Active discussions

Help protect children from gaming harms.

Take our survey

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Baby names

Find baby name inspiration and advice on the Mumsnet Baby Names forum.

Original poster

Amhlaoibh

138 replies

working9while5 · 08/10/2011 11:05

For a variety of reasons, if we have another boy we would like to give him this name.

It's pronounced Oh-lee-uv, and is the Irish version of Olaf. I am Irish and we have strong Norse connections, and this is a family name on my side.

However, clearly is it a NON RUNNER for a baby living in England, to be honest I doubt many Irish people can pronounce it.. so, we are trying to think of a way of incorporating it that will not lead to torture for any baby boy we have.

My granduncle Amhlaoibh had Humphrey as the English version of his name (back then, births had to be registered with an English name) and was called Uncle Free when the family spoke in English. Where they got Humphrey from Amhlaoibh I have no idea, but I'm not sure about it! Possibly thinking (randomly) James Amhlaoibh or Amhlaoibh James and we might do what my family did and call him James. It is common in both our families to have children known by their second name but have an alternative first name, so I have a nostalgia for this even though it makes sod all sense really!

Unless someone can think of a better alternative??

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
Set a reminder
libelulle · 09/10/2011 20:28

Coming late to the party, but I like olaoibh! If you are going for pronounceability in england, I'd go with the initial o myself. I know no Irish but have enough Irish friends with names incorporating an 'aoi' or 'aoibh' sound to know how it is pronounced - aoife is reasonably well known as an Irish name IMO - so I could decode olaoibh, but would have trouble with the amh sound. Amusing really re bunfight about unpronounceability of Irish that it is in fact far more phonetic than English!! Anyhow, it's a good name. My mum has an unpronounceable French name and it's really not abig deal to just tell people how to pronounce it. Though I have opp problem as my very english name is useless in France. My aunts and uncles still spell it wrongly after 35 years, which does nark me a bit...

Booooooyhoo · 09/10/2011 20:26

oisin is right pink Smile

Mollydoggerson · 09/10/2011 20:22

I personally do not like the name, but I do like the story behind it, so as a middle name it ensures the connection to your forefathers is cemented and if this is important to you then 6o for it.

pink4ever · 09/10/2011 20:14

Sorry but I think it is a horrible name and I love irish names-both my ds have irish names but like you couldnt find a girls one we could both agree on so our dd does not have an irish nameSad

I do think it will become very annoying as they get older having to constantly spell/correct the pronounciation. I know this because one of my ds gets this already and he has a relatively simple irish name imo.

If you are determine to use the name then I think it would be better as a middle name.

Irish boys names I love but dh vetoed-

Fergus
cillian-my fave
oisin-am sure this is not how you spell this one!

Booooooyhoo · 09/10/2011 20:04

yes northern ireland here SCOTT.

mathanxiety · 09/10/2011 20:01

True about the broad to slender transition, Shecut. Interesting compare and contrast paper here wrt Irish and Russian diphthongs.

Working, I agree about the D in Irish names not sounding quite right when pronounced as an English D.

Original poster
working9while5 · 09/10/2011 20:00

We don't call it Gaelic in the South as usually that is what Scots Gaelic is called and it is traditionally the way the English name the Irish language, which is "less satisfactory" to my ears.

The point about using "in my opinion" is still relevant...

Tyr, if you speak Irish in the Ulster dialect, your pronunciation of this name will be very different to mine but I'm sure I don't have to tell you this. I do think it's a little bit strange that you chose to be quite as negative about these names as you did. You don't like them, that is fine. Your comments seem stronger than that though. Extrapolating that you know my motivation for naming my child is to be "original" without even knowing any of my reasons or paying attention to the fact I said it was a family name was just a bit, well, odd.

OP posts:
Floggingmolly · 09/10/2011 19:59

He'll have a lifetime of explaining/ spelling it which can get really tedious. I have an obscure Irish name myself, so I speak from bitter experience... Smile

SheCutOffTheirTails · 09/10/2011 19:57

An Ghaeilge is referred to in English as Irish.

Unless I am mistaken, both booy and I are resident in the "North of Ireland", and are familiar with Ulster dialect.

Why that would make you some kind of expert on names used in Munster is beyond me.

mathanxiety · 09/10/2011 19:53

'the idea of putting a Norse name (which sounds fine in their language) into Gaelic is twattish in the extreme.'

But it already is a transliteration of the Norse Olaf. It's not original. And no more twattish than the anglicisation of pretty much every single OT and NT name, plus all those French, Greek, German, etc., names that are accepted as 'English' now -- James, William, Charles pronounced with the hard CH, Frederick, George...

It's not Gaelic, btw. It's Irish.

SheCutOffTheirTails · 09/10/2011 19:53

mathanxiety - but think of aoi after an l - even in Connemara Irish that changes the vowel sound because you have to come out of the broad l into the narrow bh. I can see where the diphthong comes in, although when I say it it is barely audible.

Aoife is different, because you start in the vowel.

Booooooyhoo · 09/10/2011 19:52

what tyr means is that donal is easy for him/her to say, the others require moving your mouth and so just isn't worth the effort, because i mean, if you must be 'out there' and traditional with names then at least make it easy for the english. we do name our children with english people's convenience in mind dont we? Hmm

Tyr · 09/10/2011 19:51

I grew up in the North of Ireland and speak the Ulster dialect although I haven't used it for the best part of 15 years. An Ghaeilge (if you prefer) is referred to in English as "Gaelic" or "Irish" (which is less satisfactory)
Your comment about an embryo is ridiculous.

mathanxiety · 09/10/2011 19:50

x-post with Shecut re dipthong and Aoife.

I have a Russian friend Lev whose 'slender' L is lost on a lot of non-Russian speakers.

ClarenceDarrow · 09/10/2011 19:48

its Irish, not gaelic, that would be Scotland.

SheCutOffTheirTails · 09/10/2011 19:47

Oh yes, Nyee-uv and Oing-ye :)

I don't so much like Neev and Awnya.

Sorry for slagging off your Dad's name, I forgot. I dislike it with the soft D, hadn't even considered the awful Doe-nal.

Original poster
working9while5 · 09/10/2011 19:47

Also, in terms of sonority, vowels carry more resonance than consonants, so Amhlaoibh, having more consonants and (in my pronunciation) a diphthong is more sonorous than Dónal.

OP posts:
mathanxiety · 09/10/2011 19:46

Tyr; here's a phrase that you might be unfamiliar with -- 'in my opinion'. Often abbreviated to 'imo'. It might come in handy.

Booooooyhoo · 09/10/2011 19:46

opinion is not fact.

mathanxiety · 09/10/2011 19:45

Digression -- Maybe Cork or Kerry Irish inserts an epenthetic vowel (I think there's another term in Greek for this but if there is I've forgotten) for the slender 'aoi' + 'mh' that Connemara Irish doesn't. How does Aoife sound in Cork?

My (sadly non-Irish-speaking) DCs got used to my own unheard of Irish name.

SheCutOffTheirTails · 09/10/2011 19:43

"sonically repugnant" :o

What a completely ludicrous thing to say about any name, never mind a name in a language you don't even know the name of.

But I am intrigued that you know that an embryo will be so upset by a particular name when born that he won't be able to live with it. What amazing foresight.

Dónal is a horrible, thick and flat sounding name. The idea that it is objectively sonorous confirms your lack of taste in Irish names.

Original poster
working9while5 · 09/10/2011 19:40

I don't know what the reasons are that you speak of Tyr, it sounds like you are trying to get a reaction from me really. Though I have to laugh that you can say that a name is "sonically repugnant" and call me twattish Grin.
Are you Irish? Yes? No? If yes, it's a shame you view the sounds of the Irish language in such a way. If no, you probably can't pronounce these words anyway.

OP posts:
Original poster
working9while5 · 09/10/2011 19:37

Yes you are right about the dark l/broad l sound. I struggled with whether to write it as lee-iv or lee-uv for that reason, as the "u" makes it too long. I would probably now say Aoife without it, but as a little girl and listening to my father it would definitely have had this little extra "bit". Of course I've had a lot more exposure to it as a name where this sound doesn't exist e.g. in common pronunciations, so it has faded. The problem is that I am not a native speaker, my father's family were the last to be native Irish speakers as my grandfather moved out from Coolea and into the city.

My father's family all spoke Irish growing up but they had a terrible time of it at home and so are quite ambivalent about their Irish, they all switched to their English names when they grew up with the exception of my father who is still Dónal. However, because my father was an Irish speaker, I learned the pronunciation of the names from him and they are different to what an English person or another Irish person with limited Irish would use. Dónal is a name I could never use, because it would be pronounced with a hard d and that just sets my teeth on edge. I suppose realistically what you are saying about Oleev is right, and I feel the same about Niamh and to a lesser extent Áine which also has a velar/back quality when spoken by my father anyway, sort of like it almost has a hidden "ng" in it somewhere.

OP posts:
Tyr · 09/10/2011 19:32

"Ollie" the child could live with. For reasons that should be obvious, I'd avoid "Tadhg" too. Aside from the obvious, it is as sonically repugnant as "Amhlaoibh."
Compare that to "Donal" (for example) which is pleasant and sonorous.

HoneyPablo · 09/10/2011 19:31

I don't think it's twattish. I love the story of the heritage of your family names and agree that you should use it somewhere in your child's name (if it's a boy).