"S'adore i sim caid him faite"

I honestly haven't a clue what it means. When I asked, I was told, "it can't be translated directly into English without losing some meaning". Any help appreciated!

S'adore i sim caid him faite - Dear Angel : I studied a bit of Gaelic a couple years ago, but didnpt get very far. I must say however, that your sample just does not look like Gaelic.

...your sample just does not look like Gaelic.

The person who said this to me is of Celtic descent and said it was Gaelic. Could it be misspelled? Any takers?

"S'adore i sim caid him faite"

Dear Angel,

I've been speaking Irish/Gaelic for 25 years and this is not a Gaelic phrase. Now that doesn't mean that they aren't celtic words. Let me analyse them and let others cross-analyse my conjectures.

S'adore This is too latin to be Gaelic. It looks more like a Norman influence so is probably Middle English akin to Chaucerian English. No Gaelic word combinations contain S'a

i Probably pronounced 'ih' rather than 'eye'. If it refers to the first person singular then it is not Gaelic. In Gaelic there isn't a first person singular! The verbs and grammar do this job. i isn't a Gaelic word. Guess: Welsh?

sim No idea. Possibly Old English. Could be a corruption of the Welsh cym

caid Now we're getting somewhere. caid (cahd) is an Irish word but makes no sense with the other words above. The first real Gaelic word. But it is also an OE and Welsh word.

him Definitely not Gaelic. Germanic. Possibly Anglo-Saxon. Norse?

faite I think this should be pronounced faw-tcha The closest Gaelic word I can think of is fáilte (fawl-tcha) which means 'welcome'. faite could mean something completely different, however.

So we have a highly unusual phrase like something out of Beowulf. Perhaps a few of the words have been mis-spelled or maybe they are not Gaelic but from another celtic language (there are several). Could you contact yoru friend and maybe clarify the spelling? Then I should be able to help you further.

Regards,

Rubrick

Angel,

Have you written this phrase out phonetically or was it written for you? Irish/Gaelic is not written phonetically so you will inevitably have made mistakes if you did.

However, since my last post I got a second opinion from a colleague of mine who studied Irish to third-level. She doesn't recognise any of the words and thinks that it is possibly Latin.

Maybe Mav can help if it's Welsh.

Regards,

Rubrick

Rubrick,

Thank you for your help. This was cut and pasted from an IM that I received, exactly as I received it tho. I do sincerely thank you for your efforts tho.

Angel

I've been reliably informed that it is most likely Breton - a celtic dialect from the Brittany region in North-Western France.

Any Francophones want to check it out??

...it is most likely Breton...[E.A.]

[lightbulb-e] The person saying this to me was born and raised on Cape Breton Island, in Nova Scotia, Canada. Does this help?

fwiw, here's a link that claims to be a Gaelic-to-English dictionary:

http://www.sst.ph.ic.ac.uk/angus/Faclair/

I always thought Cheap Breatuinn was heavily Scottish.

fwiw, here's a link that claims to be a Gaelic-to-English dictionary

It's pretty good. Missing a lot of basic words, though.

It looks like Irish misremembered by someone who doesn't know any, possibly representing an extension of the well-known céad míle fáilte 'a hundred thousand welcomes'.

Definitely no resemblance to Welsh, which means it isn't Breton either.

Definitely no resemblance to Welsh, which means it isn't Breton either.

Yeah, I found a website about Breton translation. It didn't recognise any of the words.

So. A Cape Breton dialect of Scots Gaelic with some Canadien loan words?

Yes, Cape Breton Island is mostly people of Scottish descent, and some Gaelic is spoken there. See http://www.cbrl.ca/gaelic/ResearchE.html. I suppose if worst came to worst someone could email a Gaelic professor at one of the universities mentioned in the article - it's likely they'd know about the regional variations their language has undergone.

it can't be translated directly into English without losing some meaning

So therefore we won't translate it at all, thereby losing all meaning. Doncha just love it?

This being your question, Angel, do you want to pose it to the email link in Beans site?

inssc@nssc.library.ns.ca

Rubrick says: caid Now we're getting somewhere. caid (cahd) is an Irish word but makes no sense with the other words above. But he doesn't tell me what it means.

tsuwm posted a link to a Gaelic-to-English dictionary, which only lists the word i as a pronoun she, her, it feminine.

NicholasW provided me with a few clues. And Dr. Bill threw in his two cents.

Bean has posted a link to an interesting article about Cape Breton Island for me.

And Faldage, points out a link to send an email to get help on this.

So, on the heals of all this wonderful help, I just hit the "send" button asking for help from the link provided. Thank you all, and I promise to post any response I get. Meanwhile, I am going to kill the person who started this, providing I ever hear from them again!

Received in my e-mail today:

Hello Ms. Lasy,
I've passed your message along to the folks at the Nova Scotia Highland Village here on Cape Breton. They have a # of native Gaelic speakers there and have promised to try and do an analysis of the phrase for you.
Ian

Will keep you posted.

Will keep you posted

Arright!

It's neat to think how there are people all over the world putting their minds to your problem!

"S'adore i sim caid him faite"

A little late in the game here...

I know you are trying to find a Gaelic translation to this but I have to say several words sound amazingly like jouale (street/slang French Québecois).

s'adore = he loves himself.

i = very common abreviation for "il" = he

sim = seems.
It was mostly used by second generation people who's part ancestry was English...like my Grandmother who's parents were Irish and French. A lot of English words were used phonetically like "un sing" for a sink. The Office is eliminating those words so folks under 20 have no idea what they mean.

caid = a chiftan/judge/military leader

him (exception...sounds like nothing jouale)

faite = done/accomplished



I don't know if I helped Angel, I think I may be muddying the waters more

Rubrick says: caid Now we're getting somewhere. caid (cahd) is an Irish word but makes no sense with the other words above. But he doesn't tell me what it means.

tsuwm posted a link to a Gaelic-to-English dictionary, which only lists the word i as a pronoun she, her, it feminine.

NicholasW provided me with a few clues. And Dr. Bill threw in his two cents.

Bean has posted a link to an interesting article about Cape Breton Island for me.

And Faldage, points out a link to send an email to get help on this.

And BelM offers, I know you are trying to find a Gaelic translation to this but I have to say several words sound amazingly like jouale (street/slang French Québecois).

he loves himself ... he ... seems ... a chieftain ... accomplished

LOL, Angel! He did say "it can't be translated ..."

LOL, Angel! He did say "it can't be translated ..."

And add to the list, another e-mail that said:
I have looked over the sentance you passed on to Highland Village and I can't decipher it. I think that it likely a phonetic attempt at a Gaelic expresssion. If I come up with anything, I'll send it off to you. - Jim

However, another friend offered up some latin for me:
"my love cannot change my fate" or "I am a slave to my fate even though I wish I could change it". He did say, these are very loose translations.

I have e-mailed the originator of the phrase, and have no response as of yet. [not giving up yet-e]

another friend offered up some latin for me

'At ain' no Latin what I never done seed.

OK, just got off an IM with the originator of this phrase.

Kim says:
S'adore i sim caid him faite.....what does it mean????
***says:
lol
***says:
it is Gaelic
Kim says:
what does it mean
***says:
it is hard to translate..but roughly means " a thousand lovely wishes given to a friend"
***says:
it is a way to greet a good friend

So, there you have it, folks. Right or wrong, that's what the originator of the phrase believes.

Thank you all for your input!

a thousand lovely wishes given to a friend

My Irish expert translates this as Míle dea-ghuí, a chara ('a thousand good wishes, friend') and can make no sense whatsoever of the original phrase: can't even find accidental resemblances to real Gaelic, apart from the word céad that I'd already pointed out as 'hundred'.