In a word ... Greystones

The transliteration of English place names into Irish really gets under my skin. There's such a makey-up air about it all. It seems fraudulent. I mean, Greystones for God's sake, Na Clocha Liatha. Na Clocha bloody Liatha?

Or Blackrock. An Carraig Dubh.

It’s like calling Ballaghaderreen, Oakway in English. The literal translation of that place name is “The way through the little oak wood.” Why not stick with the original place name whatever the language?

They had the right idea in Dún Laoghaire. Originally called Dun Leary, the name was then changed to Kingstown before reverting back. Or Cobh in Cork which had been Queenstown.

This transliteration of original English place names in Ireland into cobbled together Gaeilge is redolent of an inferiority we no longer feel.

A fine illustration of what I'm talking about was in an email received recently from reader Len Howard explaining how the Irish word for tomato, "tráta", came about. He was told the story by an inspector in the Department of Education.

Late one evening shortly after World War II this man had been a young inspector in the Department when a phone call came through from the Dáil. An Act was about to be passed allowing the importation of tomatoes now that the war was over. The Irish version of every Act is the definitive version so the query was what was the Irish word for “tomato”?

The inspector’s immediate reaction “was to point out to the inquirer that there was a translation department in the Dáil and that they would have the answer. “No”, he was told “we have been on to them and they directed us to you.”

The inspector said he’d ring them back. He checked around the Department to find that everybody who might be able to help had gone home. He was on his own.

Lane's English-Irish Dictionary or any other he found didn't have the word. He began to mouth it to himself, "to-mah-toe", and remembered an American calling it "to-may-toe". Inspiration struck "'to-may-toe' 'po-tay-toe'. 'Potato' is 'práta' so 'tomato' should be 'tráta'".

He rang his Dáil contact and told him confidently, “The Irish for ‘tomato’ is ‘tráta’, plural ‘trátaí’.” And so it is to this day.

Greystones is named after a stretch of grey stones between two beaches on its sea front. inaword@irishtimes.com