0:00:08 > 0:00:11The way we speak is who we are.
0:00:11 > 0:00:14It tells us how we got to be where we are, what our history is,
0:00:14 > 0:00:17what our culture is, where we're from.
0:00:20 > 0:00:23This is a story of richness and heritage,
0:00:23 > 0:00:27a celebration of the diversity of our speech.
0:00:31 > 0:00:35The Concise Ulster Dictionary is a unique collection
0:00:35 > 0:00:38that reveals who we are through how we talk.
0:00:39 > 0:00:41It will be our guide
0:00:41 > 0:00:44as we learn about those who have preserved our languages,
0:00:44 > 0:00:49uncover the sources that have influenced how we speak today,
0:00:49 > 0:00:53and celebrate those who turn words into art.
0:00:54 > 0:00:57It's a bit like DNA.
0:00:57 > 0:01:00You know, people like to have their DNA tested -
0:01:00 > 0:01:04they probably have a good idea of what the main threads are,
0:01:04 > 0:01:08but there might be some surprises, as well.
0:01:12 > 0:01:15It's something that we should take a great delight in, a great pride in,
0:01:15 > 0:01:17and seek to hang on to.
0:01:52 > 0:01:54The Concise Ulster Dictionary is one of the books
0:01:54 > 0:01:56I take off my book shelf most often.
0:01:56 > 0:01:58It's one of those great volumes
0:01:58 > 0:02:01that, if you're having a conversation
0:02:01 > 0:02:03and you hear an unusual word, the odds are,
0:02:03 > 0:02:05if it isn't Scots and it isn't English,
0:02:05 > 0:02:09it's going to be an Ulster word, and you'll find it in the CUD.
0:02:11 > 0:02:14Over 15,000 words are on these pages -
0:02:14 > 0:02:17a significant collection,
0:02:17 > 0:02:20providing an insight into how we speak in Ulster,
0:02:20 > 0:02:25a sense of place, our relationship with the land and each other.
0:02:28 > 0:02:34It is probably the most comprehensive record we have
0:02:34 > 0:02:36of Ulster vernacular speech.
0:02:36 > 0:02:40It draws from the three language groupings
0:02:40 > 0:02:43that are present in Northern Ireland -
0:02:43 > 0:02:47that is, Northern Hiberno-English, Ulster Scots,
0:02:47 > 0:02:51and also, you get loan words from Irish.
0:02:51 > 0:02:54So, there are not kind of hard and fast boundaries
0:02:54 > 0:02:57between those three language groupings.
0:02:57 > 0:03:01It tends to be fuzzy - but it's all the richer for that.
0:03:03 > 0:03:05Published in 1996,
0:03:05 > 0:03:08this dictionary was the next step of a journey
0:03:08 > 0:03:11that had begun decades earlier.
0:03:13 > 0:03:17In 1951, the Belfast Naturalists' Field Club
0:03:17 > 0:03:21began a project for an Ulster dialect dictionary,
0:03:21 > 0:03:24and this involved not only bringing together
0:03:24 > 0:03:27previously published wordlists,
0:03:27 > 0:03:32scattered wordlists from various parts of the province,
0:03:32 > 0:03:36but collecting new words on an organised basis.
0:03:40 > 0:03:44Its president, actor and author Richard Hayward,
0:03:44 > 0:03:46along with his nephew Brendan Adams,
0:03:46 > 0:03:50were particularly interested in collecting folklore and dialect.
0:03:55 > 0:03:57They sent out questionnaires
0:03:57 > 0:04:01that had originated with the linguistic survey of Scotland.
0:04:01 > 0:04:03Schools, you know, young farmers -
0:04:03 > 0:04:08all the people who might be expected to have a reasonable grounding
0:04:08 > 0:04:09in Ulster dialect.
0:04:14 > 0:04:17There was a linguistic survey of Scotland
0:04:17 > 0:04:21that was going on in the 1950s.
0:04:21 > 0:04:23There was a survey of English dialects
0:04:23 > 0:04:26which was contemporary with that.
0:04:26 > 0:04:28I think there was a feeling
0:04:28 > 0:04:31of "last chance to see", as it were.
0:04:33 > 0:04:37The world had changed so completely after the Second World War,
0:04:37 > 0:04:43they were conscious of some of these old practices and old habits,
0:04:43 > 0:04:48and with them, the old ways of thinking, were passing away,
0:04:48 > 0:04:52and so they wanted to compile a record before it was too late -
0:04:52 > 0:04:54and if they hadn't done that,
0:04:54 > 0:04:58we might never know what many of these old words were.
0:05:00 > 0:05:04This one in front of me is trying to elicit names
0:05:04 > 0:05:07for the uncut top of a bog,
0:05:07 > 0:05:09an earwig,
0:05:09 > 0:05:12the words for toppling over,
0:05:12 > 0:05:16what people say instead of "one",
0:05:16 > 0:05:21and the thing into which you run the water to wash clothes or dishes.
0:05:21 > 0:05:23One of them, here, in the letter E, is,
0:05:23 > 0:05:25"Would you even yourself to that?"
0:05:25 > 0:05:27It means, "Would you lower yourself?"
0:05:27 > 0:05:31It's quite an insulting thing to say.
0:05:31 > 0:05:36You also get the names for the last pig in a litter, say.
0:05:36 > 0:05:41The jorry, who's the last wee runt, really, to be born,
0:05:41 > 0:05:45and they were reckoned to be under the protection of, for instance,
0:05:45 > 0:05:49St Anthony, who was the patron saint of swineherds,
0:05:49 > 0:05:53so, it's all just part of the folklore surrounding the language.
0:06:12 > 0:06:15In 1959, this collection was deposited
0:06:15 > 0:06:19for the recently established Ulster Folk Museum.
0:06:20 > 0:06:23Over the years, the Ulster Dialect Archive
0:06:23 > 0:06:27continued to acquire additional wordlists and glossaries.
0:06:28 > 0:06:31In 1989, the decision was taken
0:06:31 > 0:06:34to combine all the information that had been gathered
0:06:34 > 0:06:38and produce an Ulster dialect dictionary aimed at schoolchildren.
0:06:41 > 0:06:44This seemed like a tremendous opportunity,
0:06:44 > 0:06:48given the recognition that there were different linguistic sources
0:06:48 > 0:06:50for Ulster dialect.
0:06:50 > 0:06:52There was Lowland Scots,
0:06:52 > 0:06:55particularly in the areas where Ulster Scots was still spoken,
0:06:55 > 0:06:58there was Elizabethan -
0:06:58 > 0:07:01or some people call it Elizabethan or Shakespearean English
0:07:01 > 0:07:03in Mid Ulster and South Ulster,
0:07:03 > 0:07:05and, of course, in the Gaeltacht areas
0:07:05 > 0:07:10of Glens of Antrim, Sperrins, Donegal -
0:07:10 > 0:07:14there were Irish influences, Irish Gaelic influences.
0:07:14 > 0:07:18So, with those sort of three linguistic mixes in Ulster dialect,
0:07:18 > 0:07:21this idea of education for mutual understanding
0:07:21 > 0:07:27and presenting of these wordlists, which covered all of those aspects,
0:07:27 > 0:07:30was seen as a great educational tool.
0:07:32 > 0:07:35We used the Oxford English Dictionary as the arbiter.
0:07:35 > 0:07:37If the Oxford said it was standard English,
0:07:37 > 0:07:42then, in the space of a one-volume dictionary, it had to be excluded.
0:07:42 > 0:07:46So, the dictionary isn't a picture of the whole of the language,
0:07:46 > 0:07:48it's the whole of the language
0:07:48 > 0:07:51that's in addition to standard English.
0:07:53 > 0:07:56I think the illustrations were a definite plus.
0:07:56 > 0:08:01Quite a bit of it's to do with rural craft, flora and fauna,
0:08:01 > 0:08:03agricultural implements -
0:08:03 > 0:08:07it's a wee bit difficult just explaining what bit you mean,
0:08:07 > 0:08:11and, you know, we then had the opportunity,
0:08:11 > 0:08:14because of these illustrations, to make it very clear.
0:08:16 > 0:08:18One thing that I'd never seen,
0:08:18 > 0:08:24and wouldn't have known what it was, was a breadstick, and you also...
0:08:24 > 0:08:28That's what's called a calque, or a loan translation.
0:08:28 > 0:08:31The word is madgie-aran in Irish,
0:08:31 > 0:08:35and you also get madgie-aran in the dictionary,
0:08:35 > 0:08:39and that's quite a simple wooden prop
0:08:39 > 0:08:43for drying an oatcake in front of an open fire.
0:08:43 > 0:08:45So, yeah, a picture paints a thousand words,
0:08:45 > 0:08:48and - see what these things look like.
0:08:52 > 0:08:55The joy of the dictionary, the Concise Ulster Dictionary,
0:08:55 > 0:08:56is that anybody at any level,
0:08:56 > 0:09:00whether it's at school or at home, you can look up a word -
0:09:00 > 0:09:04now, there may be a lot of words in it you've never heard of or seen,
0:09:04 > 0:09:05but the word that you're looking for,
0:09:05 > 0:09:07you'll find it, and that's the joy of it.
0:09:37 > 0:09:39"I'm livin' in Drumlister
0:09:39 > 0:09:41"An' I'm gettin' very oul'
0:09:41 > 0:09:43"I have to wear an Indian bag
0:09:43 > 0:09:45"To save me from the coul'."
0:09:47 > 0:09:50Here in Sixmilecross in County Tyrone,
0:09:50 > 0:09:54they gather to celebrate the life of a local hero -
0:09:54 > 0:09:56the Reverend WF Marshall.
0:10:00 > 0:10:04This Presbyterian minister, playwright and broadcaster
0:10:04 > 0:10:06is perhaps best known for his poetry.
0:10:08 > 0:10:15What I liked about WF Marshall was his use of the local dialect.
0:10:15 > 0:10:17The Reverend WF Marshall.
0:10:17 > 0:10:20Who doesn't know the Reverend WF Marshall?
0:10:20 > 0:10:23Well, you shouldn't be here if you don't -
0:10:23 > 0:10:26but I was just thinking, you know, about the different things that...
0:10:26 > 0:10:29WF Marshall probably means as much to people at Sixmilecross
0:10:29 > 0:10:32as Robert Burns means to the people of Ayrshire.
0:10:34 > 0:10:36Marshall's most famous work
0:10:36 > 0:10:39pays tribute to the area of his formative years.
0:10:44 > 0:10:46"The deil a man in this townlan'
0:10:46 > 0:10:49"Wos claner raired nor me,
0:10:49 > 0:10:51"But I'm livin' in Drumlister
0:10:51 > 0:10:53"In clabber to the knee."
0:10:59 > 0:11:02It sounds beautiful. You pick apart what's going on there -
0:11:02 > 0:11:04what's "clabber"?
0:11:04 > 0:11:05Dirt.
0:11:05 > 0:11:07Where does that come from? That's an Irish word, clabber, OK?
0:11:07 > 0:11:10- What's "deil"? - The deil is the devil.
0:11:10 > 0:11:13So, that the Scots pronunciation of the English devil, deil -
0:11:13 > 0:11:16but it made its way into Ulster, as well, with the Scots settlers,
0:11:16 > 0:11:18and it survived up until recently.
0:11:18 > 0:11:20What about "claner raired"?
0:11:20 > 0:11:23I mean, that's the sort of thing I heard growing up all the time -
0:11:23 > 0:11:26we were raired, you know, about the farm in Tyrone.
0:11:26 > 0:11:27Claner - why "claner", why not "cleaner"?
0:11:27 > 0:11:30Well, these are pronunciations that go back to 17th-century English,
0:11:30 > 0:11:32survived in English dialects into the 20th century,
0:11:32 > 0:11:34almost gone from English, now, too.
0:11:34 > 0:11:37So, you can see that WF Marshall was doing something really interesting.
0:11:37 > 0:11:39He wasn't just writing poems,
0:11:39 > 0:11:41he was telling us about life in Tyrone,
0:11:41 > 0:11:44but he was also capturing the linguistic essence
0:11:44 > 0:11:45of the Tyrone dialect.
0:11:48 > 0:11:51He writes about the hills and about the valleys
0:11:51 > 0:11:53and about the townlands and so on -
0:11:53 > 0:11:55a real deep love of the countryside,
0:11:55 > 0:11:58and, you know, for him, as I think it is for me, as well,
0:11:58 > 0:12:00a deep connection between that love of the countryside
0:12:00 > 0:12:03and a love of the way people speak in the countryside.
0:12:04 > 0:12:08"The dialect is no longer begging at the back door,"
0:12:08 > 0:12:10wrote Marshall in 1929 -
0:12:10 > 0:12:15an appreciation that led him to compile his own collection of words.
0:12:17 > 0:12:23He was working on the dictionary when he went to answer the door,
0:12:23 > 0:12:29and his little Labrador pup took the opportunity, as doggies do,
0:12:29 > 0:12:33of grabbing the manuscript for his dictionary
0:12:33 > 0:12:37and giving it a jolly good guzzle, and...
0:12:39 > 0:12:42..the story went around that Marshall had come back
0:12:42 > 0:12:45to discover the dictionary in bits around his study floor
0:12:45 > 0:12:46and had binned the lot.
0:12:53 > 0:12:56In fact, the dictionary survived.
0:13:06 > 0:13:09For many years, it has been held for safekeeping
0:13:09 > 0:13:11at the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum.
0:13:14 > 0:13:16He hasn't just given the word and its meaning,
0:13:16 > 0:13:21but he's got sources going right through from Shakespeare in 1592
0:13:21 > 0:13:26to Paradise Lost, Milton's Paradise Lost in 1667.
0:13:26 > 0:13:29If I can read this right, it says, "One whose drouth
0:13:29 > 0:13:33"Yet scarce allay'd, still eyes the current stream."
0:13:35 > 0:13:38I was aware that I'd never seen it before, though.
0:13:38 > 0:13:40It's sort of a unique collection, isn't it?
0:13:40 > 0:13:42It's fantastic, I feel privileged to look through them.
0:13:42 > 0:13:45There's so much information, you'd need hours and hours of study
0:13:45 > 0:13:47to get to grips with what's in them, you know?
0:13:47 > 0:13:51So, it's an amazing resource
0:13:51 > 0:13:54that thankfully survived the ravages of the dog.
0:13:57 > 0:14:00It gives the real understanding of Marshall the linguist
0:14:00 > 0:14:02behind the poetry, as well, you know?
0:14:04 > 0:14:07It's not just a list of words. He's done a study, here.
0:14:07 > 0:14:09He's showing how much knowledge he has
0:14:09 > 0:14:10about the history of the language.
0:14:12 > 0:14:13There's a nice word, "collogue".
0:14:13 > 0:14:15It almost sounds like it might be an Irish word,
0:14:15 > 0:14:17the long "ogue" at the end,
0:14:17 > 0:14:18but it's not - it comes from colloquium.
0:14:18 > 0:14:22"It means primarily to hold an intimate conversation...
0:14:22 > 0:14:24"often with a sense of intrigue
0:14:24 > 0:14:27"or something being planned or arranged," OK?
0:14:27 > 0:14:30From the Latin, colloquium. You know? So, it's all in there.
0:14:30 > 0:14:31And then he goes on,
0:14:31 > 0:14:34and gives other evidence of the uses of the word and so on.
0:14:34 > 0:14:36A really nice bit of information, there.
0:14:36 > 0:14:39So, really what you've got here isn't just a dictionary -
0:14:39 > 0:14:43or, at least, it's not a dictionary in the term of a quick list of words
0:14:43 > 0:14:44with their meanings and origins,
0:14:44 > 0:14:47he tells us about the words, how they're used,
0:14:47 > 0:14:50how they fit into the linguistic system,
0:14:50 > 0:14:52how they fit into Tyrone historically, and so on.
0:14:54 > 0:14:56There are words in here I haven't...
0:14:56 > 0:14:57Some of them I don't know, others I do know,
0:14:57 > 0:15:00others I haven't heard in a long time, others that are still used.
0:15:00 > 0:15:03You know, there's the word "cutty", for a girl, for example,
0:15:03 > 0:15:04still used in Tyrone today.
0:15:07 > 0:15:08Well, it's quite fascinating, really,
0:15:08 > 0:15:10if you think about the work that went into this.
0:15:10 > 0:15:12I mean, this is dense, page after page after page,
0:15:12 > 0:15:16this man was clearly, through his life, fascinated by the dialect.
0:15:16 > 0:15:17He made it his life's work, almost.
0:15:17 > 0:15:20I mean, why did he do this? Because he loved it.
0:15:20 > 0:15:21That's why he did it.
0:15:21 > 0:15:23He wanted to record the stuff, he was surrounded by it,
0:15:23 > 0:15:26he fell in love with the dialect,
0:15:26 > 0:15:29he wanted to write down things that he'd heard,
0:15:29 > 0:15:32and you can see that very plainly in this work.
0:15:34 > 0:15:37Nearly 60 years after his death,
0:15:37 > 0:15:41a new bust is unveiled to celebrate Marshall's legacy.
0:15:42 > 0:15:46His connection with Sixmilecross as strong as ever.
0:15:46 > 0:15:52A man who championed its people, its landscape, its dialect.
0:15:54 > 0:15:57One of the important things that Marshall did
0:15:57 > 0:15:59was he raised Tyrone dialect
0:15:59 > 0:16:03from just being that thing that people didn't think too much of
0:16:03 > 0:16:05to being something that people saw,
0:16:05 > 0:16:08actually, you can write in this, you can express interesting things
0:16:08 > 0:16:11and useful and meaningful things in this dialect.
0:16:35 > 0:16:36Here A stan,
0:16:36 > 0:16:40On the hoovin hairt o Antrim, luckin bak
0:16:40 > 0:16:42A wee at thon far ither hills,
0:16:42 > 0:16:45The dreamy, cloody hills o owl Scotia,
0:16:45 > 0:16:47Owl foont
0:16:47 > 0:16:50O iver-hantin echas, hard yit an clear
0:16:50 > 0:16:54In word an sang, in fiel an hoose an pew:
0:16:54 > 0:16:56A' that noo an lang wer ain.
0:16:59 > 0:17:03I think if anybody wants to have an example,
0:17:03 > 0:17:10either in spoken form or recorded form of a collection of words
0:17:10 > 0:17:16or idioms, of the language, as well, Jim Fenton is unquestionably
0:17:16 > 0:17:20the best proponent of that today for Ulster Scots.
0:17:24 > 0:17:29Where Slaimish is, or Sliabh Mis, if you want its Irish name,
0:17:29 > 0:17:31it's there, a landmark,
0:17:31 > 0:17:36and I have always thought of it as very much, from my school days,
0:17:36 > 0:17:40associating it with St Patrick, with all sorts of things, you know?
0:17:40 > 0:17:44So, I think if I wanted a symbol, if I'm going to use that word,
0:17:44 > 0:17:47for County Antrim countryside,
0:17:47 > 0:17:49it would be Slaimish I would think of.
0:17:51 > 0:17:54I was trying to portray the whole language.
0:17:54 > 0:17:58I wanted something that would give the feel, the soul, of Ulster Scots,
0:17:58 > 0:18:00and what it means to the people,
0:18:00 > 0:18:03and that's the whole idea of my poetry,
0:18:03 > 0:18:06is to get the feel of the land and my feel about the land,
0:18:06 > 0:18:10and as a native of this land, to get that down on paper.
0:18:10 > 0:18:14So, when I recite it or read it, or somebody else does,
0:18:14 > 0:18:19I would hope that what I have experienced, they would experience.
0:18:22 > 0:18:26Here A stan, bak luckin tae nearder hichts,
0:18:26 > 0:18:29Tae this waitin lan aroon me,
0:18:29 > 0:18:32Whar yince a hirdin weetchil stud loast
0:18:32 > 0:18:34A wee atween dreams an sa,
0:18:34 > 0:18:36Or dreamin sa,
0:18:36 > 0:18:39Streetchin braid afore him, anither ree,
0:18:39 > 0:18:43Anither flock braid-gethered, thranger far.
0:18:43 > 0:18:46Whar nicht-wantherin Orr dreamed yit, for a'
0:18:46 > 0:18:49The bitter wakkenin o ninety-echt:
0:18:49 > 0:18:52This lan that cried tha dreamer bak,
0:18:52 > 0:18:53for this is hame.
0:18:56 > 0:18:59Fascinated by local words and speech,
0:18:59 > 0:19:02Fenton set about collecting a personal record
0:19:02 > 0:19:04of Ulster Scots in County Antrim.
0:19:04 > 0:19:08It was a passion that would become the seminal work The Hamely Tongue.
0:19:09 > 0:19:15He went across the county and he interviewed all of these people,
0:19:15 > 0:19:18and asked them - he had a checklist of words,
0:19:18 > 0:19:22and he added to them as he found out words from them.
0:19:22 > 0:19:24So, he was able to include in The Hamely Tongue
0:19:24 > 0:19:27words that were common throughout the whole area.
0:19:29 > 0:19:33I wasn't setting out on a career as a poet or anything like that at all.
0:19:33 > 0:19:37It was only later on I tried, in The Hamely Tongue,
0:19:37 > 0:19:42not to write just a lexicon, a dictionary, or anything like that,
0:19:42 > 0:19:46I wanted a full picture, a portrait, in all its richness
0:19:46 > 0:19:51and variety, of Ulster Scots, and I only thought you could,
0:19:51 > 0:19:54to get the essence of that, to get the soul of it,
0:19:54 > 0:19:56you would do that in poetry as well as you could,
0:19:56 > 0:19:57to the best of your ability,
0:19:57 > 0:19:59which is why I started to write poetry then.
0:20:02 > 0:20:07To understand his poetry, you really do need to use The Hamely Tongue.
0:20:07 > 0:20:11I mean, even a fluent Ulster Scots Speaker would have difficulty
0:20:11 > 0:20:15with the literature of Jim Fenton's poetry -
0:20:15 > 0:20:19because it is literature,
0:20:19 > 0:20:23and it has all of these levels of meaning and subtleties and so on,
0:20:23 > 0:20:27and you have to be aware that a single word
0:20:27 > 0:20:30can have different connotations and so on
0:20:30 > 0:20:32to understand, fully, the literature.
0:20:34 > 0:20:38When I was young, I wandered the bogs
0:20:38 > 0:20:43that run from above Dunloy to Glarryford.
0:20:43 > 0:20:47Eight miles, ten miles of bogland, odd break of fields in between.
0:20:47 > 0:20:49At night-time I would sit there
0:20:49 > 0:20:51and as the darkness gathered round me,
0:20:51 > 0:20:53and the lights began to come on to the countryside
0:20:53 > 0:20:57it transformed the world and transformed my feelings,
0:20:57 > 0:20:59and eventually, out of that, came the poem.
0:21:02 > 0:21:04Dailygan simply means daylight going.
0:21:04 > 0:21:06Dusk, the end of the day.
0:21:07 > 0:21:10My day, as well, that I'd had, that was coming to an end, you know,
0:21:10 > 0:21:12it was all that.
0:21:16 > 0:21:18Dailygan.
0:21:19 > 0:21:24An noo the lichts ower Brochanor mak blak the brae behin;
0:21:24 > 0:21:26The sallies, hoovin saft an grey,
0:21:26 > 0:21:28come cloodin, getherin in;
0:21:28 > 0:21:31The wattr, glancing ower its dark,
0:21:31 > 0:21:36babs lippin, whusperin by; the boag's dark-sweelin, quait,
0:21:36 > 0:21:38aroon the tummock whar a lie.
0:21:40 > 0:21:44The peat's quait low, the week's saft licht
0:21:44 > 0:21:48Mak blak the ootby noo; the prootas plowt;
0:21:48 > 0:21:52the neeps' sweet steam cloods roon hir sweetin broo;
0:21:52 > 0:21:57Bae qua an boag, ower queelrod wa, thon licht's a gleekin ee
0:21:57 > 0:21:59Frae whar A come an whar A'll gae
0:21:59 > 0:22:01but cannie stie or lee.
0:22:39 > 0:22:42ARCHIVE RECORDING OF MAN SPEAKING IRISH
0:22:55 > 0:22:57The voice of Brian Mac Amhlaoibh,
0:22:57 > 0:23:00a native Irish speaker from County Antrim,
0:23:00 > 0:23:04recounting the parable of the prodigal son.
0:23:04 > 0:23:06HE SPEAKS IN IRISH
0:23:08 > 0:23:12He was recorded in 1931
0:23:12 > 0:23:15as part of a project to capture spoken Irish
0:23:15 > 0:23:18across the island of Ireland.
0:23:18 > 0:23:20Wilhelm Doegen was a German scholar.
0:23:20 > 0:23:23He had made something of a name for himself,
0:23:23 > 0:23:25particularly during the First World War,
0:23:25 > 0:23:28recording languages from around the world.
0:23:28 > 0:23:32He had a real passion for recording languages and dialects,
0:23:32 > 0:23:36and he gained access to the POW camps
0:23:36 > 0:23:39and he had an abundance of speakers from all over the world,
0:23:39 > 0:23:42and the authorities here in Ireland
0:23:42 > 0:23:46decided to invite him to make recordings of native Irish speakers.
0:23:47 > 0:23:49WOMAN SPEAKS IN IRISH
0:23:59 > 0:24:02Native Irish speakers from six counties in Ulster
0:24:02 > 0:24:06were recorded by Doegen's assistant in Letterkenny
0:24:06 > 0:24:08and at Queen's University in Belfast.
0:24:09 > 0:24:12SHE SPEAKS IN IRISH
0:24:25 > 0:24:30The importance of Doegen and his work in the early 1930s
0:24:30 > 0:24:33is really immense, because Doegen came here at a time
0:24:33 > 0:24:37where the language was spoken in areas where it is no longer spoken.
0:24:37 > 0:24:40In other words, he had encounters with the last native speakers
0:24:40 > 0:24:42in many places in the island of Ireland.
0:24:44 > 0:24:47SHE SPEAKS IN IRISH
0:25:19 > 0:25:22It tells us a lot about the nature of Ulster Irish -
0:25:22 > 0:25:25but he was able to prove, he was able to provide a body of evidence
0:25:25 > 0:25:28for some of the things scholars had wondered about -
0:25:28 > 0:25:31ie, was the speech in Ulster uniform?
0:25:31 > 0:25:35Was the Irish... Can we speak about a variety known as Ulster Irish,
0:25:35 > 0:25:38or are there varieties within Ulster that are different?
0:25:38 > 0:25:40The answer to that was yes.
0:25:45 > 0:25:48I suppose the main feature that stands out
0:25:48 > 0:25:51is the fact that the - particularly East Ulster -
0:25:51 > 0:25:56shares so many features that you find in Scottish Gaelic.
0:25:56 > 0:25:59You talk about Antrim and Rathlin, Gaelic speakers,
0:25:59 > 0:26:03they would probably have been able to converse with people
0:26:03 > 0:26:06from Arran and Kintyre.
0:26:06 > 0:26:08This archive, these recordings,
0:26:08 > 0:26:10give a good indication that that was the case,
0:26:10 > 0:26:13because there's loads of examples of grammar and idiom
0:26:13 > 0:26:16and pronunciation and stress that are shared with Scots Gaelic.
0:26:18 > 0:26:21WOMAN SINGS IN IRISH
0:26:29 > 0:26:33We listened to Aine Ni Mhuireadhaigh from Donegal, she is 17 years old,
0:26:33 > 0:26:36so, one of the very youngest of the recordings,
0:26:36 > 0:26:39and she was singing, there, a song called Tiocfaidh An Samhradh,
0:26:39 > 0:26:42a song that tells of a brokenhearted sailor
0:26:42 > 0:26:44who lost his love to another man.
0:26:44 > 0:26:46SHE SINGS IN IRISH
0:26:58 > 0:27:03To be able to connect with somebody who spoke this language
0:27:03 > 0:27:07previously in a given place, and spoke at any particular way,
0:27:07 > 0:27:09with their own local colour,
0:27:09 > 0:27:12different from the recognisable dialects nowadays -
0:27:12 > 0:27:14akin to them, of course, but different -
0:27:14 > 0:27:17to have that experience, to be able to hear about with your own ears,
0:27:17 > 0:27:20as opposed to relying on some secondary source for it,
0:27:20 > 0:27:24you know, a reference in a book or a discussion in an academic paper,
0:27:24 > 0:27:27to be able to actually hear that speech, this is a human being,
0:27:27 > 0:27:29a living person, from our place, from a different time
0:27:29 > 0:27:31and speaking a different language,
0:27:31 > 0:27:33to be able to hear that was really special.
0:27:33 > 0:27:35SHE SINGS IN IRISH
0:27:54 > 0:27:56The Reverend WF Marshall
0:27:56 > 0:27:59talked about the rose, the shamrock and the thistle,
0:27:59 > 0:28:03and that, in some ways, captures the essence
0:28:03 > 0:28:06of the language we have nowadays -
0:28:06 > 0:28:09this lovely blend, which makes our language so unique.
0:28:11 > 0:28:15Are you interested in finding out more about languages in Ulster?
0:28:15 > 0:28:16Go to...
0:28:20 > 0:28:23..and follow the links to the Open University,
0:28:23 > 0:28:25where you can watch further content
0:28:25 > 0:28:28about this rich and diverse heritage.