Aon Focal Eile Part 1
The latest additions to the Oxford English Dictionary have caused quite a stir in Ireland as one of the nation’s favourite takeaway meals, the spice bag, has officially been added. The dish consisting of shredded chicken, chips, vegetables and spices has been a staple of Irish diets for some time but recently has become increasingly popular overseas with many takeaways, pubs and restaurants across the UK, America and Australia adding it to their menus. So maybe it is about time that the people at the OED have finally taken notice. This is just the latest in a long list of contributions to the English language from Ireland. We are well known for our storytellers, poets, writers, scholars and musicians after all. Here is a look at just a few of the other contributions we have made.
Whiskey: It will come as no surprise that the word whiskey derives from Irish, we did invent it. The earliest written record of whiskey was found in Clonmacnoise in County Offaly. Here it was referred to in Latin as aqua vitae, meaning ‘water of life’. Translated into Irish that would be uisce beatha (ish-ka ba-ha) and this is where we get the word whiskey.
Brogue: from the Irish word bróg (bro-g) meaning shoe. Bróg was a sturdy work shoe worn by farmers in Ireland and parts of Scotland. The first use of brogue referring to an Irish accent goes back to 1525 when it was used to describe the accent of people that wore those particular shoes. Nowadays brogue is also a style of men’s shoe with ornate details in the leather.
Hooligan: A violent person who causes trouble for others, particularly at sporting events. The word is a variant form of the surname Houlihan. The common Irish surname was used a lot when referring to a particularly boisterous and troublesome Irish family in music hall songs and newspapers in the 1880s and 90s. The term hooligan was then coined to refer to Irish and other immigrant communities around London. The word became popular after the publication of ‘The Hooligan Nights’ in 1899, which tells a supposedly true story of a young criminal named Patrick Hooligan. There is a prison record for Patrick Hooligan and some believe that he is in fact the originator of the word.
Galore: Simply from the Irish Go leór (guh lore), meaning enough, plenty or a lot.
Lough: From the Irish word loch (lokh). Lough is a Hiberno-English term which means we actually use the English word rather than the traditional Irish spelling.
Shebeen: A bar where alcohol is sold without a licence, usually in somebody’s shed, garage or living room. The word became increasingly popular in 2020 during lockdown. In South Africa a Shebeen is a place in a township where alcohol could be bought and drunk legally. The word itself derives from the Irish term síbín (shee-been), meaning illicit whiskey.
Banshee: Ireland is the land of folklore and legends and one of our most famous is that of the Banshee. A female spirit whose screams are said to foretell the impending death of a family member. It derives from the Irish bean sí (ban shee) or bean sídhe in old Irish, meaning woman of the fairy mound.
Gob: A very versatile word. It can be a lump, a chunk or large amount of something, an informal term for an American sailor, to spit or to say anything. But the most common meaning in Ireland is mouth. While the derivation of many of its meanings is unknown, gob meaning mouth is most likely from Irish where it means the beak or bill of a bird. The word lends itself to a number of other words such as gobble, gobby, gob-stopper, goblet, gobbet, gobbledygook and a personal favourite of mine, gobshite.
Morto: The latest update to the Oxford English Dictionary has included the word morto, a common slang word used in Ireland, particularly around Dublin. It means extremely embarrassed and is simply a shortened version of the word mortified.
Brat: An unruly or spoiled child. A number of languages including French and German claim to be the origin of the word brat. But a more likely explanation is that it comes from the Irish word brat (braht), meaning cloth or blanket. The first use of the word in English referred to cloaks and rags, particularly those used by poor people. It was then used to describe beggars because of the clothes they wore, and eventually it was the term used to describe the child of a beggar. By the 16th century brat was being used whenever somebody wanted to refer to a child in an adverse or disapproving tone.
Boycott: The word has it origins in Ireland but it refers to the English surname Boycott, specifically that of Captain Charles Boycott. Boycott was a land agent who worked for Lord Erne and was known for high rents and evicting the tenants who couldn’t afford them. In 1880 Charles Stewart Parnell and the Irish Land League organised a campaign of isolation against him. Rather than violent or aggressive protests, Boycott was shunned. Workers would refuse to work for him, businesses stopped trading with him and even the postman refused to deliver his mail. The situation started to gather international attention and the term boycott was coined to describe this type of social and economic exclusion. We now use it to refer to any organised form of non-cooperation or economic pressure.
Debs: While some countries have proms, we have the debs. A rite of passage for Irish teenagers, the debs are a social event held after the Leaving Certificate exams. The term itself is a shortened form of debutant ball.
Spree: Although the exact derivation of spree isn’t known, one possible explanation is that it comes from the Irish word spré (sh-pray) or spréach (sh-pray-akh) meaning a sparkle or a flash of fire.
Dig: Possibly from the Irish word tuig (tig). This is not dig as in to dig a hole, but like the phrase ‘can you dig it’ or ‘you dig’, meaning do you understand. These phrases became popular in the United States in the 1930’s with the emergence of the jazz music scene and are believed to have been influenced by Irish immigrants. Whist many Irish immigrants would not have been fluent in Irish, they would still have used Irish phrases like ‘an dtuigeann tú’ (on dig-in too) which means do you understand. While there is no solid evidence to back up this theory, it does make a lot of sense and was endorsed by Daniel Cassidy in his 2007 book ‘How the Irish Invented Slang’. Cassidy also suggests that the word jazz comes from Irish claiming it is a derivative of teas (tass) meaning heat, although I think that one might be a bit of a stretch.
