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.

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