in this video we're going to look at how important the cow was
in early irish life and we'll see how this is reflected in certain words and
phrases that we use today in the irish language if you would
like to learn more about irish about its history
its journey words phrases and comparisons with other languages
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so the irish for cow is bó bó that's pronounced like low in english
bó and in ancient ireland it was said that the more cows you had
the higher status you had within your community
the cow was so important that it was often traded as currency as well
in an older ireland this is probably where the following terms come from
buachaill bó and bó mhór, so buachaill bó
means someone who is careless or reckless in terms of decision making
it literally translates into a cowboy and
bó mhór means the big cow so it's basically refers to somebody who is
incredibly successful or has achieved a lot or has a great status
but the word bó also features regularly
in irish mythology and folklore and we see touches of this
in the irish word bóín dé which i've mentioned a few times on this channel
bóín dé is the irish for lady bird and it literally translates into
god's little calf bóín on its own means runt as in the runt of
the litter but bóín dé together is god's little
calf and it acquired this name probably due
to the close connections between the virgin mary
and the colors red and black because the virgin mary is often depicted wearing
red and black in old images and old pictures
and this is where the name probably arises
but farmers in older ireland were always delighted to see the ladybird
because this would be one insect that they would welcome with open arms
because the ladybird will feast on other smaller pests that
would destroy crops so the ladybird is known as a friend of the farmer
and bealach na bó finne is the irish for
the milky way and this literally translates into the
way of the fair cow or the way of the white cow so this is a
wonderfully poetic and spiritual way to describe the
stars at night, bealach na bó finne
this is one of my favorite irish place names- inis bó finne
and in english it's inisbofin
it translates into the island of the white cow
so the story goes that two fishermen ended up lost at sea
and they somehow managed to get to the island of inisbofin
it was very foggy and they decided to light a fire in order to keep warm
but by lighting the fire they managed to lift some ancient spell which had been
cast on the island a long time ago, the fishermen said they saw an old woman
walking down a laneway with a white cow in front of
her, and when she struck the cow the cow
immediately turned to stone so this is one of the many
great stories and folklore associated with the cow
in irish history, inis bó finne inisbofin- the island of the white cow
let's talk about a beautiful native irish wildflower now called the cowslip
so this is what the cowslip looks like and in irish it's
bainne bó bleachtáin, let's translate that word for word so
bainne is milk, bó is cow and bleachtáin is an abundance
of something or a plentiful supply of something
the legend goes that if you were to rub the cowslip
onto the udder of the cow and the udder is here
if you were to do that you'd be able to look forward to a good
and plentiful supply of milk and that's where the name comes from
bainne bó bleachtáin - it literally means
plentiful supply of milk
let's look at the word bóthar now and how
that's connected to the irish word bó for cow so first of all bóthar means
road bóthar, and it comes about because we're taking two words and we're
adding them to one so what i mean by that is bó on its own
means cow and then thar on its own means over something or on top of something
so the irish word bóthar literally means
a way or a pathway that cows can be transported on whether
it's from farm to farm or from field to field and you may have
heard of this word here bóithrín and that's a little road or a
baby road because anytime you put an ín after something that's an ín n
it usually makes the thing that you're talking about
smaller or younger so bóthar is road and bóithrín is a small road or
a narrow country lane let's say
so as you can see the irish language is
littered with subtle little references to bó, it is very significant in terms
of irish life irish history and of course irish mythology
if you enjoyed this video please give it
a thumbs up and don't forget to let me know down in the comment section
your thoughts on this video and any other useful words or phrases
that involve bó, i'll be back very soon with another video
thanks for watching, slán go fóill.