The final volume of a unique dictionary of the Scots language has been published.

The Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue (DOST) was originally proposed in 1919 by Sir William Craigie, a Scottish member of the team which produced the Oxford English Dictionary (OED).

The work, which has been supported by Scottish universities and charitable foundations and is published by Oxford University Press, aims to define and preserve Lowland Scots, which many people speak.

There are plans for an online version

Academics said completion of the dictionary required great scholarship and perseverance.

It contains the building bricks of the language of Lowland Scotland and is based on a million quotations from the Middle Ages to the 17th Century.

Sir William Craigie suggested that the OED should be followed by other reference works including a Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue, the first volume of which, A to C, was published in 1937.

It has taken another 65 years for the final volume to be finished.

'Lack of self esteem'

The team who worked on the dictionary gathered at a conference at Glasgow University on Saturday to celebrate the end of the project.

Senior editor, Marace Dareau, gave the keynote speech and said Scots need to have their language recognised in its own right.

The editor said: "When a wee Scottish kid goes to school speaking Scots, he's sat down and taught to read and write in English, another language.

"His reality is not acknowledged and this is bound to lead to a lack of self esteem. He's being told 'what you come here and offer is not good enough'."

The 12-volume dictionary costs just over �2,000 and will be accessible through the internet in 2004.