> On Wed, 2005-10-19 at 08:54, Elliott Lash wrote:
> > Carsten Becker wrote:
> >
> > > BTW, how were Irish and Scottish women called
> > > if "O'" and "Mac" mean "son of"?
> >
> > First of all "o" means "grandson of" and is
> almost
> > exclusively for Irish names (from what I've seen).
> The
> > equivalent for women is "ni". (Both of which have
> long
> > vowels). Mac means "son of" and the equivalent for
> > females is "nic". "Ni" is a short form of "Inion
> Ui"
> > "daughter of the grandson of", and "nic" is a
> short
> > form of "inion mhic" "daughter of the son of"
>
> Pardon my pedanticism, but per the _Foclo'ir
> Gaeilge-Be'arla_ ((c)
> Rialtas na hE'ireann, 1977), "mac" (etc.) just means
> "son" (etc). The
> "of" in the English translation comes from the
> genetive case of the
> following name.
>
>
> cian@cox-internet.com
>
http://crlh.tzo.org/~cian/CR/conlang/
>