A number of questions... please help ....

flynnboy

Hi

I have a few questions which I would be very grateful for answers to:

Listening to Ronan McElwee on RNAG today I heard him reply to 'how are you' with something that sounded like 'straw calum'...... what would that be ? I am used to go maith, go brae etc.

What is:
Go maith leis ?
Ruddy mar sin ?
Mar sin ?

If I am giving a command to, say, my dog - 'Move!' would that be

Bogaim or Bog ?

and again if I was giving a command to 'Come Here' would that be:

Tar anseo or Tigim anseo - perhaps just anseo ?

Thanks and sorry to be a pain.

mr chips

Ronan was probably saying "ag streachailt liom" - struggling on ("struggling with myself").

probably "chomh maith leis" - as well as it/that
Rudaí mar sin - things like that
Mar sin - therefore/so/in that case

"Bog" would be the order for the dog to move (bogaim is "I move")

A shorter command for the dog could be something commonly used in Ulster, "Goitse!". Means "C'mere!" and is derived from "Gabh thusa anseo". Sounds very like "Gotcha".

flynnboy

Thanks mr chips.

Something just occurred to me. You know there are lots of examples of Irish words that have crept into the English language e.g yer Gob (from beak)...
I wonder if 'Bog Off' is from the verb Bog - i.e go away - move away ??

Thanks again for your help with those questions.

flynnboy

mr chips wrote: »

probably "chomh maith leis" - as well as it/that

So further to that........ there is absolutey no such statement as 'GO' maith leis ?

Tar anseo - tigim anseo are nonsense ?

Krusader

Yeah Goitse in Donegal for C'mere, they say Gabh i leith in Conamara pronounced gow-leh

Fág seo or ar aghaidh linn for Let's go

you could say ar aghaidh leat for move also

mr chips

No such thing as "go maith leis" as far as I can remember - just doesn't make sense.

Tar anseo is fine, just that in comparison to Goitse it's an extra syllable when commanding your dog! No such thing as "tigim anseo" to my knowledge.

Don't know whether "bog off" comes from the verb bog in Gaelic, but it could well do. As you've indicated yourself, lots of words & phrases in English are derived from Gaelic so it's definitely a possibility.

flynnboy

Thanks guys. I appreciate your help.

I am in Donegal so 'Goitse' is the one. But how exactly is that pronounced :

Gutcha
Gertcha
Go itcha
Gotcha.......

Pronounced as one word ???

Crosáidí is Fag seo/ar aghaidh linn for Ulster Irish also - how are they pronounced ?

Thanks again

mr chips

Hard to put across correct pronunciation in written form, really - I'd say it's somewhere between "Gotcha" and "Gitcha" as the pronunciation would include both the o and the i. Definitely pronounced as one word.

Ar aghaidh linn is pretty common anywhere, I think, including here in Uladh. Pronounced similarly to Err eye lin.

I don't tend to hear Fág seo in that context so maybe that's a more southern thing - I'd interpret that as "leave this" (e.g. in the context of leaving one task to get on with something else). Crosáidí should be able to give a more knowledgeable answer.

Fág is pronounced "faag" in Ulster, more like "fawg" further south.

Seo - this will be a lot more complicated to explain than to say! Firstly, the letter s can be pronounced a couple of ways - it's usually pronounced sh in conjunction with a slender vowel (e or i), and as a sibilant s (like sssnake) with broad vowels. It doesn't get the z sound it's sometimes given in English, e.g. "these, those" etc. So you have the word for "leg" - cos - pronounced "coss" or "cuss", whereas the word for wedding, bainis, is pronounced almost like"banish".

Therefore the word "seo" will start with a "sh" sound because of the letter e. The o is a short vowel that rhymes with words like "shore" "shawl" or "drawl", but imagine hearing those words almost cut off so that the vowel sound is similarly brief to the o in "orange" or "shot", rather than the slightly more drawn out sound in a word like "drawl". Neither is it as rounded a sound as in the word bow, so it won't rhyme with "show".

That's the best I can manage!

flynnboy

That's great mr.chips and thanks again:)

Krusader

Goitse - Gwit-sheh

Fág seo you hear it a lot on TG4 would translate to 'Leave here/this' it's used in the context as 'let's go' and is written as such on the subtitles

Fawg shuh