We often see variations of the spelling, whether it’s shepard hut, shepperds hut, sheppards hut, even shephers hut – the list goes on! But which one is the correct spelling? In this blog, we delve into the origins of the term.
What is a shepherd’s hut?
Historians have traced these huts back to 1596, where an early text reads ‘the Shepheard hath his Cabbin going upon a wheel for to move here and there at his pleasure’ (another spelling!). Most people think they date from the Victorian era with their cast iron wheels and curved corrugated iron roof. They were a familiar site on the downlands of Southern England, existing as an important part of country peoples’ lives. The most famous in history is described by Dorset novelist Thomas Hardy. In the opening chapters of Far from the Madding Crowd, Hardy introduces a hut as the home to shepherd Gabriel Oak.
Originally, they would have provided welcome shelter from Britain’s unpredictable weather – as well as offering them a place to rest their head and escape from the elements during the lambing season, which would typically take place during the colder winter months. Owning a hut allowed farmers to practice better land management; the sheep flock was ‘folded’ or fenced with hazel hurdles across the downs, manuring the ground as they went.
There would have been space for a pot belly stove, intended for basic cooking and warmth, a bed and sitting area. There was usually a corner cupboard for bare essentials and veterinary medicines. The bed would often accommodate space underneath for unwell or orphaned lambs. So, essentially, they were huts used by or belonging to someone who tended to sheep on a farm.
What is the correct spelling?
Now, let’s look at the actual spelling of the word. Is it shepperd, shepherd, or shepard? According to the Collins Dictionary, a person who employed to tend sheep is called a shepherd, with the female equivalent being shepherdess. This is the same in both British English and American English. You can even look as far back as passages from the Bible, where in passages like Song of Solomon 1:8, there are references to “tents of the shepherds” and Zephaniah 2:6 “And you, o seacoast, shall be pastures, with meadows for shepherds and folds for flocks.”
In Far from the Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy refers to a shepherd’s hut that would have been moved around the farm and probably used by multiple shepherds over a number of years, therefore using the plural form of shepherds’ hut – crucially using an apostrophe.
‘The image as a whole was that of a small Noah’s Ark on a small Ararat, allowing the traditionary outlines and general form of the Ark which are followed by toymakers—and by these means are established in men’s imaginations among their firmest, because earliest impressions—to pass as an approximate pattern. The hut stood on small wheels, which raised its floor about a foot from the ground. Such shepherds’ huts are dragged into the fields when the lambing season comes on, to shelter the shepherd in his enforced nightly attendance.’ – Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd.
Getting down to the nitty gritty, if you correctly use grammar and use an apostrophe to show possession – it is indeed ‘shepherd’s hut’.
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