Irish baby girl names

[YourKindMoose]

What do you think of these Irish girl names?

Saoirse (seer-sha)
Aoife (ee-fa)
Etain (eh-tane)
Sadhbh (sive)
Béibhinn (bay-vin)

I like the first 3 but think the last 2 are difficult if you are not living in Ireland. I used to live in Ireland so I know the pronunciation but most of UK might struggle.

I love them all ❤️

Also to add...
Fiadh
Catríona
Cara
Laoise
Aoibheann

My favourites are Aoife, Etain, and Aoibheann - unfortunately I only had boys.

I love them all, but I live in Ireland and know how to spell and pronounce them.

It depends where you live. My comments are based on where I live (SE England).

Saoirse (seer-sha) - Will be misspelt and mispronounced (and as see-uh-shuh when you've said seer-sha).
Aoife (ee-fa) - Will be misspelt and mispronounced.
Etain (eh-tane) - Probably will be misspelt as Etaine.
Sadhbh (sive) - Will be misspelt and mispronounced.
Béibhinn (bay-vin) - Will be misspelt and mispronounced.

Otherwise, they're all nice.
Consecutive vowels or consonants get transposed often.

I’ve a very Irish name and lived in England for 20 years. No issues with people being able to say my name (once I’d told them what it was), and everyone learnt how to spell it.

My nieces and nephews have Irish names and live in England. People may need to be reminded about spelling and pronunciation now and then, it's worth it ☘️

Useful to people to know:
To add a fada, you can use a keyboard shortcut depending on your device:
on Windows, use Alt Gr + vowel, or Ctrl + apostrophe followed by the vowel.
On a Mac, use Option + e, then the vowel.
On a mobile device, long-press the vowel key to select the accented option from the menu that appears.

@BeautifulSongsofLove , my name is not 'english' and nobody here gets it right. No amount of correcting works. It gets misspelt on legal or financial documents, prescriptions etc.

I love the name Orla.

I know how to say Saoirse, but my head just says sore arse

Most people only need you to tell them once and then it’s fine to pronounce, from my experience in England! Spelling is a bit trickier!

I love Fionnuala.

I love Fiadh (Fee-a) but in an English accent sounds like fear.
I also love Aoibheann (Eev-even). Easy to say but difficult to spell, but people will get used to it.
Also Niamh. More well known in England.

when I was pregnant I considered Fionn (for a boy) my SIL said it like thin.

Aoife (ee-fa) - Will be misspelt and mispronounced.

My cousin had this name in the 90s London, the vast majority know how to say it.

Perfect if you live in Ireland but setting them up for a life of explaining if UK mainland or rest of world.

See my other post. @Psychologymam .
If you are a Fiadh, you can tell them that it's not Fee-ad, but they'll say Fee-uh.
If you are an Orla, it will sound different when they say it, they'll say Aw-luh.
If you are a Niamh, you'll get Neev.
Saoirse will be See-uh-shuh.

I wouldn't say don't use them, but if you aren't in Ireland you'll have to put up with the anglicised versions.
I never got used to the anglicisations of my name, but worse is that people get my name wrong or call me something really dated that just happens to start with the same letter. (e.g. calling me Beryl, Brenda or Bevan instead of Béibhinn)

I think it's tacky when English people use Irish names. Sorry

@Ws2210 Me too, especially if they say or spell them differently. (e.g. Katelyn, Killian)

Saoirse was my #1 girls name - j’adore!

Some lovely suggestions @AOIFEmissingUalways - how would you pronounce Aoibheann? (Ay-veen or Ee-veen or ?)

I agree @allmycats that last two might be trickiest outside of Ireland.

Should have added I am living in Ireland so should be no major issues with spelling/pronunciation for any of them although obviously can get different pronunciations for some Irish names, even in Ireland. I think I am leaning towards Aoife or Etain - one very common (Aoife) which is putting me off slightly as don’t want something too safe/common and one is very uncommon even in Ireland (Etain)…although wondering if there is a reason for that that I am missing!!

Any thoughts between these two?

I think Aoife is beautiful and the most familiar outside of Ireland from your list.

I like Saoirse too but even though I know one I still have to check the spelling every time - it just won’t stick in my head for some reason! Plus the one I know pronounces her name more like Sair- sha (which is pretty but adds more confusion if there are different ways of pronouncing it!).

my experience is different - people really made an effort and once it was corrected once (generally), I/my kids had no issue, people did pronounce them correctly in nursery/school but the r sound is tricky I will grant you that! we were in a urban multicultural setting though interacting with lots of nationalities, maybe that made a difference?

@Psychologymam , school might have got them right, mine did, but as an adult I find people don't.
If you are in a multi-cultural area, people will almost certainly speak more than one language, and that makes a difference.

people really made an effort The making an effort is worse than just saying it phonetically in my case.
and once it was corrected once (generally) doesn't work. People don't really care, or they just don't get it.

Imagine it was something Caitríona and people saying Kay-Tree-Owner, Cat-tree-Owner, Katreena etc, and spelling it Katrina, Catriona, Ciatriona etc.
(it's not my actual name).

I think we have different experiences of having Irish names living in the UK and that’s okay. My experience is different to yours but it doesn’t negate it, yours is not less valid because it was different for me and both perspectives may be useful for the OP.

I would pronounce it Ay-veen, but I know that's not correct.
I know 6 Aoibhín/Aoibheann/Aoibhinn - and only one goes by the Ee sound.

Aoife is not as popular as it was 10/15 years ago, it's dropped out of the top 5 (maybe even top 10) now.

I love Etain, but DH didn't.

Op is living in Ireland 🇮🇪