A ballicater is a jagged wall of ice that forms on a frigid shore when pans of ice catch on rocks and slush freezes over them. A Canadian woman who grew up in Newfoundland says she’s warned never to go near one. Ballicater, spelled several ways, including ballycatter, is found in the Dictionary of Newfoundland English, and may be an alteration of barricade or the Spanish barricado. The word barricade likely comes from the French barrique, meaning “barrel,” because early street barricades were made from barrels. The shift from an R to an L is plausible since the mouth produces the sounds of those consonants in similar positions. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of ““Ballicater,” a Newfoundland Word for a Jagged Ice Wall”
Hello.
You have A Way with Words.
Yes.
Hi.
This is Katherine.
I’m calling about a word that I used all growing up called Bally Catters, and I know I know what it is.
Mhmm.
It’s basically a wall of ice that’s built up by pans of ice catching up on the shore and on the rocks.
And then the sea freezes over that and the slush ice comes in.
And basically, just makes a wall of jagged pans of ice and slush.
And we were always warned not to go near it, And we always call them bally catters.
I don’t know where that word came from.
It seems such a strange word.
Catherine, where are you that you’re encountering all this ice?
So that was in Newfoundland.
-huh.
And you’re there still?
No, I’m in Ontario.
Okay, gotcha.
So these big walls of ice, ice, Martha.
This is, this is…
I don’t know how to say this.
It’s evocative.
It really is.
It’s so picturesque.
I’m picturing ice that’s formed along the shore there by freezing spray and waves, like, rough and jagged and clingy.
Is that your experience of it?
Yes.
And also, like, when the ice is broken up and it floats into the shore in big pans of ice, and they catch on the rock, and then more slush comes in over that.
So it’s quite dramatic.
So before we get into Bali Catter, but a pan of ice is, just a big piece of ice almost big enough to stand on?
Or actually big enough to stand on?
Yes, actually big enough to stand on, and sometimes, like, big enough to hold up a polar bear.
I mean, it all depends, right?
And also something else we weren’t allowed to go near.
Polar bears.
Yeah.
You know, any any size of of a piece of ice, basically, but large enough to stand on to anything really big.
It’s spelled a few different ways.
B a l l I c a t e r or b a l l y c a t e r, balicater or balicater.
What’s super interesting about this word is that it may be an alteration of the word barricade the Spanish word baricado, which means the same thing.
Which makes sense, doesn’t it?
Because it forms this kind of frozen barricade along the shoreline and Oh, absolutely.
Yeah, yeah.
The word barricade itself has a fascinating story.
It may come from the French word barrique, which means barrel because early street barricades were made from barrels.
Like in Paris, you know, you would you would set up a barricade by filling barrels with earth or stones or sand and setting them up, and that was a good way to keep people, away from whatever you were trying to keep them away from.
And balicatters do the same thing, don’t they?
Oh, absolutely.
Yeah.
So we’re not totally sure of that connection, but, but it’s a pretty cool possibility.
Yeah, we’d have to talk about how the R in barricado becomes a double L in barricadar.
And that double…
That’s because the Rs and the Ls are often pronounced in pretty much the same physical form of the mouth and the tongue.
Just a difference, slight difference.
So they, they easily, the mouth easily moves from one to the other.
Oh, interesting.
Thank you so much for that.
I really appreciate it.
Thanks, Katherine.
Take care.
Thanks for calling, Katherine.
Bye bye.
Bye.
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