Gaelic names spelling and grammar

[ShanKayak]

This thread is for talking about grammar and spelling of Irish Gaelic and Scots Gaelic names, in the hope that posters looking for baby name inspiration won't find their threads running off topic.

Question for all you knowledgeable folks. Internet wasn't really around when naming our DC and poor DS2 didn't have a name for nearly 2 weeks. Anyway we put our favourites on a list and passed it back and forward until we were left with 2, Ciaran and Keir, the latter being my choice. I understand that the "an" means little and on that basis (he wasn't likely to be little and wasn't a "junior") I got my way, but DH wanted the "Scottish" version so spelt it Ciar. I'd overruled him when wanting to use Creagh instead of Craig previously so agreed.

When I returned to work, a native gaelic speaker from the Western Isles told me that whilst it's a word, it would never be used as a name and I think it's probably more Irish if it is anything.

My view would be that it's the original form of Ciaran so is possibly Irish gaelic or just made up, anyone able to clarify?

“My view would be that it's the original form of Ciaran“

It’s not, Ciar is dark/black, the little isn’t there to mean a little Ciar or Ciar Jr it’s what changes it to little dark one rather than just...dark...

Similar meaning to Keir then anyway which is swarthy/dark etc. He was a very swarthy baby, blond toddler and now dark again so I guess it suits.

It's just so much easier to find things out now than it was back then.

Thank you

It’ll be the same word tbh, just spelled Keir has become a name and ciar hasn’t.

What’s a word or a name is a bit arbitrary really, I mean, precious stones - lots of names, precious metals, nope, may and June are fine, August sometimes, September, no, that’s where we stop, lol

[quote florascotia2]In Scotland in 2019:

Alasdair 23
Allistair 17
Alastair 6
Alisdair 2
Allister 1

From Scottish government website 2019:
www.nrscotland.gov.uk/statistics-and-data/statistics/statistics-by-theme/vital-events/names/babies-first-names/babies-first-names-2019/list-of-data-tables[/quote]
That may well be the case - I was speaking, as stated, from my own experience - Facebook friends list alone reveals 8 Alistairs, 3 Alastairs and only one Alasdair. I suspect there is a degree of regional variation too - mine will be predominantly north east and south east Scotland, fewer from the west coast or highlands... More than willing to be wrong on a statistical basis!

I have a Róisín. The fadas are very important to her.

How do fadas work on documents and general paperwork? Is it too troublesome? I am really loving Róisín but will being out of Ireland (in the UK) make this a nightmare with paperwork?

You can download a keyboard with them or use ctrl commands.

@fairytimes

How do fadas work on documents and general paperwork? Is it too troublesome? I am really loving Róisín but will being out of Ireland (in the UK) make this a nightmare with paperwork?

What kind of paperwork are you thinking of?

Passports, birth certificates, bank paperwork. I am absolutely clueless about this so just thought I would ask, maybe I'm just overthinking it

If you’re physically completing a form via writing or typing, obviously include fadas, though sometimes, filling in online forms, they won’t ‘accept’ a character with a fada, so you omit. No more than mildly irritating.

Sadly, UK passports don't feature diacritical marks. It's discriminatory and gives the lie to claims of being an inclusive society.

@mathanxiety

Sadly, UK passports don't feature diacritical marks. It's discriminatory and gives the lie to claims of being an inclusive society.

In fairness, I think I remember when Irish passports started allowing fadas. And last time I booked an Aer Lingus flight (it’s been a while), it didn’t accept them. Some HSE forms used not to accept them either.

@mathanxiety I didn't realise this until my daughter's UK passport came back with her middle name incorrectly spelled Maire instead of Máire. It massively winds me up!!!

Unfortunately, using the fada can sometimes be a problem within Ireland too @mathanxiety.

www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/people-have-no-absolute-right-to-fadas-in-names-watchdog-finds-1.3852465?mode=amp

I have DC with Scottish Gaelic names, (Scottish Gaelic speaking family)one which is Eilidh, I have cringed at versions I’ve seen, the worst being Ayley;they admit they’d heard the name but didn’t know how to spell it 🙄
Personally I think it’s best to name DC within your culture/heritage.

@LizzieAnt

Yes, ró means 'too/very' in Irish as well florascotia2. Ró-ard means too high for example. I haven't heard it used in the sense of 'before', but then I'm not a native speaker or as fluent as I'd like, so I'm not sure if it's used in that sense in Irish. The modern Irish version of Ruadh is spelt Rua all right - I think the OP is using Irish in that example she gave.

OP, I think you need to make it clear when you write something here whether you're referring to conventional wisdom/established fact or just telling us your own novel musings! I like the way you think - still chuckling about Solomon/ Súilleabhán from another tread - but it's causing problems when you present something as fact without a shred of evidence. People feel obliged to correct you then in case it causes confusion.

I like that list florascotia2. Thank you.

Wow what a lot of responses. Anything I say here is just musings. Hadn't realised they were novel or unconventional. It seems to me that some posters think they have a more complete knowledge and understanding of Gaelic than they do, so they assert that I am wrong. I try not to say anyone is wrong, and hope I have not done so here. I love the language, it fascinates me, and I would encourage others to learn it.

But you’re wrong about several things.

I don't know @ShanKayak. I, for one, don't think I've a complete knowledge and understanding of Irish. In fact, I know for sure I don't, not even close. I wish!!
Neither do I think the language is like some moral dilemma where there's no right or wrong. Things are thankfully a bit more clearcut. If I get things wrong I appreciate someone telling me and I enjoy learning from others as often as I can. You make it a bit more challenging mind you - I never know whether to believe you or not
I guess most of us on this thread love the language. Glad to see you back.

Catching up. Coming back to the spelling Mhairi or Mhàirì. It's a spelling that is used and suggested, and has people saying it is "wrong". I feel uncomfortable when people mock or jeer at any name. This one intrigues me. Why did this form get used ever?
Anglicised forms of Scots Gaelic names very often seem to be derived from the vocative. Eg Hamish. Why is this? Is it that people were asked to write their names in English spelling and chose to use the vocative form? Or is it in fact a case of naming children with a surname, as is common in Scotland? Or was the Gaelic fading in contact and under pressure from English, so that people without education in Gaelic spelling and grammar began to use the dative/ genitive/ vocative case forms on place of the nominative form?
Is using the spelling Mhàirì in some way connected to whatever happened to the Anglicised names? Doubtless some people are using this form without being clear why, but others may be honouring a mother, aunt, or grandmother, and someone somewhere might have an explanation.

At the same time as it was banned in schools ,Gaelic became romantic, exotic, the 'other'. People just borrowed bits that appealed to them, without bothering to check.
I don't think there's any grammatical pattern.

People most certainly did not write their names using the vocative. Why should they? They'd use the nominative. BUT for most of the early 20th cent, Gaelic was banned in schools, so they would have written their names in the English form: eg Mary for Mairi. I remember older neighbours telling me how they were beaten if the spoke Gaelic in the classroom or playground - even if they and their classmates had no other language aged 5 or 6.
As I've said before, Hamish is an ENGLISH language name. It's not used as a Gaelic name. If a Gaelic-speaking person had written their name down c 1900 - 1960s, it would have been either Seumas or James.

On the spelling Roisin, without any fadas, this would be the appropriate spelling for a name that I have heard all my life, with two short vowels. I am not sure if it is the same name as if you added fadas, which I have also heard all my life said in many ways including to rhyme with "washing", which could be spelled without fadas, except that it follows the usual way those sounds would be said in Ulster dialect, so it is predictable is the speaker would feel they are making both vowels long.
The name without fadas may come from another root, as similar sounding names exist very widely and they don't all mean "Rose".
If you want to name your child "Rose" in Gaelic the the two fadas are required for the standard spelling.

@ShanKayak

On the spelling Roisin, without any fadas, this would be the appropriate spelling for a name that I have heard all my life, with two short vowels. I am not sure if it is the same name as if you added fadas, which I have also heard all my life said in many ways including to rhyme with "washing", which could be spelled without fadas, except that it follows the usual way those sounds would be said in Ulster dialect, so it is predictable is the speaker would feel they are making both vowels long. The name without fadas may come from another root, as similar sounding names exist very widely and they don't all mean "Rose". If you want to name your child "Rose" in Gaelic the the two fadas are required for the standard spelling.

Are you talking about Irish now, in relation to Róisín, or Gaelic?

The name without fadas may come from another root, as similar sounding names exist very widely and they don't all mean "Rose".

There is no name 'Roisin' without fadas.
There simply isn't.

Pronunciations of many names within certain accent regions are consistent with the existence of fadas.

Nobody would have used the vocative form to write their name in either Scotland or Ireland. The vast majority of people with Gaeilge or Gàidhlig as their first language would have used an English equivalent of their name on official documents, rent books, etc. Despite not learning formal grammar of their languages (because it wasn't taught in schools) they would have known the nominative and other cases of names and all the rest of the nouns of their languages and used them all correctly.

And YY to the question of what language are you referring to when you post the word 'Gaelic'?
Because if it's the language native to Ireland, it is either called Gaeilge or Irish, not Gaelic.

Yes, I think it's conventional now to say Gaelic when you mean Scottish Gaelic and just Irish for the language spoken in Ireland (when you're speaking English). To be fair, somtimes using Irish Gaelic as a term can be useful when speaking with someone who's fairly unfamiliar with the language. I've met Americans, for example, who were very surprised and disbelieving to hear that Ireland had its own language - until the word Gaelic was mentioned! They were familiar with that, but not with Irish as the name of a language.

In Irish the name of the language is Gaeilge....but the word is pronounced differently according to dialect by native speakers. (I suppose the various spellings were standardized in the 1950's along with many others.) The pronunciation in Connacht matches the spelling, but in Munster the name of the language is pronounced Gaolainn, and was - and sometimes still is - spelt like this (or as Gaelainn, though that seems to break the rules). In Ulster, inerestingly, Gaeilge is pronounced Gaelic, but I'm not sure how this was, or is, spelt by native speakers there (though I've come across Gaelig??)

So it's fine to say Gaelic when referring to the Irish language when you're speaking in Ulster Irish...but it's seemingly not the done thing when speaking in English - because it could get confused with Scottish Gaelic, I suppose?