We recently went through the ways to count words like “euro,” “úll,” and “uair.” I included the last two since they illustrate additional features of Irish that don’t show up with the word “euro,” like lenition (séimhiú), eclipsis (urú), and h-prefixation.
Another currency that might often be discussed (and counted) in Irish is the “punt.” This could apply today to “an punt steirling,” or prior to the adoption of the euro in Ireland, to the “punt” as Ireland’s unit of currency. The Irish punt (punt Éireannach) was decimalized in 1969/1971 and that system lasted until as long as the punt system did (1999/2002). Prior to deachúlú, the Irish punt was divided into 240 pence and used terms like “scilling” and “coróin” for the larger coins. If we pursue all that, it will definitely be in a later blog, although it is a fascinating topic!
In the “córas deachúlach,” the Irish punt was divided into 100 pence (pingin). The word “pingin” was considered one of the special unit-of-measurement nouns, at least by many speakers, and so it was counted slightly differently from “punt” itself, in terms of initial changes.
Conveniently, for showing contrast, both words start with the letter “p,” which can take both séimhiú and urú. Let’s count, starting with “punt,” because it follows the standard rules, just like counting boxes or tables. Note that there is no lenition with “one,” because that number comes after the noun. Then there’s lenition for 2 through 6.
punt amháin, dhá phunt, trí phunt, ceithre phunt, cúig phunt, sé phunt
(the “ph” is pronounced like “f”)
And now for pence, according to the “units-of-measurement” rule:
pingin amháin (no change)
dhá phingin (lenition)
trí pingine, ceithre pingine, cúig pingine, sé pingine (no lenition but added ending –e)
And now 7 through 10 for both “punt” and “pingin”:
seacht bpunt, ocht bpunt, naoi bpunt, deich bpunt (eclipsis, no change to ending)
seacht bpingine, ocht bpingine, naoi bpingine, deich bpingine (eclipsis plus change to ending)
Remember that “pingin” can be pronounced either with the “soft ng” sound, like “singing” (but not “finger”) OR the “–ng-“ sound can drop out, leaving you with a long vowel sound, “ee,” in the middle of the word. So the basic word could be “PING-in” or “peen.” Also “pingine” was sometimes spelled “pingne,” just to add to the mix.
Not everybody uses this special units-of-measurement rule, and especially in the North, I’ve heard “pingin” treated as a regular noun, like “punt,” or “bosca.” Of course, it’s been a while since I’ve actually heard anyone talking about “pingneacha” at all, since the euro came in.
One other note about the “units-of-measurement” rule – not all possible units of measurement are included. The word for “week” is (so seachtain, trí seachtainí, no lenition) but the word for “month” is not (mí, trí mhí, with lenition). More on that later, má tá suim agaibh ann.
Agus an dea-scéal? And surely you deserve one after all this! Once you have multiples of ten (i.e. 20 and above, but not 10 itself), there is no lenition, no eclipsis, no prefixing, and no special endings! So we could have:
fiche punt, tríocha pingin, daichead úll, caoga uair, seasca euro (no change for euro anyway, of course, but it’s in the list just for good measure), srl.
Of course, it would be nice, if we were counting our own euro(s) or pounds, to be counting in much larger numbers, like míle or milliún or even, thinking even more wishfully, billiún (hmm, gilliún?), trilliún or cuaidrilliún. But all in good time. Can’t say I know of any Irish words that equate to the uimhreacha bréige that exist in English, for really large indefinite amounts, but it wouldn’t be hard to create them (*geasuilliún, *scuailliún, *feantuilliún, mar shampla), or, my favorite would be “*ump déag,” but if it’s real money we’re talking about, I’d prefer to have more than “*ump euro déag.” Guess why I chose “euro” there? No lenition, no eclipsis, and no precedent for which mutations “*ump” might cause, if it really were an Irish word.
Nóta: I’ve put two dates (with a slash) for the transitions to decimalization and to the euro because there are differences between the agreement to change and the implementation. The general range of time is good enough for our purposes since we’re primarily concerned with whether to lenite or eclipse here, not the details of the history of coinage. But I want to give people a rough idea of what time periods are involved, since many readers may have never seen pre-decimal currency in Ireland or in Britain or, if they’re relative newcomers to Irish, may not have seen the pence-pounds system since the euro is used in today’s Irish language textbooks.
Fuaimniú: punt: This is not pronounced like “punt” in American football or in boating, but more like the English “put.” These are all short “u” sounds but if you contrast “put” with the golfing term “putt,” which is like the football/boating punt, you should hear the difference. “Punt” is actually also used for the currency of the following countries: An Éigipt, An Liobáin, an tSiria, an tSúdáin. But I can’t say I’ve ever actually had occasion to use the phrases punt na hÉigipte, punt na Liobáine, punt na Siria, and punt na Súdáine in real life. Tusa?
Gluais: bréag, lie, falsehood; bréige, fake, fictitious, lit. of a falsehood; dea-scéal, piece of good news; *ump déag, looks like I’ll have to accept the responsibility for this coinage for “umpteen” since I don’t see any other examples of it online and don’t recall ever hearing it. If you actually use “ump déag” to count something (indefinitely), remember that since the number is in the teens, the item counted comes between the “ump” and the “déag” (ump rud déag, umpteen things), just like it would for a real number in the teens, like “aon rud déag” (11 things).
Bás Michael Jackson (1958-2009)
Posted by róislín 1 CommentBhuel, tar éis a bheith ag smaoineamh faoi, after pondering the matter, I figured I may as well join the sluaite (hordes) ag scríobh faoi Michael Jackson.
First stop, as usual, what else has been written about his death, as Gaeilge? Can’t say I found mórán (much). A cuardach Google limited to “Bás Michael Jackson” brought up 99 results, only one of which turned out to be in Irish. How’d that happen? An iomarca teangacha a bhfuil “bas” (gan síneadh fada) mar fhocal acu, go mór mór, an Fhraincis (see gluaisín thíos, for vocab help).
Next stop, minus the word “bas,” to eliminate the French and other languages. That brought me back to the móriomlán (grand total) of one result for “Bás Michael Jackson” as such. Searching in the Irish version of Google didn’t seem to make any difference.
Cúpla straitéis eile, a couple other strategies. How about using the “gaelú” (gaelicization) of Jackson’s name? But first, an explanation — names of celebrities and international figures are not usually gaelicized unless their bearer shows some precedent for doing so. That’s generally true, even if they have Irish or partly Irish backgrounds. Sampla gasta, a quick example, using Google hits as an admittedly rough frame of reference: “Bill Clinton,” 23,700,000 (ní nach ionadh); “William Clinton,” 356,000; “William Jefferson Clinton,” 320,000, but for “Liam Cliontún,” the gaelú of his name, the results were exactly tada, faic, a dhath ar bith – all Irish ways of saying “nothing.” And that’s despite his dúchas Éireannach (Irish heritage). Of course, I’m not saying here that no one has ever used the “Liam Cliontún” version of his name, just that it doesn’t show up in a Googlable manner. If the results had been, mar shampla, “Bill Clinton,” 5, and “Liam Cliontún, 0, then I’d say, “completely inconclusive.” But at 23 milliún+ to náid (0), I think we can safely say there’s no formal precedent for saying “Liam Cliontún” when referring to iaruachtarán na Stát Aontaithe (the former president of the United States), even if writing in Irish.
For good measure, I even tried “Liam Clinton,” a hybrid version of the name, since some people are more comfortable changing their “ainm baiste” (given name) for use in Irish language classes or social contexts, but are less likely to adapt their surname, even informally. “Liam Clinton” gave me about 155 hits, of which only a handful were actually about an tUachtarán, the president. There are other Liam Clintons in the world who come up in the search, including one who was born in 2009. And most of the presidential references were due to glitches in wording, which meant that “Wil-liam Clinton” (with word-break) would show up in my search for “Liam Clinton,” where “William Clinton” would not. So much for that ascaill (avenue), or, to be more concise, sin sin (that’s that).
There are some exceptions to not gaelicizing names, mar shampla, An Mháthair Treasa, possibly triggered by the expected translation of the honorific, and Criostóir Colambas.
So, now back to Mícheál Mac Siacais. Did searching for the gaelicized version of his name bring up any abundance of commentary as Gaeilge? Can’t say it did. I found a móriomlán of one actual article and two brief fan commentaries.
I also tried searching for “bás Mhíchíl (Mhícheál) Mhic Shiacais,” using the name in the genitive case (Mhic instead of Mac, etc.) figuring that anyone who cared enough about the ábhar (topic) to write about it in Irish might have gone ahead with the gaelú anyway. Glantoradh (net result), one repeat hit.
OK, so this has gotten me through blag amháin eile without even getting up to my intended project, a capsúlbheathaisnéis* of Jackson, as Gaeilge. So far, I’ve only gotten through whether or not it made sense to refer to him as Mícheál Mac Siacais (Mac Siac-Ó?). So the capsúlbheathaisnéis will have to wait for blag eile, and will be forthcoming, more on the “forth-“ (sooner) side of things if I hear from readers that they are interested in the ábhar. More on the farther side of “forthcoming” má chloisim (if I hear) tada, faic, a dhath ar bith uaibhse (from ye). Even though my own musical taste is much more traidisiúnta, I’m happy to write about virtually any topic that is tráthúil (timely) agus i mbéal na ndaoine (being talked about). But there are other topics looming large, tearmainn na n-asal (the donkey sanctuaries) agus an chéad scannán eile i sraith Harry Potter, mar shampla, so do let me know má tá suim agaibh!
Sin é – Róislín
*OK, OK, in the time-honored tradition of Gaeilgeoirí, especially those active before the general spread of World Wide Web and Internet usage, which brought online dictionaries and which I date to about 1994, I made up the word “capsúlbheathaisnéis.” I find no precedent for it online. But that is how new words get started. Hint: beathaisnéis itself comes from beatha, life + faisnéis, information, i.e. biography. I didn’t choose to say “beathaisnéis chapsúil,” since to me that would sound more like the life story of a capsule (say what?), from being part of sheet of plastic to being a tablet filled with medicinal powder. Not real exciting – it would sound a bit like the booklets we used to have ar scoil (at school), like “The Story of a Coffee Bean.” These would cover the saolré (life-cycle) of the pónaire chaife (coffee-bean) from péacán (sprout) to cupán “iáva.” Not that a pónaire chaife is really a pónaire, it’s really a síol (seed), ach sin scéal eile – Á.B.E.!
Gluaisín [GLOO-ish-een]: an iomarca [un YUM-ark-uh], too many; a bhfuil … acu [uh wil … AHK-uh], that/which have; gan [gahn], without; go mór mór, especially; an Fhraincis [un RANK-is, silent “f”], the French language, scannán, film, movie; sraith, series (“th” is silent).
Leideanna Fuaimnithe: faic [fwack], capsúlbheathaisnéis [KAHP-sool-VA-hash-naysh, silent “t”], uaibhse [OO-iv-sheh], beatha [BA-huh], faisnéis [FASH-naysh]. saolré [seel-ray], síol [sheel]