(le Róislín)

In the last blog, I made quite a point of saying that certain compound words include a ‘fleiscín‘ in Irish and others do not, all depending on the spelling of the words that happen to be joined together in a ‘comhfhocal.’

What pattern do you see in these examples, all of which are comhfhocail?

drochlá

drochoíche

droch-cháil

droch-chroí

seanfhear

seanbhean

seanúll

sean-nós

The above examples show the prefix ‘droch-‘ used with four words.  The two that include the ‘fleiscín‘ begin with the same two letters that the prefix ends with.  That is to say, since “droch-” ends in “-ch,” we use the fleiscín when the second part of the word begins with “-ch” (cháil, chroí)

Of course, the second “ch” in the pattern is because the prefix causes lenition, changing “c” to “ch.”  If you look up the root words in a dictionary, you’ll find them under “c,” not under “ch.”  So the root words are:

cáil [kawl], which means …? (freagra thíos sa ghluais)

croí (kr^rree), which means …? (freagra thíos sa ghluais)

Similarly, when “sean-” comes before “fear” or “bean,” we simply apply lenition, but there’s no fleiscín.  So “fear” becomes “fhear” (pronounced “ar” as in “Larry”) and “bean” becomes “bhean” (pronounced “van”) for “seanfhear” and “seanbhean.”  But with “nós,” we need the fleiscín, so both parts of the word are clear (sean + nós).

So what is this word ‘fleiscín‘ that we keep using here?  It means ‘hyphen’.  There are various other forms of the word, like the verb “fleiscíniú” (to hyphenate) and “fleiscínithe” (hyphenated).

‘Fleiscín‘ is a diminutive of the word ‘fleasc,’ which has a fairly wide range of meanings.  We start with “rod” or “wand.”  Curve it, and we get ‘fleasc‘ meaning “band,” “hoop,” “circlet,” “rim of a wheel,” “wreath” (and there’s our title connection), or “garland.”  In the culinary realm, it can mean a “fillet” or “filet” (a long narrow strip of meat or fish, especially one cut in such a way that it is easy to debone), although these days, that would more likely be “filléad” (filléad sicín, filléad sóil bonne femme–what a name!, or stéig filléid).

‘Fleasc‘ can be given an anthropomorphic touch and mean a “stripling” or “scion.”  And finally, in language, punctuation, and typography, it can mean a “dash,” or historically speaking, the straight line or stroke used in ancient Irish ogham (ogam) writing.

Curiously, though, if we’re really talking about modern typography, ‘fleasc‘ as ‘dash’ has largely been replaced by ‘dais‘ (pronounced like its English counterpart “dash”).  So we have “eim-daiseanna” and “ein-daiseanna” in the fields of “clófhoirne” and “clóghrafaíocht.”  To pronounce those, remember, no “eim” as in “Heimlich” or “ein” as in “Einstein” sounds here.  Just “eim” like English “hem” and “ein” as in English “pen” or “hen.”   Kudos to anyone who remembers which mark is wider, the “em-dash” or the “en-dash.”

And then, just to add to the mix, we have the “corrfhleasc,” which is another type of “dash” in typography.  Kudos (again) to anyone who can guess which one.  Freagra thíos.  And no, it’s not a “churn dash”–that’d be a “loine.”  And it’s not a “dash of milk” (steall bainne, bolgam bainne).  Nor is it a type of race, like a “ráib céad slat” (hundred-yard dash).

Did you get the meaning of “corrfhleasc“?  If not, tá an freagra thíos, faoin ngluais.  SGF–Róislín

P.S. This ‘fleasc‘ is a completely different word from ‘fleasc,’ a ‘flask’ for drinking.

Gluais: cáil, reputation, so droch-cháil means “bad reputation”; croí, heart, so droch-chroí means “bad heart,” which itself can mean “a weak heart” or “an evil heart/disposition”;  nós [nohss], custom, manner, style, so “sean-nós” means “old custom,” “old manner,” or “old style,” and is primarily used these days to describe music and dance.

Freagra: corrfhleasc [kor-l^yask, with the “fh” silent], a swung dash.  That’s the mark that looks like the ’tilde’ we see in Portuguese, for example (São Paolo), but which is used either to indicate similarities or to indicate deliberately omitted parts of words in dictionary entries (sráid, ~e, ~eanna, telling us the additional forms are ‘sráide” and ‘sráideanna‘).