Áine (Irish - pronounced onya)

[FrazzledCareerWoman]

Yes or no... obviously no one will read it correctly..: but I love it

not for my hypothetical last chance baby number3 that I might not even have

My best friend is called Áine. I like it.
Shamefully we all say Onya, as she does herself, but when we all met at the age of 12 I suspect it was easier.
Her mum always says Awn-ya but her brother and sister say Onya.
She is totally not bothered how it's pronounced and mainly it gets shortened to Ons.

I like the name. I only know a few and none are babies. I would say Awn-ya.

I like it. Personally I prefer the name Enya as I think Ainé isn't too well known in England and would get lots of mispronunciation but it is a pretty name.

@Nellesbelles

I like it. Personally I prefer the name Enya as I think Ainé isn't too well known in England and would get lots of mispronunciation but it is a pretty name.

Enya is just one woman's nickname though. I think her name is Eithne.

I know an Áine and I had seen her name written without the fada before I met her. I thought it sounded like Ain. Had I seen the fada, I would have known it was irish.

@Ceramide

Too similar to aine which is French for groin.

Omg

This is a deal breaker

French MIL

So sad

@EekGoesTheBaby

I think it's beautiful. Just make sure the surname isn't slang for male genitalia (Johnson, Peters, etc)

@PleasantBirthday, Eithne is properly pronounced Enya.
(Actually it should be Enyeh- short e sound at the end - but heyho).

Some people pronounce it as if the name follows English phonetic rules - Eth-na - but that pronunciation is incorrect.

First thought is...onyabike

[quote mathanxiety]@PleasantBirthday, Eithne is properly pronounced Enya.
(Actually it should be Enyeh- short e sound at the end - but heyho).

Some people pronounce it as if the name follows English phonetic rules - Eth-na - but that pronunciation is incorrect.

[/quote]
You say "some" - I have honestly never met an Eithne who didn't pronounce it Ethna. Even the Irish-speaking ones (although to be fair none of them were from a Gaeltacht area). Maybe the anglicised pronunciation has just sort of become the norm? I'm not saying you're wrong, I understand how it should be pronounced in Irish (silent th etc) but I've just never heard it any other way.

Beautiful name.

@Littleheart5

It’s awn-ya not onya, but I really love it 😊

I've only heard it said like this

I prefer Anna with a short a, or even Anya, also short a - but it's OK

Love it

Sorry OP

I have honestly never met an Eithne who didn't pronounce it Ethna. Even the Irish-speaking ones (although to be fair none of them were from a Gaeltacht area). Maybe the anglicised pronunciation has just sort of become the norm? I'm not saying you're wrong, I understand how it should be pronounced in Irish (silent th etc) but I've just never heard it any other way.

Any Eithne I've met says Ethna too evilharpy - I'm in Munster, not a Gaeltact area, and it's the default pronunciation here now. I think when the name was revived the incorrect pronunciation mistakenly became commonplace. Mostly, people don't realise it's not the original way it was said. (As an aside, I'm not sure the 'y' sound would have been said in Munster either, the same goes for the y in Áine for that matter).

However, the link below shows some people do pronounce Eithne as Enya (the speakers are from Connemara and BridEilis also says she's a native speaker).

forvo.com/word/eithne/

I love Áine OP. It's a pity the French meaning spoils the name for you, but better to know now I suppose, given that you have French in-laws.

@evilharpy
I should have said, too, that the singer also pronouces her name as Enya, simply because that's how Eithne (her actual name) is said in the Donegal Gaeltacht. So there are a fair few people saying Enya for Eithne (just not where I live).

My favourite girls name. I pronounce it Awnya though!

As an aside, I'm not sure the 'y' sound would have been said in Munster either, the same goes for the y in Áine for that matter

The (N)Y represents the slender N in both Eithne and Áine.

It looks like donkey In french

Am Aussie so reminds me of “Good Onya”

Suppose it’s not that different to Sonia but also don’t like that name either….

I think it’s more of an adult sounding name that they could grow into, given time

Sorry Op I think it's very ugly.

LizzieAnt wrote:
I think when the name was revived the incorrect pronunciation mistakenly became commonplace. Mostly, people don't realise it's not the original way it was said.
In Old Irish, "th" is a voiceless dental fricative. In Modern Irísh, it is either silent but tends to lengthen the vowel, (Donegal) or it is pronounced as a "h" (West Cork iiuc)
Bríd Eilís is a native speaker so whatever she says is right for Connacht.
With names sometimes an old pronunciation persists long after all other words have moved on. Eithne was a very common name, and I am not sure it ever did fall out of use, so maybe the "th" sound in there reflects memory especially in places where Irish was widely lostbefore the sound changed from th to h.

chickenpie1984
I know several and pronounce is Ann-ya. 
No, you're just pronouncing it wrong, and they're being polite.

Umm no I'm not. Im a fluent Irish speaker and have taught in Irish medium schools in NI. In our accent this is how everyone in my community pronounces it.

Dawn and Don sound exactly the same in my accent also.