Gabrial Rosenstock seems to have coined the word Dinneenisms for arcane words taken from foclóir Phrádraih Uí Dhuinnín. He gives about twenty examples of them in his book, Beginner's Irish. Here are two of my favorites:

buarach bháis - used in witchcraft, an unbroken hoop of skin cut form the corpse while reciting incandations. The piece, the length of the entire body from shoulder to foot sole, is then wrapped in silk of the colors of the rainbow. It is used to tie the legs of a person to produce certain special effects.

sleith - a term in Brehon Law, signifying intercourse with a woman without her consent or knowledge.

I heard Ray MacManus give one in lecture. It was a word that meant soemthing like making love in a tree. I wish I could remember the word. Does anyone know it?

Are there any other interesting Dinneenisms you might share with us in this thread?

(Message edited by lúcas on December 09, 2004)

(Message edited by lúcas on December 09, 2004)

Dinneen is full of Dineenisms.

Biddy Jenkinson wrote a whole detective short story around "mac saithe" a secondary swarm of bees. Published in Feasta recently.

pardon, what you call witchcraft, do you mean things which were punished by the inquisition,
or do such special effects belong to serious druid rituals?

one has to be careful, if he reproduces such words.. as it can establish wrong ideas, like some ill-fashioned fairytales.

its not neccessary to blamish them by title, but most people know such silly stories..told by unknowing parents. nothing against them, if they(the stories) are naive, but sometimes i would say there was bad intention, and toxic intake by the authors.

why i reply here is that 'the ghost man' (an ghóst feár) is with me (i possess this book)

something similar i host at my page is:
Spectre/ Bogeyman - Irish: taibhseach or púca
vamped from irishcultureandcustoms.com

now, if that is a bogeyman, it needs a disclaimer for such strange doings...
what are incandations?

A Akidd, a chara,

I think Dineen mention witchcraft in the same sense as the Inquisition. Perhaps, it was more of a druid ritual. In fact, Dinneen gives the first definition of the word draoidheacht as "the profession of [a] druid" while his eigth defintion of the word is "witchcraft."

Incandations. Sorry that is a typo. It should have been incantations.

Lúcas,

there is a difference between druids, and lets say, circus magick. (in the sense that the first can be dangerous to others, while the last is that for the performers)

another word would be spells (shorter). incantations seem to be repeated chants, if you mean that.

but i were not 'with you', talking about Dinnenn. no idea what it might be, of course i could search yahoo! for it.

WHAT?!?!?! "Buarach bháis" not used anymore?!?!?

Gabriel Rosenstock should speak for himself!!!

;-)