XPost: soc.culture.scottish, soc.culture.irish, ie.general
From: ciaran@ciaran.com
The Highlander wrote:
> On Sun, 19 Nov 2006 02:06:48 GMT, Ciaran wrote:
>
>> allan connochie wrote:
>>> "Ciaran" wrote in message
>>> news:455E9F8B.9020903@ciaran.com...
>>>> allan connochie wrote:
>>>>> "Ciaran" wrote in message
>>>>> news:s9h6h.64485$rP1.8080@news-server.bigpond.net.au...
>>>>>> Some form of Q-Celtic Gaelic may have been used by the Picts as on the
>>>>>> inscription in the Gaelic Ogham alphabet cited below. Note that
>>>>>> "mac"/"mic" means "son" in both Scottish Gaelic (Gaidhlig) and Irish
>>>>>> Gaelic (Gaeilge) - if you pronounce the Pictish incription "meqq" it
>>>>>> sounds much closer to the Gaelic version than to the P-Celtic Brythonic
>>>>>> version "mab"/"map" which means "son" in both Welsh (Cymraeg) and
>>> Breton
>>>>>> (Brezhoneg).
>>>>> This is nothing new though. It is generally accepted that the 'meqq'
>>> could
>>>>> mean son of. It could be Gaelic - which would be no surprise as the
>>> Picts
>>>>> became Gaelicised, at first probably just influenced by, then probably
>>>>> bi-lingual, then Gaelic speakers. However that is not the same as the
>>>>> Pictish language itself being Gaelic. Likewise 'meqq' could simply be
>>> their
>>>>> way of putting 'map' to print. It is also possible that 'meqq' has
>>> nothing
>>>>> to do with son of - I'd doubt that myself by the fact is we don't know.
>>>>> Likewise some have suggested that the inscriptions don't actually mean
>>>>> anything - though again I'd doubt that.
>>>>>
>>>>> What is true though is that the suggestion that 'meqq' could be the
>>> original
>>>>> Pictish 'map' Gaelicised has been public knowledge ever since people
>>> started
>>>>> looking at the inscriptions. Little things like that are what pushed
>>> some
>>>>> scholars in the 19thC to suggest that Pictish may have been Q-Celtic.
>>>>> However these views have ben roundly debunked for a century or so and
>>>>> opinion amongst those who study the subject is just about unanimous. It
>>> is
>>>>> generally accepted that the Pictish language was P-Celtic.
>>>>>
>>>>> Allan
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>> Sorry, No, VERY UNLIKELY - the Ogham letter Ceirt (5 horizontal strokes
>>>> to the left of the line) which is transliterated as "q" represents a
>>>> hard "K" sound as in "Mack". There are other Ogham letters for "b/p"
>>>> which they would have used instead. "MAQ" is also used extensively on
>>>> definite Gaelic Ogham inscriptions everywhere Ogham is found.
>>> What is very unlikely? The whole post? I've given several possible reasons
>>> which have been put forward. It is all by the by anyway. Even if it is a
>>> representation of Mac actually in Gaelic, which I said would be no
surprise,
>>> it makes no difference to the argument. No-one is denying that Gaelic
didn't
>>> spread into Pictland, influence Pictish and eventually replace it - what is
>>> being said is that the Pictish language itself was P-Celtic.
>>>
>>> I take it your point is about the 'meqq' possibly being the Pictish
attempt
>>> at puting 'map' to print? This is not my idea. I was simply giving one of
>>> the possible reasons. Talking about the said subject Elizabeth Sutherland
in
>>> her book "In Search of the Picts" quotes Niall Robertson............."when
>>> the Picts wrote their Ogam inscriptions in P-Celtic they might have used
the
>>> 'fid' for 'q' to represent 'p', so that inscriptions using MEQQ or MAQQ
>>> would have been read as MAP or MAPP"
>>>
>>> She then goes on to explain "Ogam inscriptions in the other P-Celtic areas
>>> such as Wales and the old district of Dumnonia used the 'cert' for 'q' if
>>> they used it at all, but these inscriptions are written in Irish and don't
>>> attempt to represent local language as the Pictish Ogams seem to do"
>>>
>>> Again I have no wish to personally put forward this particular theory. It
>>> was just one of the various theories around.
>>>
>>> Sutherland by the way was responsible for establishing the museum at Groam
>>> House in Rosemarkie as a Pictish centre. I think she knows a thing or two
>>> about the Picts as she has dedicated a good part of her life to studying
>>> them. She doesn't herself come to any conclusion about the MEQQ question,
>>> which is possibly sensible, as it couldn't be proved one way or the other.
>>> Whatever the answer is though it doesn't itself affect the overall
>>> acceptance of Pictish being P-Celtic and she says "the opinion generally
>>> held by Celtic scholars from the beginning of the 20thC is that Picts spoke
>>> a P-Celtic language"
>>>
>>> I could of course quote from stacks of volumes written by respected
>>> historians but I thought this one would do to make a point. You suggested
>>> that it wasn't you who has an agenda here, rather it is myself and the
>>> entire Scottish community of historians who have the bias. These are two
>>> quotes from William Ferguson's "The Identity of the Scottish Nation"
>>>
>>> "Indeed about the one fact that modern scholarship has established with
>>> certainty is that the Picts were P-Celts"
>>>
>>> Now according to you scholars like Ferguson are pushing this idea to
forward
>>> their own agendas. The only problem is he makes repeated statements
>>> throughout the book like this
>>>
>>> "It was the Scots of Dalriada, an Irish tribe who settled in Argyll in the
>>> sixth century AD and gradually extended their sway over most of Scotland
>>> north of the Forth, who gave their name to the country; and more than their
>>> name, for they contributed to and, to a large extent, shaped the subsequent
>>> Kingdom of Scotland. For many centuries, and those the most formative,
their
>>> language, Gaelic, was the lingua scotica of the regnum scotica"
>>>
>>> In other words your suggestion that people claim the Picts were P-Celts in
>>> order to knock Gaelic is utter codswallop. The Gaelic language is important
>>> enough that you don't need to reshape history in order to make it more so.
>>>
>>>
>>> Allan
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> Tha gu math !!! Ailean, tapadh leibh :-)
>>
>> Excellent !!! Allan, thanks :-)
>
> Please forgive me for nitpicking, but what you wrote directly above,
> "Tha gu math" translates as "is well", a common response to "Ciamar a
> tha thu? - How are you?"
>
> You should say "sgoinneil", a word originally meaning careful,
> needful, attentive, pleasing, but now commonly used to say "excellent"
> .
> You can even combine it with "gasta" (formerly spelled "gasda") as in
>
> 'How the Scots Invented the Modern World' - leabhar gasta sgoinneil! -
> a splendid, excellent book!
>
> Le deagh dhùrachd!
>
>
>
>
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