Irish Translation Forum

so.... Ó Broin is an oooooold name?

so is Thomas (it's the only Aramaic name I could find)

Hehe yer family is mentioned in "Follow Me Up To Carlow"

See the swords of Glen Imayle,
flashing o'er the English Pale
See the children of the Gael,
Beneath O'Byrne's banners

woo hoo!!!!

Sorry to get off topic, but here's a bit of history I found about the song "Follow me up to Carlow"

Us O'Byrne's are awesome!!!

Glenmalure is a valley in the Wicklow Mountains, south of Dublin. In 1580 Feach MacHugh O'Byrne fought and won against the English army, who were lead by Lord Grey de Wilton. It was a turning-point event, and part of a wider revolt that was initiated by the Fitzgeralds. The revolt ended in failure, but Grey's defeat was a significant victory. O'Byrne's stronghold was at the eastern end of the glen and there are some ruins of it remaining on Ballincor Mountain in Wicklow.

One Fitz-name which is indigenous to Ireland is Fitzpatrick originally Meic Giolla Phádraig and Normanized to Fitzpatrick probably in the 13th century.

O' or On is a cognate with German Von and Dutch Van "From" and usually "means descendant of". O'- names were once common among the Scotts too but have almost disapprared. One that still survive, O'Graighainn is often Anglicized as Graham.

Mc and Mac names first began appearing on a large scale in the 11th century after the Viking invasions broke down the traditional Irish social organization. They are common among the Scotts however MacNamara is definitely Irish and I understand that Lennon is a contraction of the Irish name MacGillFhionniain "Son of the servant of St. Finnian".

How fascinating.

"Mac" comes from an Archaic Irish *makwkwos, (appearing as MAQQI in ogham inscriptions) which in turn derives from Common Celtic *makw- and ultimately PIE *maghu-, referring to a young person of either sex. In Germanic, it came to specifically refer to young women, giving us German Mädchen and English maiden. The Old English form of this word was maegden, which gives us the Irish word maighdean: "maiden; virgin."

Good stuff. Very interesting.

i thought Colm was irish..

Cullom means dove

but i think in old irish its MacCullom

maybe its McCullom, je ne sais pas..

oisin718 wrote:Ó came first, and was originally "grandson" but then came to mean "descendent."

Mac came later, probably to differentiate between different Ó's. This was probably about the time that the Gaels were making their way across the water from Antrim to Scotland, which is why there are Mac's in both countries but Ó's only in Ireland.

Fitz is Norman French, and is common throughout Ireland and England. It marks the descendent, in most cases, of the knights and lords who conquered England with William I in 1066 and Ireland under Henry II in 1172. It usually gets translated into Irish as Mac.

De is also found in Irish names (Burke = De Búrca), and is also Norman French.

As in Eamonn....Valera?

Nope. De Valera's name is Spanish.