Another groan-worthy typo illustrated. Mouseover the image to see the solution.
Another typo
March 10th, 2010Crazy spelling
March 6th, 2010Having pondered long and hard as to what might be the pottiest alphabetic spelling in any language, I have finally come to a decision. I considered:
ss → [z] in English scissors, possession etc.
Another candidate was Portuguese êm → [əiəi] (approximately, but nasalised), as in têm “they have”.
However, I award the Golden Doozy Prize to Donegal Irish for
-adh → [u:] in words like bunadh “origin, people, kindred” and many, others.
In Connacht and Munster the sequence is simply [ə], but where on earth did [u:] come from?!?!
Perran
March 5th, 2010Today is St. Piran’s Day. Perran, as he is called in Cornish, is one of the contenders for the title of Patron Saint of Cornwall. The other is St. Michael. Cornish saints, by the way, traditionally did not have the title “saint”. They were simply called by their name. Many place-names preserve this tradition: Breage (St. Breaca), Paul (St. Paul) and Zennor (St. Senara) are examples. Of course there are names of places which contain St. — St. Austell, St. Breward, St. Ives and so on.
Perran was obviously a popular guy, especially in West Cornwall. He is commemorated in a number of place-names: Perranporth (P.’s port), Perranzabuloe (P.’s place on the sands), Perranarworthal (P.’s place by the marsh), Perranuthnoe (P.’s place in the manor of Udno).
The remains of the old church at Perranzabuloe
Used under a Creative Commons Licence: Tony Atkin
St. Piran’s Day was originally a holiday observed by tin miners, as Perran was their patron saint. Apparently, the holiday was celebrated by the consumption of large quantities of alcohol, leading to the 19th century phrase as drunk as a perraner.
Most localities in Cornwall will be festooned with St. Piran’s flag today and there have been calls over the past few years to make the day a bank holiday in Cornwall. The day is even celebrated as far away as California, where the Cornish miners who contributed to the development of mining in Grass Valley are honoured.
Gráinne Mhaol
February 25th, 2010Gráinne Mhaol ([ɡra:ɳə we:ɫ] or [ve:ɫ] in Munster Irish) is the nickname of a feisty lady. Her real name was Gráinne Ní Mháille, and she is generally known as Grace O’Malley in English, which is a bit odd because Gráinne and Grace are not at all connected in meaning. She lived from about 1530 to about 1603 in County Mayo in Connacht in the west of Ireland. She was the daughter of Eoghan Dubhdara Ó Máille, head of a clan which was unusual for the Ireland of the times in that they were sea-farers and levied taxes from all the fisher-folk who ventured into the waters off their native lands, including fishermen from England.
According to legend, when Gráinne was a young girl she wanted to go on a trading mission to Spain with her father, but he forbade it, saying her long hair would get caught in the ship’s ropes. Gráinne promptly cut her hair short, thus shaming her father into letting her go with him. It was thus that she got her nickname, because maol means “bald, shaven-headed”.
Bronze statue of Gráinne Mhaol at Westport House, County Mayo
St. Buryan
February 21st, 2010My listing of West Penwith place-names has been on the back burner for a couple of months. No, let’s be honest. It’s ground to a halt. I must get going again soon. In the meantime, here is a little information about St. Buryan. This is a sizeable (by West Penwith standards) village between Penzance and Land’s End. The name derives from that of an Irish female saint, Beriana. The earliest recorded Cornish form of the village’s name is Eglosborrie (= “Beriana’s Church”). The modern pronunciation of the name is [sənt ˈbʌriən].
Beriana, according to legend, had a chapel where the present church stands, and administered to the sick and needy, but she was abducted by King Geraint of Dumnonia, and was only released after St Piran interceded with a miracle. Gereint said he would release her if he were wakened by a cuckoo calling across snow — a highly unlikely occurrence. St Piran prayed all night, and in the morning sure enough, snow, snow, cuckoo, cuckoo! Gereint, however, was a bounder and a cad, apparently, and although he did release Beriana, he changed his mind and tried to nab her again. In this attempt poor Beriana died.
