Tilly
Tilly
In Brief
Applying free indirect style in a small way to a minor
character, the narrative of Telemachus approaches the
language of the old milkwoman when it says "She poured again a
measureful and a tilly." Like the "baker's dozen" of English
tradition, "tilly" is a Hiberno-English word for giving
customers a little additional measure of the substance they
are purchasing. It comes from the Irish tuilleadh,
meaning "extra" or "added."
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In An Anglo-Irish Dialect Glossary for Joyce's Works
(Syracuse UP, 1987), Richard Wall defines "tilly" as "a small
added measure given by milkmen, shopkeepers, etc., to their
customers." Terence Patrick Dolan's A Dictionary of
Hiberno-English (Gill and Macmillan, 1998) supplies a
similar definition: "a small amount added to anything as a
token gift or for good measure, especially by milkmen." Dolan
supplies the example of a seller from Cork who "always gave a
tuille with a pint of milk."
