in the Scots speaking area in the 18C as part of the Anglicisation process of Scots. But the apologetic apostrophe only serves to imply that Scots is a truncated version of StE, which is historically incorrect. These are perfectly correct and complete Shaetlan words in their own right. The equivalent would be a bit like writing

'bike

h'ook

n'ook

(with an apologetic apostrophe) in StE, because the Shaetlan words are longer (pushbike, hyook, nyook).

The Shaetlan word oo 'wool' comes from Old Scots oull (attested since 1447), which in turn comes from Old English (w)uul(l). It is a very old word that goes all the way back to Proto-Indo-European and is found in all branches of that language family. In Old Norse it was ull (which it still is in all Scandinavian languages). The pronunciation /u:l/ (without a /w-/) is attested in Old English from the 8C. The pronunciation /u:/ (without /w-/ or /-l/) is attested in Scots since at least the 18C.