Irish Translation Forum

Whoa! I'm happy to have gotten all these replies, thanks everybody!

To Gumbi: You've been really helpful, thanks! How do you pronounce Madra Allta and Faolchu, by the way?

To Redwolf and BridMhor: Redwolf, I guess being called "Mac" must've been annoying! I wish I could get a personalized license plate like that . So, "glas" can mean green or grey? That could be an interesting wordplay, but how do you differentiate between the two colours, then?

To Errigal2466: I agree with you about war being anything but beautiful. My real name is Arabella, so if you take the Latin route it would be Ara-Altar and Bellum-War. In Italian, though, "ara" remains the same and "bella" would be "beautiful". As to why an Irish pen name, well, Irish culture has always interested me and I've just started to act on that interest. It's a really different world for me (I'm Mexican), and I'd like my pen name to reflect that in some way.

EDIT: Just read the new replies. So, Faolchu uaine would be correct then?

psellia wrote:Whoa! I'm happy to have gotten all these replies, thanks everybody!

To Gumbi: You've been really helpful, thanks! How do you pronounce Madra Allta and Faolchu, by the way?

To Redwolf and BridMhor: Redwolf, I guess being called "Mac" must've been annoying! I wish I could get a personalized license plate like that . So, "glas" can mean green or grey? That could be an interesting wordplay, but how do you differentiate between the two colours, then?

To Errigal2466: I agree with you about war being anything but beautiful. My real name is Arabella, so if you take the Latin route it would be Ara-Altar and Bellum-War. In Italian, though, "ara" remains the same and "bella" would be "beautiful". As to why an Irish pen name, well, Irish culture has always interested me and I've just started to act on that interest. It's a really different world for me (I'm Mexican), and I'd like my pen name to reflect that in some way.

It wasn't really all that annoying. I've always tended to use netnicks that are fairly ambiguous (I used to use "erbivrus" on the vegetarian boards, and people assumed I was male because of the "-us" ending...they didn't click that it was a phonetic rendering of the American pronuciation of "herbivorous"! Some of my friends from back then still call me "erbie.") But I was in a situation where I didn't want people thinking that I was trying to pass myself off as a guy.

First things first: pronunciation. That will differ a bit among dialects. I'd say MAD-ruh ALL-tuh and FWEEL-khoo (where "kh" represents a gutteral sound, such as the "ch" in "Bach" or "loch.")

Do watch the spelling, though. It's "faolchú." The accent is important...without it, the word is misspelled (and with some words, you may even have a different meaning. For example, "fear" means "man," but "féar" means "grass").

As far as knowing which was which when dealing with "glas," context would be the thing. If you're talking about grass or leaves or something like that, "green" would be meant. If talking about a horse or cow, "grey" would be meant.

Redwolf

For the grey/green thing, it depends on the context (ie, what exactly you are talking about). If it's hair, for example, you use gruaig liath for grey hair. but for grey horse it's capall glas

As for the meaning of your name, you can't just "take the Latin route" on a whim. it mightn't necessarily be Latin in origin. Or Italian, for that matter. (I'm not saying it isn't, but I'm saying that just assuming it has a root in Latin by how it's spelled is not how interpreting the meaning of your name should be done).

Arabella is a name found in Ulster and it's usually rendered in an Irish vesion as Nábla

Gumbi wrote:As for the meaning of your name, you can't just "take the Latin route" on a whim. it mightn't necessarily be Latin in origin. Or Italian, for that matter. (I'm not saying it isn't, but I'm saying that just assuming it has a root in Latin by how it's spelled is not how interpreting the meaning of your name should be done).

I get what you mean about the name. I didn't make those up in a whim, though; I have done more than a bit of research and it turns out Arabella is a name with more than just two possible ethymologies behind it, but the ones I mentioned appear to be the most plausible. I have yet to find a source that clearly states which is the most legitimate, however.

kenailan wrote:Arabella is a name found in Ulster and it's usually rendered in an Irish vesion as Nábla

This, I admit, is new to me. Gotta investigate some more,thanks!

So, Faolchú Uaine it is. Just one more question: how do you pronounce "uaine"? Does it resemble "jaune" or is it completely different?

psellia wrote:how do you pronounce "uaine

Probably like weh-neh

kenailan wrote:

psellia wrote:how do you pronounce "uaine

Probably like weh-neh

I'd say OO-in-yeh

Redwolf

^ Me too.

psellia wrote:I get what you mean about the name. I didn't make those up in a whim, though; I have done more than a bit of research and it turns out Arabella is a name with more than just two possible ethymologies behind it, but the ones I mentioned appear to be the most plausible. I have yet to find a source that clearly states which is the most legitimate, however.

No, āra bella meaning ‘altar of war’ is NOT a plausible etymology at all. It can be said to mean ‘beautiful altar’, but not ‘altar of war’ (that’s ara bellī).

As it happens, the Latin route for this name isn’t the most plausible, either, necessarily: the name first appeared in Scotland in the Middle Ages, as far as I can tell, and I can’t think of a good reason why they would have made up such a name at that time: semantic names of this kind are usually much, much older (pre-Roman, Greek, or Hebrew normally).

By far the most plausible etymology is that it’s a Scottish variation of Annabel(la), which in its turn is either a combination of Anna and Bella (both girl’s names already, and thus very commonly compounded in Mediaeval times) or a further corruption of Amabel (= the modern English name Mabel), from Latin amābilis ‘lovable, delightful’.

kenailan wrote:Probably like weh-neh

me too

Arabella - Redwolf and Kokoshneta are right too as they have Ulster dialect. So probably Ulster is the right one for you considering the information Kokoshneta gave you about the roots of your name.

Glas can also mean Immature, Unripe or incomplete. Glasmhíol Leveret
Glasbhairneach, Glasoileán, glasbhoicín