Tag Archives: séanmhar
How many ‘happys’ are there in Irish for the various seasonal greetings? Posted by róislín on Dec 14, 2017
(le Róislín) How many ways are there to say ‘happy’ in Irish? Quite a few, but for right now we’ll concentrate on two seasonal variations. One will be for saying ‘Happy Christmas,’ which in US English would be ‘Merry Christmas,’ and the other will be for ‘Happy New Year.’ The bottom line is that neither…
Happy, Happiness and Happy Dances in Irish (mostly based on ‘áthas’) Posted by róislín on May 25, 2015
(le Róislín) “I’m just doing a little happy dance.” Recently overheard at an event I attended, where one of the coordinators had had to sit on the floor because all the seats were taken. At the end of the event, she got up, did some yoga-like stretches, and one of the other coordinators asked if…
How to Say ‘Happy New Year’ in Irish and How to Pronounce the Consonant Cluster “thbhl” Posted by róislín on Dec 31, 2014
(le Róislín) Athbhliain faoi shéan is faoi mhaise duit. Happy New Year to you. Athbhliain faoi shéan is faoi mhaise daoibh. Happy New Year to you (plural). So how do we pronounce that, what does it literally mean, why are the actual words “happy” and “new” not in the phrase, and where does a consonant…
Happiness Is … Lots of Ways to Say “Happy” in Irish (including “Happy Christmas”) Posted by róislín on Dec 3, 2011
(le Róislín) Recently we talked about some of the more whimsical (i.e. jingle-ish) ways to describe Christmas (“Holly Jolly” and “Berry Merry”) in English and pondered their translatability into Irish. Today let’s get back to the more traditional Irish phrase, and look at its various forms (singular and plural, greeting and response): Nollaig Shona duit…