Irish Language Blog

Whose horns? What dilemma?

(le Róislín)

Amongst the numerous phrases in English for being, essentially, stuck between two difficult choices, we have “between Scylla and Charybdis,” “between the devil and the deep blue sea,” and, perhaps most widely used of all, “between a rock and a hard place.”  Irish, natch, has its equivalents.  One is, fairly straightforwardly, “rogha an dá dhíogha a bheith agat” (to have the choice of two “worsts”).  That one’s pretty much like saying “to choose between the lesser of two evils.”

But let it not be thought that English has cornered the market for figurative speech.  Irish keeps pace handily, metaphor by metaphor, simile by simile, and tagairt liteartha by tagairt liteartha.  Just think of all those madraí bána, dromanna muc, liúdair (a iompraíodh go Toraigh) and, of course, na laethanta go léir a bhí ag na Paoraigh ó thús ama.   If that has you a bit mystified, let’s just say those are fodder for future blogs.

So, while “Sciolla” and “Cairíbdis” may be an ancient analogy, so is the popular (and seasonal) Irish phrase, “a bheith idir dhá thine Bhealtaine” (to be between two May Day fires), which is considered the Irish equivalent of being “on the horns of a dilemma.”  The Irish phrase works quite well in a literal interpretation, as long as one has a basic understanding of the importance of tinte cnámh in ancient Irish ritual (and even into relatively recent modern times, as for example, in Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa, admittedly a fictionalized treatment).

To be “between two May Day fires” refers to the traditional practice of driving a cow between two bonfires lit for this purpose on Lá Bealtaine (May Day).  This is presumed to be a purification ritual and may have had further religious significance.  I’ve also been wondering whether this cattle-driving ritual also had something to do with preparation for taking the cattle up to the higher hills for the summer pasture (the formal name for the practice being “transhumance”).  May 1 is the beginning of summer in the Celtic calendar, so perhaps the cows could not be driven up to summer pasture until they had been purified?

The phrase “a bheith idir dhá thine Bealtaine” actually breaks down quite literally:

a bheith [uh veh, with a short “e” pronounced, like “vet”], to be

idir, between

dhá, two, causes lenition to the following word (if lenitable)

tine, fire; lenited after “dhá” so it becomes “thine” [HIN-yuh]

Bealtaine, May; lenited after “thine” because the phrase is really “of May” (lenition indicates the ‘of” aspect)

One can also be “gafa idir dhá thine Bhealtaine” (caught on the horns of a dilemma)

Anyway, getting back to the English word “dilemma,” the usual Irish equivalent to “dilemma,” as such, is “aincheist” ([an-hyesht] ain-, bad, unnatural, over-, intense  + ceist [kyesht], question).  That’s a fine word, but it doesn’t really deal with the two-pronged aspect of the situation.  There are a few other choices, “cruachás” (lit. hard situation), “achrann” (entanglement, tangled growth, strife) and “sáinn” (trap, fix, predicament), but again none of these use any of the prefixes for “two-“ or “bi-“ in Irish.  So be it.  I tried every combination I could think of combining “dé-“ or “dá-“ with “leama” but got nothing.  A fhealsúnaithe, cad iad bhur mbarúlacha (since all this di-lemmatizing started with philosophy anyway)?

It does seem a convenient figure of speech, though, to be on the horns of a dilemma as we drive cattle through the tinte Bealtaine.  Not, of course, one of your muley-headed (i.e. hornless) cows, at least for present purposes.  That’s “muley-headed” in its original, or at least agricultural sense, i.e. a polled or hornless cow.  “Muley” here is based on a Celtic word for “bald” (Irish: maol, Welsh: moel), of course, otherwise I wouldn’t bring it up.  Actually that’s not true.  I’m equally interested in loanwords from languages as diverse as Narragansett, Basque, and Klingon (such as succotash, chaparral, and qep’a'). I’ll assume the last one qualifies as English now since I see it embedded in English sentences.

“Muley-headed” can, of course, also mean plain ol’ ornery stubborn (aka bull-/hard-/pig-headed), in which case it’s not connected to “maol/moel,” but is simply comparing a person to a mule.  Bhuel, come to think of it, I guess a “muley-headed” calf could be both hornless and stubborn.  If the “muley-headed” calf has been missing for two days, as the song “The Old Chisholm Trail” tells us, maybe it has a stubborn streak as well.  Remember?  “Spent two days lookin’ for muley-headed calf / Ain’t been to sleep in a week and a half /Come a ti yi yippy yay yippy yay come a ti yi yippy yippy yay.”  Hmm, cén Ghaeilge a bheadh ar an gcurfá sin? Comataidhaigh-ghippí-é-ghippí-é, comataidhaigh-ghippíghippí-é?

Cows, horns, and dilemmas notwithstanding, what I’d really like to know is why heelless shoes are called “mules.”  Eolas ag duine ar bith?  Ábhar blag eile, b’fhéidir?

I do wonder, since we’re talking about cattle and all, how the situation would pan out if we were driving a four-horned cow through the fire, in which case, would we be on the horns of a tetralemma?  Although I can’t find any attested Irish for that, I assume it’d be “teitrileama (teitri-, tetra- + leama, lemma).  At least the territory hasn’t already been claimed with the more general words for dilemma (just to review: aincheist, cruachás, achrann, sáinn).

Bhuel, a lán ábhar do bhlaganna eile as a bheith ag caint faoi aincheisteanna, faoi thinte, faoi Bhealtaine, agus faoi nósanna cainte.  Deacair an chéad ábhar eile a roghnú, ach dóigh amháin nó dóigh eile, déanfaidh mé é.  SGF, Róislín

P.S. Speaking of “liúdair” (coalfish), you might remember the brief “tagairt” to them in the blog of 23 February 2010, http://blogs.transparent.com/irish/notai-fuaimnithe-pronunciation-notes-don-bhlag-deireanach-or-not-your-abuela%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%9Cua%E2%80%9D-vowel-sound/ .  As I recall, no one actually responded re: the presence of coalfish in the waters around Tory, but the comments section is always open.  A iascairí?  A iasceolaithe?  A Rí Thoraí (i. A Phatsy Dan Mhic Ruairí)?  Eolas ar bith agaibhse?

P.P.S.  In writing this blog, I diligently searched for any examples I could find of a more literal approach to those old dilemmatic horns, but I didn’t find anything using both “adharca” (horns) and “aincheist”, or any related forms, except as a very occasional calque.

(le Róislín)

Thinking further about all the “time” words we’ve recently discussed, another thought struck me, with interesting vocabulary implications.  The following terms use the “-time” suffix in English, but not in Irish.

Daytime: there are several ways to express this, none using “-time” as such: an lá (as a noun) and, for “in the daytime, “sa lá,” “i rith an lae” (with the tuiseal ginideach), and “isló” (a bit literary, perhaps dated, but still in use)

Night-time: like “daytime,” we have the same basic idea, “oíche,” for both “night” and “night-time,” and similar prepositional phrases, with “san oíche” or “istoíche” for “at night-time,” and “d’oíche” or “de shiúl oíche” for “in the night-time.”

For the four seasons, we can either use just the basic noun, or add “ráithe” (three-month period, season, quarter), which means we also switch to the genitive case.  None of the words for seasons typically take any of the usual Irish “time” words as a suffix or to make a compound word as such.

Springtime: “an tEarrach,” with “san earrach” for “in the spring(time).”  Less commonly, we have “ráithe an Earraigh” [… un YAR-ee]  with a total of 6 Google hits.  For “san earrach,” though, we have at least 620 hits, with ca. 17,600 before duplicates, etc. are eliminated.  A substantial difference either way!

Summertime: usually just “an Samhradh.”  There is also the phrase “ráithe an tsamhraidh” [… un TOW-ree].  Total hits online for “ráithe an tsamhraidh” – four!  For “sa samhradh,” about 609, out of 11,600 (before sorting out the duplicates).  Plus another 554 for the Northern dialect version, “sa tsamhradh” [suh TOW-roo] (out of 1,770 before sorting)

Wintertime: “an Geimhreadh,” with occasional use of “ráithe an gheimhridh” [… un YEV-ree].  Total hits for the latter?  Eight, including four duplicates, so five, really, in, erm, essence.  Simply using “sa,” we have two variant phrases to track: “sa ngeimhreadh: gives us 158 (out of 637 pre-sorting) and “sa gheimhreadh,” which yields 469 (out of about 13,100 pre-sorting)

But no “fall-time” or “autumn-time,” i mBéarla!  Diabhal a fhios agam cén fáth!  Irish, though, more consistently has occasional uses (trí amas ar líne, sin an méid) of “ráithe an fhómhair.”  That comes from “Fómhar” (autumn, fall, harvest).   “In the fall/autumn” gives us 629 hits for “san fhómhar” (out of ca. 7750 pre-sorting) and 449 for “sa bhfómhar” (out of ca. 2580).

Clearly the phrases with “sa”: are more widely used than the phrases with “ráithe.”  Not that these Google searches are absolute, and they will also change constantly, but they do establish a pattern – that including the element of “time” is just not that critical for these “season” terms.

A final interesting word in this regard is “eadra,” which has fascinated me since I first learned it.  “Eadra” means “late morning milking time,” “the time spent by cattle as they wait to be milked” (hmm, are they aware they’ve got their own word for this?),  or, in an even further extension, “late morning” (without milking),“dinner-time,” “noon,” or “an idle interval.”  The word “bó” (cow) can be added for clarity but the term is understood without it.

Somewhat contradicting my general point in this blog, about “time” words without the “time” element, we do also have “eadarlinn” (milking-time) or “eadarlinn na mbó,” where “linn” has been added, a slight spelling change has been made, and we now have a time-related suffix.  The exception that makes the rule?

Here’s an intriguing seanfhocal to wrap up the “eadra” discussion, “Déanann na ba seasca féin an t-eadra” (even dry cows take advantage of the milking-time rest).

That “seasca” is the plural of “seasc” (infertile, unfruitful, dry re: cows).  Nothing to do with the other “seasca” (60) in case you were wondering.  Another use of this “seasc,” and a great word for your next Irish-medium eco-cocktail party is “corr sheasc” (a sand-eel without milt or roe).  Just what I was planning to talk about with my friends tonight.

I hunted around on line and on the printed page for an exact equivalent to “Time is of the essence.”  I didn’t find any word-for-word translation (ní nach ionadh), that is, nothing that actually included the word “eisint” or “bunbhrí” or “éirim” (not “eírím,” the verb, with the “i-fada” but “éirim,” the noun, with two short i’s).  But I did find two interesting results.  Someone writing on Answers.com contributed the following “Ní tráth moille é, based on “This is no time for delay.”  (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_Gaelic_for_’time_is_of_the_essence’, which works as expressing the same basic sentiment.  And more formally speaking, I found the phrase “am ina bhuntréith sa chonradh” for “time of the essence of the contract.”  Literarily, it means “time in its ‘essential quality’ in the contract.”  You may know “conradh” from “Conradh na Gaeilge,” where it means “league,” but it also means “contract, agreement, or treaty.”

Bhuel, sin é don bhlag seo agus tá súil agam nach am amú é.  SGF, Róislín 

(le Róislín)

OK, so what’s that hybrid title all about?  The last blog discussed how the word “aimsir,” usually meaning “weather,” can also mean “time” in certain phrases like “aimsir na Cásca” and “in aimsir na bhFiann.”  That got me thinking, how many other ways are there to say “time” in Irish?

So I figured I’d carpe the old diem, since there’s no time like the present, and strike while the iron of vocabulary intrigue is hot.  In other words, I’d take “time” (“uain”) by the “forelock” (“urla”).  Hmm, that’s as opposed to what, a hindlock? Ah, in Irish, that would have to be the “cúilín” (hair on the back of the head, ach sin, once again, ábhar blag eile, especially considering all the rule and regulations pertaining to hair in medieval Ireland).  Not that I’ve ever actually heard “cúilín” translated as “hindlock,” in fact, I’ve hardly ever heard “hindlock” in English but Googling gives me about 300 samples of it online, mostly pretty obscure stuff.  It’s not in any of my hard-copy dictionaries, though, English or Irish.  As for taking time by the hindlock, well, …

Anyway, back to the question, how many ways are there to say “time” in Irish?  This blog will briefly describe a baker’s dozen (that’ll be thirteen), wrapping up with at least a couple of phrases in Irish that are about some aspect of time, but which don’t actually include any of the Irish words for time, including the classic, “Time, gentlemen, please!” and phrases “like “seven times as,” regarding size or amount.

But let’s start at the beginning, with the word usually learned first in most Irish language programs, “am” (pronounced like “ahm,” not like the English verb “am” as in “I am”).  Here are a few key phrases for “am””

1a. Cén t-am é? or Cén t-am atá sé?  What time is it?  You might ask, “Where’d that “t-“ come from?”  The same place it came from when we say “an t-am” (the time), or for that matter, “an t-úll” or “an t-oráiste.”  Since “cén” is really a compound of “cé” + “an,” the same rules apply for “cén” as apply to “an” (cén t-am, cén t-úll, etc., also cén eilifint, cén bhean, etc.).

The usual answer to this is “Tá sé a haon a chlog,” or whatever time it is you wish to say.  As in English, we don’t tend to repeat the word “time” in the answer.

1b. Cén t-am ar tháinig sé?  What time did he come?  Note that this question phrase is followed by “ar tháinig,” not “a tháinig,” which can be used elsewhere.  We have the same basic set-up for other verbs, that is, the dependent verb form, with “a” in the present and future tenses (Cén t-am a bhfuil …?  Cén t-am a mbeidh …?), with “ar” for most past tense verbs (Cén t-am ar ith sé?  Cén t-am ar ól sé?) and with “a” for some of the past tense irregulars (Cén t-am a raibh …?  Cén t-am a ndeachaigh …?).  There are various interpretations of this rule, but my understanding is that the idea is “at what time did he come,” triggering the dependent form, as opposed to a question such as “Cén t-am atá sé?” (where “sé” equals the time) or “Cén t-am atá feiliúnach?” (where the adjective “feiliúnach” describes the time).  Those two examples use “atá,” the independent form of the verb.

Now, how about the other twelve words for time?  Here goes, in alphabetical order,  which means that “aga,” probably the most obscure of them, happens to come first.  I’m sure there are more possibilities but this should be go leor for now:

2. aga, a period of time, an interval, as in “Caith aga leis!” (Take your time with it!)

3. aimsir, time, as in this proverb in slightly archaic Irish , “Do b’fhéidir do luchóig le haimsir cábla do ghearradh ar a dhó” (In time, i.e. given enough time, a mouse may bite a cable in two).  Also means “tense” for verbs and “time of year.”

4. cian, a length of time, an age, as in “ó na ciantaibh” (from time immemorial) or ”ó chianaibh” (a while ago), both still used but featuring the archaic dative plural (–ibh ending)

5. faill, time, occasion, opportunity, chance,  as in “ag feitheamh na faille” (playing for time) or “nuair a bheidh faill agam” (when I have a chance/the time)

6. linn, a space or period of time, as in “idir an dá linn” (in the meantime, lit. between the two time periods)

7. ré, portion or period of time, as in “i ré Iorua” (in the time of Herod); “ré” also means “space” and “moon” (although “moon” is more typically “gealach”)!

8. saol [seel OR sayl], time, as in “ar na saolta seo” (in these times, nowadays); also means “life,” “world,” and “all creation” in different contexts

9. seal [shal], time, spell, stint, as in “do sheal a chur isteach ar na báid” (to do your stint of time on the boats)

10. tráth [traw], time, hour, occasion, as in “i dtrátha na Nollag” (around Christmas) or “Tráth na gCeist” (Question Time, a quiz show)

11. tréimhse, period or term of time, as in “sa tréimhse a bhí dlite” (in the time that was allotted).  Sometimes, more specifically, “a three-month period of time.”

12. uain, time, interval of time, opportune time, as in “ar uainibh” (by turns, at times, occasionally; with the old dative plural ending, -ibh) or “breith ar an uain ar an urla” (to take time by the forelock)

13. uair, time, hour, season, as in “an uair seo den bhliain” (this time of year) or “baois na huaire” (the folly of the times).  This is probably the most commonly used of all of these twelve examples, occurring in widely in expressions such as “Cén uair …?” (When …?) and “trí huaire” (three times).  Occasionally it can also be used for “weather,” in a neat reversal of the “aimsir” time-weather continuum.

Well, sin trí fhocal déag ar “time.”  So, which of these do we use in Irish for “Time, gentlemen, please!”  Well, at least according to standard lexicography, none of them.  The phrase “Caithigí siar iad!” (lit. drink them back/down) suffices.  Of course, these days, the phrase shouldn’t be limited to “gentlemen,” but should instead perhaps be phrased as “gentlepeople,” or, perhaps more colloquially, as “folks.”  Or drop out the vocative, and just leave the imperative (in Irish) or the noun with verb implication (“time,” i.e. “drink up”)

We could ask, though, is this phrase even needed these days, now that pubs have all kinds of hours?  And how did it come about anyway?  Well, the origins probably go back to beginnings of the registration of drinking hours (whenever that was), but I did discover one new piece of the puzzle, albeit a very English one.  Time, Gentlemen, Please! was the name of a 1952 movie, set in the fictitious village of “Little Hayhoe” (no less!) and starring Eddie Byrne (the Dublin actor) as an archetypal boozy but sly old codger who gets the “luck of the Irish” in this quintessentially English setting, half-timbering and all.  The movie also features Hermione Baddeley, Raymond Lovell, and Sid James, in case you’re interested.  How the Irish character ends up in Hayhoe is never stated but the story is mildly amusing, if we can forgive the stereotyping.

Another “time” expression in English, which is “time-less” in Irish is “seacht n-oiread an méid sin,” where both “oiread” and “méid” mean “amount.  So the full phrase would be translated as “seven times as much” or “seven times that amount.”  More literally, but a bit awkwardly, I’d say, “seven amounts of that amount.”

Well, that’s thirteen ways to say time in Irish, plus a couple of extra expressions, and I’m sure there are more.  Keep in mind that most of these words have multiple meanings, and may well be translated in other ways than “time.”  But that’s all we have time for in one blog.  Maybe we’ll return to this topic am éigin eile (some other time).  SGF, Róislín