Wheen
A few, several - or, depending on the speaker, quite a lot. Almost always in the construction 'a wheen of [thing]'. 'A wheen of pints' is more than two and probably fewer than ten; the exact number is the listener's problem.
Etymology
From Old English 'hwōn' meaning little or few, via Middle English 'whan' / 'wheen'. The Old English instrumental form gave 'hwēne' / 'hwǣne' (somewhat, a little). Survived into Scots and Ulster Scots after standard English dropped it. Documented in Walter Scott from 1815 and through the Scottish literary tradition; Macafee's Concise Ulster Dictionary records the same construction in current Ulster speech.
In a sentence
I have six terriers at hame, forbye twa couple of slow-hunds, five grews, and a wheen other dogs. - Walter Scott, Guy Mannering, 1815
a wheen sheep and milk-kye in the fields - John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide, 1902
Historical notes
Wheen has a useful imprecision. Saying 'a wheen of people' commits the speaker to a quantity without naming one, in a way that 'a few' (clearly small), 'several' (oddly formal), and 'a lot' (clearly large) all fail to do. The word is also a documented contranym - in some contexts it leans small, in others it leans larger - which lets the listener supply the calibration the speaker has politely declined to give. In Ulster usage the construction 'a wheen of' is the standard form; bare 'wheen' is rare.
Sources
- Dictionaries of the Scots Language (DSL), entry WHEEN. · dictionary
- Macafee, Caroline. A Concise Ulster Dictionary. Oxford University Press, 1996. · dictionary