Kilkenny Irish
Gaeilig Osraí i gCo. Chille Choinnigh. The Ossory Irish of Co. Kilkenny.
Monday 23 August 2021
How to learn Kilkenny/Ossory Irish?
Sunday 22 August 2021
Materials in Kilkenny Irish
Update: I received an email back from St. Kieran's College unfortunately confirming that they do not have any recording from Margaret Cody meaning it doesn't survive.
Here are all the materials I am aware of in the Kilkenny dialect or in native Irish from the county.
The further back in time we go, the amount of written material grows quite a bit however most of this is written in non-dialectal Classical Gaelic. I will try to take this into account and choose sources from around 1750~ onwards focusing on material that gives in insight into the actual local dialect.
Cín Lae Amhlaoibh Uí Shúilleabháin, 1827 - 1835
A diary kept by Amhlaoibh Ó Shúilleabháin. Ó Súilleabháin was born in Cill Airne/Killarney in Co. Kerry but relocated to Callainn/Callan Co. Kilkenny aged nine with his family. His diary was apparently not written in the Classical Gaelic of the time but rather in a colloquial style. I do not have this but Tomás de Bhaldraithe published a version in 1970.
Duanaire Osraíoch
A collection of poetry and songs written from the region, the majority of which comes from pre Famine Kilkenny. I would assume that a lot of what's written here is again in Classical Gaelic since it is verse but that's to be seen.
Labhrann Laighnigh
This book has plenty of material from Kilkenny as well as other counties in Leinster. The longer material is generally older however there is still quite a bit
Recording and stories from Pádraig de Paor, 1936
A 12 minute recording featuring 10 stories in Irish and 1 story in English and written material mostly in English here. The audio in the recording is quite difficult to make out at times and the written material appears to be standardised somewhat. I have access to this recording.
Recording from Margaret Cody, 1933
A recording made by Canon William Carrigan in 1933 of Margaret Cody. I don't have access to this recording but I'm awaiting response from St. Kieran's College in Kilkenny on whether they have the recording in their archives or where I might be able to find it. If it still exists, which is doubtful, it would be useful to compare with the audio from de Paor for to figure out more details about phonology, particularly intonation which is difficult to gage from the storytelling register de Paor uses in the audio from him.
That is basically all the information available written in the native dialect from Kilkenny. There are, of course, further records of linguistic information published in journals and books but that is different. I plan on putting up a list of all the resources there are for learning this dialect.
Sunday 15 August 2021
Great video from An Loingseach
Saturday 14 August 2021
Little scéilín
Bhí fear ón áit seo fadó, agus bhí sé ag obair in sna tite ag baint phrátaí, agus bhí toice aige, agus bhíodh sé a rá anois is aríst léi: 'B'fhearr liom go mbeitheá thoir!'
'Bhuel, nuair a bhís thoir chonaic tú cad a bhí agat - tú féin is do dhá ghabhairín!'
Bhuel, chua' sí siar, agus chua' sí chun an tí. Agus bhí sé ar lár an urláir istigh, é féin is a dhá ghabhar, ag ithe prátaí as an gcorcán. Tháini' sí abhaile, agus tháini' sé sin i ndia' seachtaine eile chún a ghnó a dhéanadh. Agus dúirt sé: 'B'fhearr liom go mbeitheá thoir!'
'Bhuel, nuair a bhíos thoir,' ar sise, 'cad a bhí agat? Tú héin is do dhá ghabhairín ag ithe prátaí as an chorcán!'
Saturday 7 August 2021
Known Irish speakers from Kilkenny in the 20th century
"Along these hills also died the last remnants of native spoken Irish," writes O'Kelly (1968:108) about Tullaher, and again (Ibid. 165, under Coolnahau): "Irish survived as a spoken language among some of the older generation in this hill area until this century and Canon Carrigan interviewed old native speakers ... in Coolroebeg, Mullinakill, Listerlin, Brownstown, Weatherstown, Kilbraghan and Ballyverneen as late as 1920. A dictaphone recording of the Ossory dialect was taken in 1933 from the late Mrs. Cody (nee [sic] Breathnach) of this townland.... She was then 78 years of age and Irish was the language of her home in Mullinakill until she was 20 years old. She had a limited knowledge but retained the 's' sound of this dialect...." A short prayer-stanza taken from this informant is reproduced by Ó Ceallaigh (1964:7) in illustration of the distinctive palatal r sound in local Irish (cf. Ch. II, parr. 2.30-2.32).
Thank you for your email. You are correct the College has a good number of the notebooks upon which Canon Carrigan relied in writing his history of the Diocese of Ossory. These however are not indexed, but they are available to view from the College archive.
Sadly however we don’t have any audio recordings relating to Canon Carrigan’s work and I am unable to direct you to such audio recordings as presumably if they are not stored with these notebooks, they were not retained.
Area: Baile Shéamac/Baile Shéamais/Jamestown. Townland: Gleann Mór/Glenmore.
"Béarla a labhras leis an bPaorach i dtosach, ach ba ghairid an mhoill gur thuigeas ná raibh aon leisce air chun dul ar an nGaeilig liom. Agus is aige a bhí sí go lán-nádúrtha. Ní nach iontach, d'uireasa taithí agus de dhruim díchuimhne, ní raibh a chuid Gaeilge saor ar fad ó mhiontuaiplisí deilbhíochta agus comhréire. Ach le hais leis an gcumas a bhí ar an dteangain aige agus a éascaíocht a tháinig sí leis, ní miste neamhshuim a dhéanamh dá leithéidí (rud a dhineas féin agus na téacsaí laistíos á gcóiriú agam). Bhí breis is leathbhliain roimhe sin caite agam ag fiosrú agus ag cur tuairisce seanchainteoirí dúchais Gaeilge ar fuaid an chontae, ach dob é an duine seo an t-éinne amháin dár bhuail liom go raibh an teanga aige go lánéifeachtach ina meán conbharsáide. Níor bhraitheas aon easnamh ná lagar cumais sa tslí sin air ach amháin nuair a thugadh sé faoi ghiota filíochta a aithris gur róbhaol do mearathal agus díchuimhne á bhaint dá threoir. Ach is féidir an méid sin a chur i leith na haoise. Má b'é an cainteoir donn deireanach é a thug Gaeilig Cho. Chill Choinnigh leis ó dhúchas — agus is dóichí gurbh é — níor mhídhiongbhálta an tOisín tar éis na bhFian é Pádraig Paor. Solas na bhFlaitheas is radharc na Tríonóide go raibh aige i gCathair na Glóire (mar a déarfadh sé féin)."
Townland: Baile Hugúin/Hugginstown.
Area: Coill Fhearna/Kilfarney. Townland: Baile an Phoill/Ballyfoyle.
Tuesday 8 June 2021
De Paor Audio
I will soon be posting my attempts at linguistic notes of the audio but sharing the actual sound will not be possible until I know more about the correct protocol for reproduction of the National Folklore Collection's material.
For those interested, Sound Archive material is referenced as follows:
National Folklore Collection (henceforth NFC), sound archive reference, item number, informant, age, occupation, address. Collector, date.
Example:
NFC TM163/A/2; John Reilly (80), farmer, Ballydesmond, County Cork. Collector: Tom Munnelly, 16th June 1972.
So, the Pádraig (Paddy) de Paor recording is referenced as follows:
NFC CT0241_M0676a-M0676d; Paddy de Paor, Gleann Mór, Cill Chainnigh. Collector: Séamus Ó Duilearga, January 1936.
Sunday 30 May 2021
How Fortis Consonants Affect Vowels
In this quick post I'll go over how each vowel combines with a fortis consonant to give a unique result. I'm not knowledgeable about this so I'd urge anybody to correct me if I'm wrong.
In some parts of Ireland, there is a phonemic difference between fortis consonants (from Latin meaning 'strong') and lenis consonants (from Latin meaning 'soft'). This has historically applied to l, n and r although no such distinction is found in Munster these days and the distinction for r has fairly much died out as a meaningful distinction for most Irish speakers in Connacht and Ulster.
This distinction presents itself in writing with fortis having double consonants and lenis having a single letter. The difference in speech is that fortis l and n have a dental quality being produced with the tongue on the teeth and r being strongly trilled whereas lenis l and n are alveolar with the tongue touching the ridge behind the teeth and r being softer. In Celticist transcription, the fortis consonants will take an upper-case letter and lenis have a lower-case one. For those that preserve it, the difference in sound can be found in the following examples
- ballach v. bealach
- gall v. geal
- gleann v. glan
- ceann v. cochan
- thar v. carr
- fear v. farraige