Orality and Literacy!

The American pronounciation of Mahoney (Ó Mathúna) is a matter of litearacy and the orthography adopted when the name (derived from Mathún < mathghamhain as indicated earlier in the thread) was anglicised.   The rendering of (Ó) Mathúna as Mahoney obviously took place in a prototonic milieu (a lovely word for stressing the first syllable) and would have caused no trouble in a context where the oral pronounciation was known independently of the spelling.

In a context where this "oral" knowledge didn't exist (e.g. in America), the pronounciation was attempted from the written word and became Mahoney to rhyme with Baloney, which is deuterotonic (just as lovely a word for stressing the second syllable).

A parallel to this process would be the pronounciation in England of the Irish surname Moran. In Ireland, this is prototonic (< Móráin) with a long o sound and clipped final syllable. When the Dublin Gaelic Footballer went off to Manchester to play soccer with United, the Irish suddenly heard English commentators say the name with an unstressed initial syllable and a long flat a sound in the final. This was new to a lot of us. Again, just a question of context and whether precedence is given to a pre-existing oral knowledge or to presumed parallels in orthography.

The American long o pronounciation of Mahoney would not have been derived from an Irish pronounciation carried across the Atlantic. The -ún- < -amhn- would not have given a long o sound in any situation (historical phonology is what separates "etymology" from "folk etymology"???).

It is interesting however that the long u sound, stressed in Munster Irish doesn't seem to have survived in any anglicised version of the Ó/Mac Mahon/Mahoney names. Any known instances of surnames containing an element such as Mahoon in the various parts of the mudcat world would be of great interest.

The use of Mahone and reported pronounciation with long o, while interesting, is likely based on the American Mahoney pronounciation rather than derived from Mahon. Sound phoney to anybody?

And in an attempt to save the bearers (pun there?) of Mahon and Mahoney surnames from constant reference to the posterior, let us leave the delicate area for the delicatessen and submit another etymology to the mudcat examiners: Mayonnaise named from a Mac Mahon of the Wild Geese in France. This language contact is outside my area but at least it should give any Mahons or Mahoneys some material to distract people from the pogue mahone stuff.

Unrelated: The Irish surname Flaherty became something like Flarity (under metathesis) in America. I am wondering if another surname, Cloherty, ever underwent the same process giving names such as Clority or Clarity (hardly that, in the area of etymology!). Any instances would be greatly appreciated.

And one final question, does "folk etymology" mean "wrong/incorrect etymology"?

Martin - Is maith sinn agus is maith sin!

Dáithí - galore < go leor, deifinitely. Shanty < seantigh - a new one on me and I don't know: sean would come before tigh (that adjective always precedes the noun it qualifies) so your "teach sean" objection can be dismissed; however, the areas where the old dative tigh is retained as an independent nominative or accusative form also retain a final g sound in the phonetics which would give shantig in English if the derivation were true. That would have to be overcome if the etymology were to be proven.

BTW, anyone read Godel's Theorem of Incompleteness. A "little bit" mathematical, but I'd put it on the required reading list for anyone dealing with etymology.

Oh, while my hand is in it, and as surnames are part of it -

Hooligan - this is from Ó hUallacháin (Houlihan) and represents a stage when the -ch- sound retained more phonetic value than it does in the Houlihan anglicisation.   The word nicely racist to those Irish who are not suffering a mother-in-law née Houlihan.

Larrikin - an Australian coinage, looked on with a little more affection than a hooligan but probably derived in the same way from the Irish surname Larkin (Ó Lorcáin). Used as an adjective as well as a noun in Oz I think (we await confirmation).

Much too much...apologies.