# Irish :  Cábóg



## L'irlandais

Hello,
Still on about loan-words from Irish used in everyday English.  I am however being to think this is far more common in West Cork than in other parts of the country.  Am I right in thinking this?


*Cábóg* is a rustic labourer, in English I suppose one would say clodhopper.


> Example He's a right _cábóg_ that fella.


 Irish usage of Fella I believe is simply a coruption of the word "_fellow_" rather than being an Egyptian loan-word_ fellah _meaning _peasant_.


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## Pedro y La Torre

Never heard of this one l'irlandais hence I suspect that this is indeed confined to the southern part of the country.


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## L'irlandais

Evenin' Pedro,
I think you're right.  I stumbled across a listing of hundreds of loan words used in _"ordainary speech of Durrus people in the 1930's"_ earlier on today, called "_School Folklore Project 1938_".
Given that I myself am only familar with a few dozen loan-words in use during the 1970's & '80's, does that mean things are getting better in West Cork, or not?
Perhaps it only means I lived a sheltered childhood.


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## elirlandes

New one to me...


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## L'irlandais

elirlandes said:


> New one to me...


Cheers,
In which case, not much point in my creating a seperate thread for swear words nobody knows, given how limited my _répertoire_ is in Irish.  The other two are as follows :  Instead of _"Stop being an idiot/eejit."_ I've heard "Stop being a _*gamal*_" or was it "Stop _doing_ the gamal." , I'm not sure.  I remember hearing also "Stop acting the *gom*, will ya." but this is another word entirely.  Does anybody know the meaning of  "_gom_" in Irish?


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## elirlandes

L'irlandais said:


> Cheers,
> In which case, not much point in my creating a seperate thread for swear words nobody knows, given how limited my _répertoire_ is in Irish.  The other two are as follows :  Instead of _"Stop being an idiot/eejit."_ I've heard "Stop being a _*gamal*_" or was it "Stop _doing_ the gamal." , I'm not sure.  I remember hearing also "Stop acting the *gom*, will ya." but this is another word entirely.  Does anybody know the meaning of  "_gom_" in Irish?



My personal favourite in Hiberno-english is "balooba" meaning a lout - the usage stems from the name of the tribe that attacked and killed a number of Irish UN troops on their first ever deployment (Congo 1960s).


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## Pedro y La Torre

That's a good one alright, and still current too.


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## Banbha

Hadnt heard of cábóg meself but just asked me grandparents who are also from Cork and they both said if someone calls you a cábóg it means ''your an awful feckin eejit'' .....which seems to be the translation of any irish insult nowadays 

with regards 'gom' I do use this word a lot myself. I think it derives from gombeen (Irish gaimbín from gamba meaning 'lump' ...I suppose you would often hear someone saying your a lazy lump etc... as an insult] and I remember there is a word a 'gombeen man' which is something to do with a tax collector a way back in the past and I suppose in our poverty stricken country they would have been disliked and maybe the insult derived somehow from that?? 

Edit:  ''A Gombeen Man is a pejorative Hiberno-English term used in Ireland for a shady, small-time "wheeler-dealer" or businessman who is always looking to make a quick profit, often at someone else's expense or through the acceptance of bribes. Its origin is the Irish word "gaimbín", meaning monetary interest. The term referred originally to a money-lender and became associated with those shopkeepers and merchants who exploited the starving during the Irish Famine by selling much-needed food and goods on credit at ruinous interest rates'' 

Interesting threads anyway keep them up


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## franc 91

Perhaps you'd be interested in this one - plàmàs (sorry the fadas should be the other way) which has come into Irish English as plàmàsing (Oh you're just plàmàsing me - which sounds like plumhorsing) it means sweet talking and bamboozling someone (or as we say in French baratiner), but I'm told that it comes from the French word, via English blancmange(r) - a dish that evidently impressed the guests and could be something to boast about.
There's a page on Wikipedia on Hiberno English and quite a few books that have been published on the influence of Gaeilge on the way English is spoken in Ireland.


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## L'irlandais

franc 91 said:


> Perhaps you'd be interested in this one - plàmàs (sorry the fadas should be the other way) which has come into Irish English as plàmàsing (Oh you're just plàmàsing me - which sounds like plumhorsing) it means sweet talking and bamboozling someone (or as we say in French baratiner), but I'm told that it comes from the French word, via English blancmange(r) - a dish that evidently impressed the guests and could be something to boast about...


Hello franc,
Thanks for joining in, here's a (very) short *discussion thread* from a while back.  I had posted a list of all the Irish discussion in this forum, however it was deleted as it's against the rules appearantly.

By the way, I'm not a great fan of Wikipedia myself.  _~shrug~_


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## Pedro y La Torre

franc 91 said:


> Perhaps you'd be interested in this one - plàmàs (sorry the fadas should be the other way) which has come into Irish English as plàmàsing (Oh you're just plàmàsing me - which sounds like plumhorsing) it means sweet talking and bamboozling someone (or as we say in French baratiner), but I'm told that it comes from the French word, via English blancmange(r) - a dish that evidently impressed the guests and could be something to boast about.
> There's a page on Wikipedia on Hiberno English and quite a few books that have been published on the influence of Gaeilge on the way English is spoken in Ireland.



I heard somewhere that this is popular in Cork English. You wouldn't hear it around the Dublin region in my experience.

Edit: I just saw elirlandés's contribution in the other thread, perhaps it is used in Dublin after all. Mysteries abound.


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## ewhite

Back to cábóg, for a moment, if you will. It was definitely part of my grandmother's vocabulary (she was from Kilfinane, Co. Limerick), and was used liberally to describe what today we would probably call an oaf.


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