Irish names help!

[nothingseasy]

Hiya,
I'm calling out to all Irish speakers please.

I want to call my baby Ayveen In Irish. I've established from other threads that it's not Aoibheann or Aoibhinn or anything beginning with Aoi as this makes an ee sound. However nobody can conclusively say how it should be spelled.

I'd like to know what letters (diphthong/triphthong) make the aye/ay sound I am looking for. Do they exist in Irish?

Alternatives I've seen are

Éabhaoin
Éimhín
Aibhín

I personally favour the Aibhín but does ai in Irish make the sound ay?

Please help it's driving me mad!!

We are living in England and I want to keep a connection to my Irish heritage so I want an Irish name. We have trawled through them all and this is the only one we liked so when we found out it wasn't even said right we were devastated.

Please don't tell me not to bother with an Irish name in England or that I shouldn't give it an Irish name because they will have trouble e.t.c.

Help resolving the spelling is really all I am after.

Thank you x

@MindyStClaire

I'm with Lizzie, I think it's more likely to be a mistake and Aoibheann (Ayveen) probably has sisters Sorcha (soresha) and Caitlin (Kate Lynn).

I think there is a risk of what I would call spurious accuracy, where our (mis?)understanding of the language as she is written nowadays erases the traces of our past.

We don't have a clear understanding of the evolution of this name and its pronunciation though SeanChailleach, at least not on this thread.
There are some hypotheses, and your ideas in particular are very interesting, but we're not sure, or at least I'm not. I know very little about Old Irish. I certainly don't want to erase traces of the past, but I do want to make sure I interpret and understand them as accurately as possible. That's why I suggested to the OP that more research was needed.
I don't want to erase the past, but I don't want to misinterpret or misunderstand the past either.

[quote nothingseasy]@spookycookies

I appreciate your input but I'm looking for constructive help. I'm enjoying learning about words and where they come from and how they are pronounced. Please stop telling me not to use this name. I don't want negative input thank you very much.[/quote]
You might not want it but your kids going to get a lifetime of it.

If you are going to live in the UK you really do need to consider how easy any Irish names are going to be for the general public to pronounce though? I sometimes throw out Irish names in the office and ask people to guess how they are pronounced and Tadhg is one which causes much rolling of eyes and laughter. I also had a period of dealing with someone call Cathal and anyone else from the company who spoke to him mis-pronounced his name even after being told how to pronounce it. Love the name Lochlainn though - it's my youngest son's middle name!

@spookycookies and @unfortunateevents

I hear what your saying however this isn't really the point of the post. I'm Irish and have an odd surname and have lived here long enough to already appreciate this.

I was looking for help with and Irish spelling not help deciding on whether to have the name or not.

I want a connection to Ireland and an Irish name. Ay-veen is not difficult to say. It might be difficult to read but ppl get used to it like they have done with more "conventional" Irish names.

@LizzieAnt no we don't have a complete picture. Women's names in particular were written down less often and used in place names less often and used as surnames less often. So we have less source material to go on than with men's names.
The pronunciation of the name may well have been influenced by the gorgeous name Bé Bhinn. Or Étaín.

The very best book on Irish names is
"Irish names" by Donnchadh Ó Corráin and Fidelma Maguire
www.amazon.co.uk/Irish-Names-Donnchadh-%C3%93-Corr%C3%A1in-ebook/dp/B006YZWAFS?tag=mumsnetforu03-21

These are two great scholars who do know what they are talking about. Does include the spelling Aébfhinn which I do like and this is strong evidence that the name was pronounced the way the OP wants. It isn't Modern Irish, but I do sometimes feel like the Modern Irish orthography, genius as it is, still needs some more sounds.

The A at the start is needed because in Irish we join words together.
"B'Éibhinn í." has a slender b. "She would be Éibhinn."
"B'Aoibhinn í" has a broad b. "She would be Aoibhinn."

A whole freaking Irish phonics lesson in a single name... I'd better tell you that mh nasalises the surrounding vowels, like in French, whereas bh doesn't. This effect is most noticeable in Munster where we talk like North Wales Welsh funnily enough. And least noticeable in Ulster. The 2nd vowel in this name Aobheann is already nasalised by the nn which then affects the bh... Maith thú féin má tá tú fós ag léamh.

@SeanChailleach

Does this book tell you the pronunciation as well?

Also @SeanChailleach

Do u think either Éibhín or Aibhín work?

I have no idea whether this is right or wrong... but when I look at Éabhín written down (and I would pronounce this Ayveen) it makes me think 'Little Eve' which I think is lovely! So that would be the spelling I would choose

Aibhín doesn't work for me at all... seeing it written down I would automatically say Ah-veen. Like Ailbhe would be Alva

Thanks very much @SeanChailleach.

Thanks @Gooseysgirl but I think we realised Éabhín doesn't work because of caol le caol... there needs to be two slender vowels either side of the by 🙄

bh not by 🙈

The book only gives one pronunciation. There's a Look Inside preview.

Aibhín is quite different. With an a fada it might by Ayveen on Tory Island but not a lot of people know that.
Éibhín is close phonetically.
I'm coming round to the spelling "Aeibhinn", because the language is literally spelt "Gaeilge" so I hope people would agree that would be pronounced "ay", and you'll only have to educate them on the inn.

OP just to warn you, I've known two 'Eimhin's and both have been male and pronounced it 'Evan'. (There are fadas, I just can't do them on this phone) So you run the risk of it being mispronounced in the UK and in Ireland, which would be quite frustrating.

Also, the UK-born 'Ayveens' I'm aware of have spelled it Aoibhin (again, with appropriate fada) so if it becomes a popular name among this generation of Irish settled in the UK, which wouldn't surprise me, and its pronunciation becomes 'known' like Niamh and Siobhan you might find the one people recognise is the 'wrong' spelling. I know a lot of Irish-speakers, and quite a few Aoibheanns of various spellings, and my extended family are native Irish speakers, and while its incorrect I think Ayveen / Aoibheann/Aoibhin is definitely the most common spelling/pronunciation in current day Ireland.

Also, because nobody else has mentioned it - what about the boy's name 'Aodh'? Again, my understanding was that was pronounced like the letter 'A'? So some precedence there?

I think of all the options you've been given either Eabhaoinn, which most Irish people would get first or second time, or the Heaney version seem like the best compromise. I'll also say, from knowing the mother of an Oisin in London and working with another, that once people in the UK see a letter written down they will unable to pronounce an alternative vowel sound so I really think you'd benefit pronunciation-wise if you start it with an 'A.'

In regards to Oisin, I was constantly saying 'no, its like a 'U' sound, and people who hadn't seen it written down could generally make a sound like 'Usheen' but those who saw it written first could still only say O-sheen. I think if you start it with an E, you'll get E-veen, no matter how many times you correct people.

I just checked the book, the Look Inside preview.. The pronunciation given there is ī-vin, where ī is described as roughly equivalent to the sound in fee. So Eevin, I suppose.
That doesn't mean there weren't other pronunciations I guess.

I can’t help with the Aoibh sound, but my mind has been blown by this thread. Niall is not pronounced nye-uhl?! My whole life has been a lie.

I agree with the 'first letter' problems you might have in the UK, OP. I'd agree too that Aibh doesn't usually give the 'ave' sound you're looking for, unfortunately. At least, I've only ever heard it said as either 'ive' or 'av'.
Neil is the Irish language pronunciation of Niall afaik.

Yes. I take the point that 'Aibhín' isn't wholly true to Gaeilge. It's a hybrid between English and Irish.

@nothingseasy just goes to show I should have RTFT 😆 In that case I'd probably go with Éibhín... good luck with the decision, it's a gorgeous name 🥰 My DS has an Irish name and people rarely get the pronunciation or spelling correct, but it doesn't bother him in the slightest. Plenty of names about in other languages besides Irish that might be challenging to pronounce but everyone just gets on with it 🤷🏻‍♀️

To get Ay-veen I think you'd need to spell it Éibhín. If you live outside Ireland, just bear in mind she will spend her life correcting people who will mispronounce her name... It's quite a hassle as I know from experience!

Thanks @namechangemarch21

" Ayveen / Aoibheann/Aoibhin is definitely the most common spelling/pronunciation in current day Ireland."

Yes for sure it is and I do wish I was just happy to follow the crowd but after reading around it, I just can't. I can see my daughter asking me when she grows up why her name is spelled like that and I will sound it out saying, well.. bh is a v sound in Irish and i(fada) is and eee sound and then aoi is a .......well it's supposed to be ee but lots of people started saying it was ay so we went along with it. So I just can't do it I'm afraid.

"what about the boy's name 'Aodh'"

Yes I think that was one of the reasons we looked at maybe just dropping the i in Aoibheann/inn/i(fada)n so it became Aobheann but we can't have that because of the slender/broad rule in Irish. @SeanChailleach explained earlier that it may have been 2 words Aobh-bhinn in old Irish so the vowel issue wasn't a problem, only when you try merge it into one name.

Oisin was one of my fav boy names as well (my partner can't say it!) Again, I am aware of all the issues of English people not pronouncing it right, i can't think about that too much. Not to be offensive but English people and Americans to be honest are not good at pronouncing anything that isn't standard, not just Irish names. If I made my decision mostly based on that I'd end up calling it something I didn't like. It's obviously a slight consideration but it isn't on the top of my list by any means. I want it to sound right in Irish.

Aww don't worry @Gooseysgirl

Thanks for the encouragement. I know she'll face some hassle but also it's an ice breaker and a talking point and a reminder shes Irish which I think outweighs the mispronunciation.
I think she'll appreciate it when she is older. I have loads of Irish cousins in America with names like Niamh and Aoife and people get them wrong all the time but they love that they have Irish names. It's not always a negative.

I know @P0gM0Th0in

That's a new one for me too! I can't believe it! I honestly thought it meant Neil, like the way Sean is John (I think) but that it's actually pronounced Neil in Irish blew my mind!

Examples of aoi pronounced like English "ay" on teanglann:

Only in Munster:
www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/faoi
www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/gaoil
www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/naoi

Only in Ulster and a subtly different sound:
www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/saoiste
www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/taoibh

I had to search for these to prove to myself that I wasn't imagining it.