Talk:Seanchaí

Wikipedia has a related page under a different spelling: Seanachai. This other page refers to the same reality (Gaelic bards) but suffers from an incorrect spelling -- the final letter "i" should have a "fada", thus: seanachaí. Many instances within the article have been corrected. Meanwhile from what I can tell, the term "seanachie" is a bit off as well; it seems to be a combination of the Irish and the Anglicized versions. If using the Anglicized form with the "ie" ending I believe that the word should be "shanachie". Thus, either "shanachie" or "seanachaí".

This page title is misspelled

The page title is misspelled. If you want to write it in Irish then it should be Seanchai which follows the Irish spelling rule of strong with strong, weak with weak. This means that a consonant or consonant cluster must be preceded and followed by a vowel of the same class, either strong or weak. A, O and U are strong. E and I are weak.

In English this word is written Shanachie which reflects the fact that Irish words with a consonant cluster beginning in N often have a slight vowel sound (Schwa) after the N. Of course, there are alternate spellings in English but Google will show that Shanachie is the most popular.

I suggest that the ideal course of action is to name the page Seanchai and have a redirect page named Shanachie.

This page Irish Dictionary (S) shows seanchaidh but there was a spelling reform in Ireland after the revolution which dropped the silent dh. My copy of Collins pocket Irish dictionary ISBN 0-00-470765-6 shows Seanchai with stress on the last syllable (pronounced -ee) and a meaning of story-teller or historian. I suggest that someone with access to a large public/university library verify the spelling in a recent Irish dictionary.