Certainly; and issues of this kind always make me wish that I had paid more attention when I was actually supposed to be studying linguistic history. A single (notional) root word can branch out into a whole range of meanings that may seem entirely unconnected until you look at analogous forms (though these can be misleading as well as illuminating).

In the case of 'bodhran', it may be that, even if initially derived from '[tam]bourine' when used of a drum, the consonance with the existing Gaelic word for 'deaf' is no coincidence but that both words descend from the same distant ancestor and are here re-united after a long time apart. Etymology, depending as it does largely on logical speculation without possibility of absolute proof, is a problematic subject.

I don't know that we have many linguistic historians here; [Jonathan] Lighter is one, though his main field is English-language dialect and slang, I think.

Thanks for that reference, Emma. The first explanation given really does seem most likely given the known history of usage, but I hesitated to suggest it myself in so many words, the question being rather a vexed one. The second is always cited in discussions here relating to the bodhran (and not always with humour), but objectivity demands that both possibilities be presented, even if the matter cannot be settled one way or the other.