"Owain" wrote:

    >Here in Scotland we get a Gaeilge soap opera subtitled into Gaelic - Ros na
    >Rún you call it? - on TeleG (Freeview digital)
Because of a misplaced hill, I do not get it here in Ireland. It is
about to be used in schools as a language-learning resource. Seems to
me to be a good idea.

PB

In article , [email protected] (Des
O'Donoghue) wrote:

    > > One thing I did learn was the Irish National Anthem in Irish -
    > > needed to sing that at all the Rugby internationals at Landsdowne
    > > Road.
    > >
    >
    > Not no more.. now we have that abomination "Ireland´s Call"...

Is that a straight translation of the anthem in Irish? (Which has the best
tune of any in the world I've heard, BTW.)

In article ,
[email protected] (Derek McBryde) wrote:

    > Clo Romhanach
    > or roman script. This uses the letter "h" to mean a dot over the
    > previous letter ( c/f the german umlaut and the frequent use of "oe"
    > to depict this). So the girl's name Siobhan is actually Siob(with
    > a dot over it) an.

Ah -- that does indeed clarify something I'd wondered about. Thanks!

wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
    > In article , [email protected] (Des
    > O'Donoghue) wrote:
    > > > One thing I did learn was the Irish National Anthem in Irish -
    > > > needed to sing that at all the Rugby internationals at Landsdowne
    > > > Road.
    > > >
    > >
    > > Not no more.. now we have that abomination "Ireland´s Call"...
    > Is that a straight translation of the anthem in Irish? (Which has the best
    > tune of any in the world I've heard, BTW.)

Oh God no. The National Anthem would be "the Soldiers Song" in english.
Irelands call is a politically neutral song for the Irish rugby team - it
was written by Phil Coulter (need I say more) and is designed to get over
the hurdles some N.Ireland players had in singing the Irish national
anthem...why they couldn´t have chosen "There is an Isle" Isle never know...

On Sun, 23 Feb 2003 16:36:05 +0000 (UTC), [email protected]
wrote:

    >In article ,
    >[email protected] (Derek McBryde) wrote:
    >> Clo Romhanach
    >> or roman script. This uses the letter "h" to mean a dot over the
    >> previous letter ( c/f the german umlaut and the frequent use of "oe"
    >> to depict this). So the girl's name Siobhan is actually Siob(with
    >> a dot over it) an.
    >Ah -- that does indeed clarify something I'd wondered about. Thanks!

Hehe it gets worse! There is a hidden "h" in the
pronounciation. The short vowels are pronounced with an "h"
following an "s". Hence we have "she-vawn" and not "see-vawn" and
Sinead (as in the singer Sinead O'Connor or the actress Sinead Cusack)
which is pronounced Shin- ade. You also get it in the name "Sean"
as in Sean Connery. Often people spell this as it is pronounced -
eg Shaun. You have Sinn Fein ("shin fein") and words like
"sea" - one of the Gaelic responses for yes, which is pronounced
"shah" and not "see".

Actually once you have learned a few basic rules, Gaelic is very easy
to speak as it is always pronounced as it is written. None of the
bough, rough, cough business you find in english.

My apologies to the news-group for going off topic but many thanks
Barney for awakening so many happy memories of my school days in
Dublin.

Derek