Irish Translation Forum

! I think Redwolf's been accidentally editing other people's posts again . . . .

Bass wrote:

Redwolf wrote:

Bass wrote:hmm that's interesting thanks!! I must say that I did read somewhere that it meant the exchange of two souls....I took that as being soulmates....but I suppose it could mean something else. So ‘anamchara’ is as close as it gets?? That works for me!!! Thanks Pol, and RedWolf

No! Absolutely not! "Anamchara" means "spiritual advisor" or "confessor." It DOES NOT mean "soulmate" in the English sense of the word (that's what that whole thing that Tadgh wrote and Pól and I quoted and re-quoted is saying). The CLOSEST thing in Irish to the English concept of "soulmate" is "sonuachar."

Redwolf

I didn't mean to start any wars...I'm just saying that I did read it somewhere...they obviously translated it incorrectly.

No war...I was just being emphatic. You'll see this translated incorrectly a lot because "anamchara" literally translates to "soul friend, and people unfamiliar with the language extrapolate that to be the same thing as "soulmate." You'll even see newcomers here offering it as a translation. The problem is, as with so many words and phrases in different languages, the literal translation isn't what the word actually MEANS (i.e., it doesn't reflect the word's actual usage). If you look up "anamchara" in an Irish-English dictionary (a good print one, that is...not just something that someone has thrown together on-line), it's defined as "confessor or spiritual advisor." Makes sense, when you think about it, but not the same meaning as "soulmate" at all.

Redwolf

wdsci wrote:! I think Redwolf's been accidentally editing other people's posts again . . . .

You're right...I just fixed it. Darn, I hate it when it do that!

Redwolf

you see, the edit and quote button are right next to one another and sometimes when we're in a rush, we don't notice that we're editing instead of quoting

I'm glad all the confusion has been cleared up