{"id":133,"date":"2010-02-11T18:07:21","date_gmt":"2010-02-11T22:07:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/?p=129"},"modified":"2016-03-29T06:51:12","modified_gmt":"2016-03-29T06:51:12","slug":"sneachta-casca-easter-snow-the-song-not-the-weather-forecast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/sneachta-casca-easter-snow-the-song-not-the-weather-forecast\/","title":{"rendered":"Sneachta C\u00e1sca: Easter Snow (The Song, not the Weather Forecast)"},"content":{"rendered":"

(le R\u00f3isl\u00edn)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A final thought on snow and Ireland would be the title of the traditional tune \u201cEaster Snow\u201d (Sneachta C\u00e1sca<\/strong>), as played by uilleann piper S\u00e9amus Ennis (1919-1982), amongst many others.\u00a0 It was one of Ennis\u2019s favorite tunes and he used it as the name of his house.\u00a0 Christy Moore used the tune title as the name of a song he composed as a memorial to Ennis.\u00a0 With its poignant lyrics (\u201cOh the Easter snow, it has faded away, It was so rare and beautiful, And it melted back into the clay\u201d), the song symbolizes the piper himself.\u00a0 It\u2019s available on \u201cThe Christy Moore Collection, 1981-91\u201d (<\/span>http:\/\/www.christymoore.com\/discography.php<\/span><\/a>).\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSneachta C\u00e1sca<\/strong>\u201d is actually a sort of bilingual \u201cmondegreen\u201d (a misinterpretation, particularly in folksongs or poetry).\u00a0 The term \u201cEaster Snow\u201d is believed to come from a place name \u201cD\u00edseart<\/strong> (or \u00cdseart<\/strong>) Nuadhain<\/strong>\u201d [DEESH-art (or: EESH-art) NOO-in], meaning \u201cdesert or retreat of (St.) Nuadh.\u201d \u00a0\u00a0There\u2019s no logical reason I can think of for the variant \u201c\u00cdseart<\/strong>,\u201d but letters have amazing ways of being dropped, added, or transmogrified as words go from Irish to English and back again.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Apparently the place name, near Boyle and Carrick-on-Shannon, sounded like \u201cEster Snow,\u201d to English speakers, and that became the English version of the name.\u00a0 This was later interpreted as \u201cEaster Snow\u201d and then translated back into Irish, becoming \u201cSneachta C\u00e1sca<\/strong>.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

If \u201cmondegreen\u201d is a newish word for you, it was coined ca. 1954 but didn\u2019t make it into major English dictionaries until a few years ago.\u00a0 Since it is based on mishearing an unfamiliar phrase in a Scottish ballad (\u201cLady Mondegreen\u201d mistakenly heard for \u201claid him on the green\u201d), the term can\u2019t really be translated into Irish, or any other language.\u00a0 Hmm, looking at that line in isolation, I\u2019d better add the context: \u201cThey hae slain the Earl o\u2019 Murray (Moray), and laid him on the green.\u201d\u00a0 Anyway, the term first appeared in Sylvia Wright\u2019s 1954 article in Harper\u2019s, available for a small fee at <\/span>http:\/\/www.harpers.org\/archive\/1954\/11\/page\/0048<\/span><\/a> if you\u2019re interested.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

However convoluted the origin of the phrase \u201cSneachta C\u00e1sca<\/strong>,\u201d Christy Moore\u2019s use of the term is an eloquent and fitting tribute to S\u00e9amus Ennis, \u201can fear ceoil.<\/strong>\u201d\u00a0 Hopefully by Easter time this year, we will have no further reason to be talking about snow!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

N\u00f3ta: C\u00e1sca<\/span><\/strong>, of Easter.\u00a0 This is the possessive form of \u201cAn Ch\u00e1isc<\/strong>\u201d [un khawshk] (the) Easter.\u00a0 It is used for many other phrases as well, such as \u201cCoin\u00edn C\u00e1sca<\/strong>,\u201d (Easter bunny), Domhnach C\u00e1sca<\/strong> (Easter Sunday), and Tine Ch\u00e1sca<\/strong> (Paschal Fire), where it is lenited, becoming \u201cCh\u00e1sca<\/strong>\u201d with an \u201ch\u201d and pronounced with the guttural (throaty) \u201cch\u201d also found in German \u201cBuch<\/em>\u201d and Welsh \u201cbach.<\/em>\u201d \u00a0SGF —\u00a0R\u00f3isl\u00edn<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(le R\u00f3isl\u00edn) A final thought on snow and Ireland would be the title of the traditional tune \u201cEaster Snow\u201d (Sneachta C\u00e1sca), as played by uilleann piper S\u00e9amus Ennis (1919-1982), amongst many others.\u00a0 It was one of Ennis\u2019s favorite tunes and he used it as the name of his house.\u00a0 Christy Moore used the tune title…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3898],"tags":[4671,5044,6735,6865],"class_list":["post-133","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-irish-language","tag-christy-moore","tag-easter-snow","tag-seamus-ennis","tag-sneachta-casca"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7788,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133\/revisions\/7788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}