{"id":83,"date":"2009-09-28T10:55:54","date_gmt":"2009-09-28T14:55:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/?p=83"},"modified":"2009-09-28T10:55:54","modified_gmt":"2009-09-28T14:55:54","slug":"tairge-gearrshaolach-guinness-%e2%80%93-an-cuimhin-leat-e-ar-bhlais-tu-e","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/tairge-gearrshaolach-guinness-%e2%80%93-an-cuimhin-leat-e-ar-bhlais-tu-e\/","title":{"rendered":"T\u00e1irge Gearrshaolach Guinness \u2013 An Cuimhin Leat \u00c9? Ar Bhlais T\u00fa \u00c9?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m still mulling over some good descriptions of Guinness in Irish and the one that comes first to mind, in English, doesn\u2019t seem to exactly fit in Irish.\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cMellow\u201d could be \u201cm\u00e9ith<\/strong>\u201d or \u201cs\u00famhar<\/strong>\u201d or \u201cmaothlach<\/strong>\u201d or \u201cl\u00e1naib\u00ed.<\/strong>\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>But these could also mean \u201cfertile,\u201d \u201csucculent,\u201d mushy,\u201d or \u201cfully ripe\/mature,\u201d in that order, and none of those terms seem to conjure up blas pionta Guinness, <\/strong>at least not \u201ci mo shamhla\u00edocht f\u00e9in.\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0 <\/span>Smaointe ar bith ag duine ar bith?<\/strong>\u00a0 <\/span>Any ideas, any one?\u00a0 <\/span>If so, please send them in as comments on the <\/span>blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/<\/span><\/a> page.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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

So I\u2019ll look for another Irish angle on Guinness for the time being, and wait to see what suggestions you might have for describing \u201ca pint of plain\u201d aka \u201cyour only man\u201d aka \u201ccara an oibr\u00ed<\/strong>,\u201d to borrow rather loosely from Flann O\u2019Brien aka Myles na gCopaleen aka Brian O\u2019Nolan.\u00a0 <\/span>OK with the aka\u2019s, just trying to be thorough and give credit where credit is due.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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

Bh\u00edodh Guinness \u201cBre\u00f3\u201d ann agus deirtear go raibh blas \u201ccitreach\u201d air sin.\u00a0 <\/span>Rinneadh as cruithneacht \u00e9 agus bhi tortha\u00ed agus sp\u00edosra\u00ed ann<\/span><\/strong>.\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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

Too bad \u201cBre\u00f3\u201d didn\u2019t catch on, since it showed that the company was trying to use Irish to promote a new product.\u00a0 <\/span>It was discontinued in 2000.\u00a0 <\/span>The word \u201cBre\u00f3<\/strong>\u201d was based on the Irish word \u201cbreo<\/strong>\u201d (usually without any long mark), which has a variety of meanings.\u00a0 <\/span>Guinness defined it as \u201cglow,\u201d but it can also mean \u201cfire,\u201d \u201cflame,\u201d \u201ctorch,\u201d or \u201cbrand\u201d (the burnable kind).\u00a0 <\/span>In most cases, the word \u201cbreo<\/strong>\u201d is a bit on the poetic side.\u00a0 <\/span>There are more basic words that I would say cover the same meanings: tine<\/strong> (fire), lasair<\/strong> or bladhm<\/strong> (flame), t\u00f3irse<\/strong> (torch, flashlight), and splanc<\/strong> (brand).\u00a0 <\/span>\u201cBreo<\/strong>\u201d is also used as part of the Irish word for \u201cflint,\u201d which is \u201cbreochloch<\/strong>\u201d (lit. fire- or spark-stone).\u00a0 <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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

But as a product name, it was certainly tarraingteach <\/strong>(catchy, attractive).\u00a0 <\/span>I\u2019m sure that that as a brand name, Bre\u00f3\u2019s similarity to the Italian word, brio<\/em> (vigor, vivacity) was neither coincidental nor overlooked by the creators of Guinness\u2019s advertising campaign for that brew.\u00a0 <\/span>In fact, though Italian, the word \u201cbrio\u201d is believed to have Celtic roots, as are a small but interesting number of other Celtic words we know via Latin or the more modern Romance languages.\u00a0 <\/span>Of course, the idea of a \u201cbrew\u201d that has both \u201cbrio<\/em>\u201d and \u201cbreo<\/strong>\u201d is especially appealing, both from a marketing viewpoint and for the \u201cblasl\u00f3ga<\/strong>\u201d (taste buds).\u00a0 <\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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

An cuimhin le l\u00e9itheoir ar bith \u201cBre\u00f3?\u201d\u00a0 <\/span>Ar bhlais duine ar bith agaibh \u201cBre\u00f3?\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

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

N\u00f3ta\u00ed: gearrshaolach <\/span><\/strong>[GYAR-HEEL-ukh, note silent \u201cs\u201d] short-lived; mo shamhla\u00edocht<\/strong> [muh HOW-lee-ukht] my imagination; bh\u00edodh [<\/strong>VEE-ukh] used to be, used to exist; deirtear<\/strong>, it is said; rinneadh<\/strong>, was made; cruithneacht<\/strong> [KRIN-yukht, note: first \u201ct\u201d is silent], wheat; tortha\u00ed<\/strong> [TOR-hee] fruit; an cuimhin le X <\/strong>[un KIV-in le X] Does X remember; bhlais<\/strong> [vlash] tasted<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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

Fuaimni\u00fa: m\u00e9ith<\/span><\/strong> [may], s\u00famhar<\/strong> [SOO-wur], maothlach<\/strong> [MWEE-lukh]; bladhm<\/strong> [blime, that is more or less rhyming with the fruit, \u201clime,\u201d the \u201cd\u201d being completely silent; breochloch<\/strong> [broh-khlukh]<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m still mulling over some good descriptions of Guinness in Irish and the one that comes first to mind, in English, doesn\u2019t seem to exactly fit in Irish.\u00a0 \u201cMellow\u201d could be \u201cm\u00e9ith\u201d or \u201cs\u00famhar\u201d or \u201cmaothlach\u201d or \u201cl\u00e1naib\u00ed.\u201d\u00a0 But these could also mean \u201cfertile,\u201d \u201csucculent,\u201d mushy,\u201d or \u201cfully ripe\/mature,\u201d in that order, and none of…<\/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":[4397,4399,4446,4447,4454,4462,4558,4620,4687,4688,5747,5834,6004,6061,6062,6463,6468,6971,7027,7666],"class_list":["post-83","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-irish-language","tag-blas","tag-blasloga","tag-breo","tag-breochloch","tag-brew","tag-brio","tag-cara-an-oibri","tag-celtic","tag-citrus","tag-citrusy","tag-italian","tag-lanaibi","tag-maothlach","tag-meith","tag-mellow","tag-pint-of-plain","tag-pionta","tag-sumhar","tag-taste-buds","tag-your-only-man"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83","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=83"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}