Siling it down

[Graham-W]

Anyone know where the phrase "siling it down" for heavy rainfall comes from? Is it just a Yorkshire saying or is it used everywhere?

[Quizmonster]

It comes from the Scandinavian word, sil, meaning a sieve. Thus, the rain connection suggests that it is like water pouring from a shower-head or strainer. It's a dialect word used in the north of England and in parts of Scotland.

[Charisse]

It is a Yorkshire phrase, and it was siling it down yesterday!

:0]

[swedeheart]

<Is that my native tongue I hear spoken...?> Yes indeed, just as QM says, sil is sieve, at least in Swedish (haven't checked Danish and Norwegian but they may very well be the same). Over here it's not a common expression but if you were to say (in Swedish) that the rain is siling down/being siled down, anyone would immediately understand the kind of image you are trying to convey. I googled the phrase "regnet silar ner" (the rain is siling down) and got 151 search hits.

[Graham-W]

Thanks everyone. I suspected that, like laiking (playing) it had probably come to Yorkshire with the Vikings but it's nice to get it from the Swedehearts mouth, so to speak.

[swedeheart]

*neighs benevolently* :-)

[Quizmonster]

In its noun-sense of sieve, the earliest recorded use of sile in English dates back to the mid-15th century, but in its verb-sense of pour down it did not appear until the 18th.
Both were rather a long time after Danelaw-days. Mind you, it possibly was lurking around there in the North-east's 'collective unconscious' since Viking days.