Moving house-Flitting

I said Viking as opposed to Dane - not the modern Dane. I suppose I should have said Norse. Or perhaps Scandinavian. Its amazing how our language developed.

Old Norse has the word flytja meaning to move or relocate so you are probably correct NfkDumpling.

NfkDumpling. On this trip I have learned that Vikings were not a race of people (or ethnic group) as I had thought but more a term like pirate. They came from different ethnic groups and banded together to rape and pillage. For some it was a part time way of providing for their people. In summer they would farm and in winter pillage.

So that means flitting is probably a Viking word then Esspee.

I'm from Fife too and we always said "flitting" when moving house. There's lots of "scottitisms" you never hear anywhere else.

Esspee That's amazing, thank you so much for posting. You learn such a lot on GN!

I contributed to this thread a couple of days ago and this morning I was in a museum in the Arctic in Kirkenes, Norway, just 8 miles from the Russian border when I spotted a display on Sesongflytting- annual migrations of the Sami people.
We knew the Sami people as Laplanders in my youth and every year they take all their worldly belongings and migrate from their winter accommodation to their summer homes near the coast.
So in Norway they too use the word "flitting"
As my granny used to say "It's a small world".

Well, we flit here in Norfolk! Moving at speed, in a hurry. Not just with house moves either. My mum used to flit around the house with a duster if she was in a hurry to make the place look respectable. I myself don’t do much flitting these days. More plodding which has to be carefully thought through.

Moonlight flit stems from a dead of night unannounced move to avoid debtors.

And I too remember the flit guns full of DDT to kill flies. I thought it was a trade name.

a moon light flit when someone couldnt pay the rent.....or doing something they shouldnt do at midnight..

GabriellaG: We called off-licences 'the beer-off' in Yorkshire.

Growing up in Lancashire we called the off licence "the outdoor"

Flitting still in common useage here in North East of Scotland.

I lived north of London growing up and ‘flitting...’doing a flit’ ....or indeed’ a moonlight flit’ was always used in the sense that the ‘flitter’ was avoiding debt or police!!

In Australia we say moving but then if you are flitting then you aren't moving you are running from something or someone....

I was brought up in East Yorkshire and flitting was moving and a moonlight flit was hasty and without people knowing in advance, presumably to avoid debts.
We also used a 'flit gun' to spray flies. It was like a bicycle pump with a canister of fly spray on the end and was pumped by hand.

Aberdonians still use 'flitting'. As a child, moving house was the only meaning of flitting for me.

I was brought up in West London and we used the term 'Moonlight Flit' for anyone who suddenly left their house quickly and disppeared.

According to the Cambridge English Dictionary it means:
to leave secretly, especially to avoid paying money that you owe:

We called off-licences 'the offee'.

The DH and I were watching 'Mrs Wilson' last night and saw the husband taking his wife away from a flat on which he had not paid the rent. 'Oh!' says the DH, 'Doing a flit!'

Yes, something I have done a few times!

As a Londoner "...doing a moonlight flit" was always part of everyday language, and something that happened frequently in our neighbourhood!

I was born and raised in Yorkshire and we always referred to anyone who was moving house as flitting. Anyone who was moving stealthily who owed rent was doing a "moonlight flit".

We ‘flit’ in North East Scotland too. A ‘moonlight flit’ was, as others have said, a hasty move under the cover of darkness to avoid any debtors catching you!

We always heard, ‘Saturday flit, short sit’.
My granny and mother used to say a dishevelled person was like ‘ a hoor at a flittin’ ‘

Moonlight flit and flibbertygibbert were used in Fife where I was brought up.