Hello friends,

I am humbly asking for help in finding an Irish name for a fictional fishing village in 1820s Western Ireland. In my novel, the village is sited approximately where Kinvara is but it is more like Claddagh was then, with their hooker sailboats and fishing focus.

I want something like, "small harbor" or "calm harbor" as its name. In my research, it looks like Cuan Beag (pronounced something like KEWn Beeug) might be correct.

May I have your feedback on that as a name (or alternatives) for a small fishing village in Galway Bay in 1820s?

I had been working with a history professor at NUI Galway, Niall Ó Cíosáin, but alas, he has retired.

Many thanks for your assistance.

PS - The target audience for my novel is American Irish, mostly females, as it is a heroine's journey story with magical realism. It comes out on March 1st 2025, so I'm down to the wire vetting everything I can.

Pronunciation KEWn?

Listen yourself:
https://www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/cuan
https://www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/beag

Thank you, Labhrás. I have used www.teanglann.ie often and I appreciate the advice around pronunciation. For my novel, set in Galway Bay, the closest pronunciation is the Connacht version, I suppose?

What I was really wanting to check with you all about is whether the Irish words, "Cuan Beag" are the best/most accurate words for "Small Harbor". (Since my novel is set in a small fishing village, I want a realistic sounding small fishing village name for my novel. If other names -- such as still waters, calm waters, etc. seem more apt for a village name, I would appreciate your help.

Thank you.

Jennifer

I think if it's particularly small, you would use the term camas, but I'd translate this more like "cove", so if you are talking about a fishing village fitting within this bay, I would imagine the bay in question would have to be larger than anything I'd describe with the term camas. What I don't understand is that, you say it's set in Galway bay, in which case, presumably, that is the bay in question regardless of the size of any village along its shoreline. Regardless, if you're set on inventing a place-name, I'd offer the following advice:

I think you're on the right track with cuan, but I wouldn't recommend using Cuan Beag. Grammatically there's nothing wrong with it that I can see, but it sounds a bit unnatural to me. It's the kind of name that might be given to a BnB or soulless modern housing estate by someone who speaks little or no Irish, but who hopes to attract business from tourists or higher buying prices by trading on how "Gaelic" the place is.

In reality, Cuan Beag it's a very simplistic construction which, as far as I can tell, isn't actually used anywhere in Ireland as a place-name. Usually in Irish place-names which use the element, cuan, will have a genitive construction, like Cuan na Gaillimhe "Galway Bay", or Cuan Héilin "Helen's Bay". Very often, if not in most cases, these will be named based on nearby towns or cities, as with Cuan na Gaillimhe "Galway Bay", Cuan Loch Garman "Wexford Harbour", Cuan Chorcaí "Cork Harbour", Cuan Phort Láirge "Waterford Harbour", Cuan Fionntrá "Ventry Harbour", Cuan Shligigh "Sligo Bay", Cuan Thrá Mhór "Tramore Bay", Cuan Dhún Garbhán "Dungarvan Harbour", and Cuan Chionn tSáile "Kinsale Harbour". Where the element beag does occur with cuan in real place-names, it tends to modify the second element rather than cuan itself, as in Cuan Cam Beag "Councambeg" (lit. "Bay of the Little Bend") or Cuan na gCealla Beaga "Killybegs Harbour" (lit. "Bay of the Little Cells"). In fact, Killybegs is notable for being the largest fishing port in Ireland.

Perhaps more importantly, however, where cuan is used in place-names, this generally refers to either the body of water itself, or the local area surrounding that body of water. I can't think of any settlements (towns or villages) with the element cuan in the settlement name. I dare say if any exist, they are in the minority of place-names that include the term cuan.

What I would suggest to you is that you should come up with some genitival construction for the name of the bay. Maybe call the bay after a character, or some ancestral figure like a notable fisher. Alternatively, you could start by coming up with a name for the nearby fishing village, then work backwards from that. For example, if the village is named Baile Beag you could call the bay Cuan Baile Beag.

Thank you so much, Ade, for your reply. This is very helpful.

In my novel an old Sessile Oak is prominent near the village's center and is near to being a character as well. And so, I think the best name for the village is: Place of the Oak OR Place of the Old Oak.

And I understand that naming the small cove would be from the village name.

So in terms of the village/town/place name, how would I say that in Irish?

Thank you in advance for your help. I very much appreciate it.

Assuming you want "place of the oak" referring to a single oak tree, that would be Áit na Darach, or Áit na Seandarach for "place of the old oak".

I'm not sure if this combination works well, though, or how likely a combination like this would be as a place-name. Áit does occur occasionally in place-names, but in my experience they tend to be (relatively) modern place-names. By that I mean, they tend to refer to modern things, like manor houses or other buildings. For example, you get Áit Tí Chathail (lit. "place of the house of Cathal"), Áit Tí an Chaoich (lit. "place of the blind house"), Áit an Tí Móir (lit. "place of the big house"), Áit Tí Mhic Aodha, (lit. "place of Mac Aodh's house"), áit an tSeantí (lit. "place of the old house"), and Áit an Tí Nua (lit. "place of the new house"). By contrast, settlements like towns or villages tend to make use of well established, older place-names, and these are more likely to refer to trees, forests or oaks, though they tend not to use the element áit. A few examples of existing place-names which refer to an oak tree (or trees) are Ais na Darach (lit. "back of the oak"), Goirtín Darach (lit. "little field of oak[s]"), Cill Dara "Kildare" (lit. "oak church"), Darú "Durrow" (lit. just "oak"), Béal Átha Darach (lit. "mouth of the oak ford"), Ard Darach (lit. "oak height"), Cúil Darach (lit. "backs of oak"), and An Dair Ríoga (lit. "the royal oak").

Assuming the oak in your novel, or the presence of oaks in the area more generally, predates the settlement of the fishing village (which is likely), you might consider a name for the town like Baile Ghort na Darach "town/village of the field of the oak". This would suggest that the town/village developed in an area which was already known as Gort na Darach "field of the oak". The alternative is that the village is older than the oak, in which case it seems unlikely that it would be named after it.

Dear Ade,

Thank you so much for your wise insights. I think I will settle on Baile Ghort na Darach. Although the village name is only used eight times in a 300-page novel, getting it right means a lot! If you are interested, I would like to thank you in the acknowledgments at the back of the book. Or I can credit the Irish Language Forum in general for the help. Please let me know. (And I would need your name if so.)

Thank you again.

Jennifer