(le Róislín)

Bhuel, seo mise báite go dtí mo shúile ag léamh faoin difear idir thorthaí agus ghlasraí.  ‘Sea, fós.  Mar a bhí mé sa bhlag roimhe seo, ach anois “níos báite.”  Ceist na gcnónna agus na nglasraí pischineálacha atá i gceist inniu, chomh maith leis na sainmhínithe bunúsacha arís. 

So, let’s backtrack a bit there.  I’ve been immersed in reading about the difference between fruits and vegetable since the last blog.  And now, nuts and legumes are also part of the question.

Bhuel, ever onward, ag treabhadh pháirc na n-idirdhealuithe.

Back to the basics first–torthaí agus glasraí.

Torthaí: I suppose the basic keywords, beyond “síol” and “síolta” themselves, here are:

ubhóirín, ovule, based on “ubh” (egg)

ubhagán, ovary, at least in agriculture and botany, not to be mistaken for “uibheagán” (an omelette); another word for ovary is “síollann”

and at least sometimes, bia laíonach, pulpy flesh.

Note the use of “bia” (usually “food”) here for the “flesh” of a fruit, at least when pulpiness is involved–the other typical words for “flesh” wouldn’t really suit the context, e.g. “feoil” (usually “meat”) and, even more obscurely, at least for our purposes, “steillbheatha.”

But come to think of it, is there a difference between “pulpy flesh” and “fleshy pulp”?  Both may be used to describe the material around the seeds in fruit, ach mar a dúirt mé cheana, ní luibheolaí mé (ná pomologist ná fruiticulturist ná olericulturist ach oiread–focail iad uilig nach bhfuil mé ábalta teacht ar a leithéidí i nGaeilge).

But anyway, since “fleshy pulp” has entered the picture, what would it be i nGaeilge?  Hmm, and why did I never encounter the dilemma of differentiating “pulpy flesh” from “fleshy pulp” before?  Well, I can’t answer an dara ceist there but seo cúpla smaoineamh don chéad cheist.

For “fleshy,” the first word that would come to mind, for me, ar a laghad, would be “feolmhar” (meaty, etc.) as in a certain “fear mór féitheogach feolmhar,” whom some of you may recognize as Vernon Dursley in Harry Potter agus an Órchloch.”  But that doesn’t really seem to work here, since it’s sort of odd to describe fruit as “meaty.”  Although I guess if fruit can be “mellow,” it could also be “meaty.”  But it doesn’t ring familiar that way!

Note to self: Céard faoi “beef tomatoes”?  Ábhar blag eile, is dócha!

So how about another choice for “fleshy,” the word “méith,” which can also mean “mellow” or “juicy” in addition to its perhaps more typical meanings of “rich,” “fat,” or “fertile” usually regarding land, pigs, and the like?

As for “pulp,” to flesh out the phrase <unh!>, we have “laíon,” the noun on which our adjective, “laíonach” is based.

“Laíon méith” for “fleshy pulp” then, is dócha.

I can’t recall any adjectives based on “bia” (food, pulp, etc.) that would really serve today’s context.  There is “biata” (well-fed).  And “biatach” (food-providing).  And “biamhar” (abounding in food).  But none of them mean “pulpy.”

Of course we could always say “laíon laíonach” but how “leadránach” is that!

So anyway, sin cúpla rogha duit.  Needless to say, I couldn’t find any examples of “pulpy flesh” or “fleshy pulp” in any searchable Irish text, otherwise I would have presented them here straight up.  And Google Translate, which I find dubious at best, especially for Irish, bails entirely.  Google Translate tells me that the Irish for “pulpy flesh” is “flesh pulpy” [sic].  I kid you not.  They must think I’m ready to buy that swamp land in Florida that everyone keeps talking about.  I think it would be better to have no results than to simply reverse the word order of an English phrase and tell me that it’s Irish!  And I don’t trust Google Translate’s results for “fleshy pulp” either, since it seems to come straight from a text that discusses a “bean caife” (coffee bean!) and “shrimp dearg” and also forgets the (admittedly counterintuitive) “sa” after “istigh,” all within one sentence (http://our-travels.com/ga/guatemala/1070675).  So for whoever created that caption for the photo of the coffee beans, I applaud the effort, but the text needs some major tweaking.

And actually, is there a different between “pulpy flesh” and “fleshy pulp” other than the words used to describe them?

Before finishing, and hopefully without straying too far afield down this garden path, I can’t help but observe that “pulp fiction” in Irish is “garrfhicsean,” using yet another word for “pulp,” which is “garr.”  I’m a little reluctant to use “garr” for our basic purposes, describing fruit, since “garr” has overtones of other, less savory meanings, such as “ordure,” “filth,” and “garbage.”

At any rate, our sub-meme for the blog so far must be a slight variation on the title of the blog as whole:

“Síolta, ubhóirín agus gambaí de bhia laíonach … a thiarcais!” (Seeds, ovules and globs of pulpy flesh … oh my!).

So what are the takeaways for today’s blog?  Probably the most basic words are: “bia” (food, and in specialized contexts, pulp), “síol” (seed, which also gives us “síollann“), and “ubh” (ubhóirín, ubhagán, and in passing, uibheagán).  For the pulp literati among you, “garrfhicsean” is actually pretty useful, given its perennial popularity.  Just be sure to understand it as a compound word unto itself, not as “ordure fiction,” or some other such “cacophony” of meaning.

Hmmm, I wonder if anyone can run that one by Quentin Tarantino?  Was his Pulp Fiction ever subtitled in Irish?

And lo and behold, it looks like this blog will have to be another two-parter, since I’m out of space and I still haven’t really gotten into the glasraí, tiúbair, bleibíní, and gasa yet.  Nor the “cnónna” and the “glasraí pischineálacha” (aka “léagúim“).  Ábhar blag eile, roimh i bhfad. SGF — Róislín