My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?

Subject: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,Bill Cummings
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 02:02 AM

Anybody know what a "cushla" or a "cushla dear" is, from the classic Irish song, My Irish Molly-Oh, and/or its signifigance to the song and stylistic period? Anyone know a free site to reference Irish and Gaelic Words?

Bill

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Felipa
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 03:16 AM

I think this term has been discussed in Mudcat before. a-cushla from Gaelic "a chuisle", o my love. There are many terms of endearment; this one comes from "cuisle" a pulse, as in a-cushla machree, "a chuisle, mo chroi" - o, pulse of my heart

I don't know of a site that would give you transliterations. For vocabulary for Irish speakers and learners, try www.beo.ie or www.acmhain.ie

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Fergie
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 09:29 AM

Felipa is correct, it means pulse (pulse of my heart)
Fergus

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 01:05 PM

Irish Molly is an American song written by William Jerome, with music by Jean Schwartz; you can see two examples of 1905 sheet music at the Lester Levy Sheet Music Collection:

My Irish Molly O
My Irish Molly O

It's a typical product of the American "Stage Irish" style; such songs very often include tags such as "acushla" and "machree", which essentially were thrown in for flavour by professional songwriters who as often as not were far from being Irish themselves. Although they will have known that the terms were common endearments, they may well have had no idea of their derivation or precise meaning. Those two terms in particular have, I think, been discussed here a number of times; they are very common in stage and parlour songs of the period.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,Anne Croucher
Date: 15 Feb 04 - 07:14 PM

I sing a song which is partly in Scots Galic - I think - and the second verse is

Thou are the music of my heart
Harp of joy 'cruit mo chridh'
Moon of guidance by night
Strength and light thou are to me

It has a note to myself 'cruish ma chree'- I must have either found the words on a record sleeve or seen the phrase written.

I understood that the meaning was difficult to render into English even though we have the term heart strings this is something like 'harping of my heart'

Anne

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Apr 07 - 03:51 PM

myself and my mother are both called cushla.
to find its true meaning it must be spelt cuisle. cuisle on its own means pulse / heartbeat. but "mo cuisle" means my darling, my sweetheart.

two well irish songs are "mo cuisle" and "oh a cushla geal mo chroi.."

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Declan
Date: 15 Apr 07 - 07:23 PM

To get technical for a minute "A chuisle" is the vocative case and "mo chuisle" is the genative. These have been anglicised as Acushla meaning "Oh pulse/heartbeat" and Macushla meaning "My pulse/heartbeat".

As Malcolm says above these would have been taken as generic Irish terms of endearment and used by many songwriters as such.

There was a well known landmark in Dublin called the Macushla which started out as a ballroom and later became a Bingo Hall. It is now the site of offices of the Irish Gas Board "Bórd Gáis".

Michael Marra has an interesting song set in Dublin called "to please Macushla" which is set in Dublin, and is well worth a listen.

Machree is an anglaicsation of "Mo Chroí" (modern Irish spelling - used to be "mo Cridhe") which means "My Heart" or "of My heart".

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Mr Happy
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 04:15 AM

From 쳌ethe mountains of Mourne쳌f: Percy French

I believe that when writin', a wish you expressed
As to how the fine ladies in London were dressed
Well, if you believe me, when asked to a ball
Faith, they don't wear no top to their dresses at all.
Oh, I've seen them myself and you could not in trath [truth]
Say if they were bound for a ball or a bath
Don't be startin' them fashions now, Mary Macree,
Where the mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Mr Happy
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 05:23 AM

& also 'Mother McChree'

Here's 'Count' John McCormack singing it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYfzPGgKevQ

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Irish sergeant
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 12:01 PM

Go to Google (or whomever) and type in translation guides and you should be able to find several sites. Neil

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 01:06 PM

In Clint Eastwood's award-winning film Million Dollar Baby, Clint's character is an aging trainer/manager of boxers who, against his better judgement, takes on a young woman (Hillary Swank, in an Oscar-winning performance) as client/protege.

The setting and the characters are American as can be, but Eastwood's character is studying Irish Gaelic langauge as a sort of hobby, and Swank's has an Irish name (Maggie Fitz-something) although little or no knowledge of or interest in Irish history and culture. When the young female boxer begins to experience real success and goes off to Germany to fight a world-title contender, her manager surprises her with a green-and-gold robe inscribed on the back with the words "Mo Cuisle." She has no idea what it means, and Eastwood's character won't tell her, but the crowd includes enough exiled Irish boxing fans to raise an enthusiastic chant of "Macushla! Macushla!" The meaning is not revealed right away, but Maggie's new nickname catches on as she rises to international prominence, and eventually we learn that it means something along the lines of "sweetheart" or "my darling."

I won't give away any more, for those of you who haven't seen it and may want to check it out. I'll just say this: if you expect an old-fashioned-Hollywood "happy ending," prepare to be disappointed...

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Rog Peek
Date: 16 Apr 07 - 01:10 PM

Yes, it means darling or sweatheart I believe.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 10:26 AM

In Irish when you are talking directly to someone dear to you, EG, your partner or child, you could address them as, 'A chuisle' = 'Love' or 'darling', but if you are speaking about them to someone else you might refer to him/her as 'mo chuisle' = my dear/darling. The Irish people switched languages but brought this term and many others such as 'a ghillín', 'a stór', 'a chroí', 'a mhúirnín', etc ] over into their version of English and spread them abroad. Many of Irish or part-Irish descent use them without knowing the literal meaning and I reckon that's great.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 11:06 AM

GUEST 4/17/07 10:26 AM:

If you're still hereabouts, how about (a) translations and (b) phonetic spelling for 'a ghillín', 'a stór', 'a chroí', 'a mhúirnín.' ~ please?

Without having a clue as to how they're pronounced, I don't know whether I've heard these expressons or not. And, of course, I'm curious as to what each one means.

Thanks,
A 2d-generation Irish-American

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: JulieF
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 12:44 PM

a stor -   treasure
a chroi - heart

as in A stor mo chroi -   treasure of my heart

sort can't be bothered looking for the bit that lets me put the fadas on


J

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 01:26 PM

Fadas, whatever they are, wouldn't be of much help to me.

By "phonetic spelling," what I meant and had hoped for was something along the lines of rendering "Mo Cuisle" as "Macushla."

Using the diacritical marks listed in fine print in the OED would be little more helpful than just leaving the original Irish-language spelling as-is.

Sorry about my linguistic limitations. I like to think of myself as a bit of a polymath, with a lot of trivial knowledge about a lot of different subjects, but this particular area is well outside my curent grasp. And I've reached an age where I'm not likely to learn too many more "new tricks."

But then again, maybe I'll follow the example of Clint Eastwood's character in the movie, and begin serious study of a beloved but essentially dead language long after I'm old and gray.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: JulieF
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 01:51 PM

the fadas are the accents above the words.    I'm sorry I'm not much help at spelling things phonetically as although I am learning Irish slowly I don't have any real skill, I can only sing it at the moment - take the tune away and I'm completely lost

try http://www.irishgaelictranslator.com/ as they have some sound clips and also have a whole community of people willing to translate and help phonetically.

J

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Declan
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 02:14 PM

"A mhúirnín" is pronounced a woor-neen or a voor-neen depending on what part of Ireland you come from. Not sure of the litteral meaning of the word, but it would translate fairly well to the English word darling.

Also not familiar with a Ghillín - probably derives from the Irish word geal ehich means bright. A gill-een is an approximate pronunciation. The Gh sound is hard to explain, but if you try to pronounce it like the gh in lough, you won't be too far out.

A Stor is roughly pronounce like A Store, although there is abit of an ir sound at the end. a bit like a stow-ir, but the ir is cut short. Its difficult to convey these sounds in print.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 02:41 PM

I have some idea how to pronounce the Irish "gh," if only because I've heard my own (original) family name ~ Heneghan ~ spoken during my one brief visit to Ireland a few years ago. (It's a much more common name in the Mayo/Galway area than I would have suspected; here in the states, there are not very many of us.)

My great-uncle Luke dropped the "g" upon arrival in New York, so we're "Henehans" on this side of the Atlantic. In Mayo, our remaining relatives still use the original spelling, of course. There are folks all around the west of Ireland who spell their name exactly like mine ~ including the owner of a busy pub on Westport's High Street ~ but they're not kin to me, and they're relatively few in number. There are many more Heneghans than Henehans in the national telephone listings, including my cousins who live on the farm from which my grandparents emigrated, as well as quite a few others.

In the US and worldwide, there are many Irish surnames ending either in "gan" or "han"; I suspect that most if not all of these names originally included "ghan" as the final syllable, until the inability of English-speakers to pronouce that dipthong resulted in people choosing either the "G" or the "H" rather than trying to continue using both!

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: MartinRyan
Date: 17 Apr 07 - 06:17 PM

"muirnín" means "darling, beloved, sweetheart", according to Ó'Dónaill, the standard Irish-English dictionary.

"gillín" is an interesting one, assuming the spelling is reasonably correct. According to Ó'Dónaill, its primary meaning is "gelding"! Takes all sorts....

Regards

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,blowz at work
Date: 18 Apr 07 - 06:44 AM

Interesting - when i was a child and spent time on a farm, he old farmer used to say 'cushla' to his cows, when he was milking them, or moving about in their byre - it sort of kept them calm.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,mary
Date: 27 Jul 07 - 09:44 AM

Cushla is indeed an old irish term of endearment, mo cuisle meaning my darling. The spelling of Cushla seems to be the english translation in more modern times. the words mo cuisle appers in another song called Dan O`Hara..."O Cuishla ghra mo chroi wont you buy a box from me and you`ll have the prayers of Dan from conemara" As far as I know Dan was a poor man who sold boxes of matches, and the meaning of the first line being "O Darling love of my heart.." note the spelling of Cushla is again different, but that is the Irish language for you, donegal irish being spoke different than conemara irish for example. another translation for cushla is beat of my heart coming from Cuisle meaning pulse. Cushla or any other variations has an overall meaning of someone very dear and loved. i called my daughter Cushla for this very reason and also as she would be the beat of my heart and like a pulse you cannot live without! what a beautiful name.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Aug 08 - 04:30 PM

A cushla, attending to all its varied Irish gaelic spellings and pronunciations is, a very beloved someone, large or small. My mother had, "a cuisle mo chroi" chisled into the headboard of my handmade cradle. She said it meant "the beat of my heart", or "heart of my heart".

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,donnelly
Date: 29 Sep 08 - 03:45 PM

It means pulse of my heart

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Jun 11 - 09:42 AM

wow my name is cushla and it was very nice to learn a little more about my name - i was always told it meant 'my darling' and had no idea of its other spelling pronouciations and meanings.. Thankyou for the info its strangley touching to learn so much more

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 01 Jun 11 - 12:33 PM

From 쳌the mountains of Mourne쳌: Percy French···
I believe that when writin', a wish you expressed
As to how the fine ladies in London were dressed
Well, if you believe me, when asked to a ball
Faith, they don't wear no top to their dresses at all. ====

Quoted 16 apr 07.

Should of course be no BACK, rather than no top, to their dresses at all. I can remember when ladies' evening-dresses were backless de rigueur; and Emma tells me they still often are.

~M~

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: MartinRyan
Date: 01 Jun 11 - 07:06 PM

What he actually wrote (or published, anyway) was:


Well, if you'll believe me, when axed to a ball
They don't wear a top to their dresses at all!

Regards

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST
Date: 03 Jun 12 - 07:55 AM

It has mostly been done to death but
My father always sung the song mo cushla in his great scotish tenor voice and I remember it being sung in the movie The Four Feathers I think that is what the movie was called a very old black and white movie.
Cheers Heide-Rose ( yes my name is from another song sung I think in war time)

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Johnny J
Date: 03 Jun 12 - 08:51 AM

Could it have the same meaning as "Cushie" in Scotland(Cushie doos etc) and Geordie Land(As in Cushie Butterfield)?

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Joe_F
Date: 03 Jun 12 - 06:25 PM

In the comic strip "Barnaby" by Crockett Johnson, popular during W.W. II, the little boy's fairy godfather, Mr O'Malley (a vulgar Irishman with flimsy but functional wings) continually exclaims "Cushlamochree!" as a mere exclamation of surprise or dismay. I had no idea what it meant until, many years later, I had occasion to look up the better-preserved version in a poem by John Betjeman:

The roll of the railway made musing creative:
    I thought of the colleen I soon was to see
With her wiry black hair and grey eyes of the native,
    Sweet Moira McCavendish, acushla machree.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: AmyLove
Date: 03 Mar 16 - 12:12 AM

The links Malcolm Douglas provided above no longer work, but I think these two links provide the same information from the Lester Levy Sheet Music Collection:

My Irish Molly O

My Irish Molly O

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Mr Red
Date: 03 Mar 16 - 04:04 AM

I have translated an FAQ page in Gaelic for mister.red using http://imtranslator.net/translation/english/to-irish/translation/ but am struggling to get it corrected by an "Irish" speaker. It will happen one day to be sue, to be sure.

FWIW translating from Spanish to Irish - the word mañana (manyana) is very difficult to translate, there isn't an Irish word that conveys nearly enough urgency!!

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Thompson
Date: 03 Mar 16 - 05:26 AM

MacBain's etymological dictionary of Irish and Scots Gaelic gives 'gile' as another word for 'darling', and gilleen would be a diminutive of that.

Cúisle (with a fada on the 'u' to indicate an oo sound rhyming with 'scoot' or 'hoot') is the Irish for a pulse, a heartbeat, an artery, a vein - it suggests that your love of the person is so deep that they're your heartbeat and your pulse. A chúisle (acooshla) means O heart/pulse/etc. Mo chúisle (muhkooshla) means my pulse/heart/etc. Both can be used to address the person you're talking to.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: MartinRyan
Date: 03 Mar 16 - 07:47 AM

FWIW:

Neither Dineen nor Ó Dónaill have a "fada" on that "u". In my experience, when used in Irish, the sound is always the slender, weak one rather than the broad "uh" sound.

Regards

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 03 Mar 16 - 10:19 AM

Hello, Amy Love. Thanks for the link to the sheet music. I've made a MIDI of the melody.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 04 Mar 16 - 05:24 AM

'Uh' sound?

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: MartinRyan
Date: 04 Mar 16 - 05:40 AM

Broad = "cush" as in "mush"! The slender is nearer "wish".

Regards

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,JTT
Date: 04 Mar 16 - 01:06 PM

Never heard it pronounced any way but khooshla by native speakers.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: MartinRyan
Date: 04 Mar 16 - 05:01 PM

JTT. Interesting, indeed. Were they using it in the "pulse" sense or in the "sweetheart' sense? The latter may be be a kind of back-formation - a bit like "craic".

Regards

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Thompson
Date: 05 Mar 16 - 02:46 AM

Sweetheart sense; but I *think* the teacher (from ITÉ) in a course in Oideas Gael a few years ago, who was explaining the source of various words for 'darling',pronounced both usages as kooshla or muh khooshla.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,Martin Ryan
Date: 05 Mar 16 - 03:36 AM

I blame John McCormack!

Regards

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Thompson
Date: 05 Mar 16 - 03:39 AM

The odd thing is that none of the various online sites that offer audio for Irish words - teanglann.ie, focloir.ie, etc - have audio for this essential word.

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: Thompson
Date: 05 Mar 16 - 03:46 AM

Even Liam Ó Maonlaí's Irish course's section on love - plot-heavy, running from that first heady besottedness (I can't bear to be away from her) to "They managed to get an annulment from the Pope" - doesn't seem to have the word. Girls! Feck!

Subject: RE: My Irish Molly-Oh - What's a Cushla?
From: GUEST,Martin Ryan
Date: 05 Mar 16 - 03:59 AM

Yes - I noticed that gap too!

Regards