Irish Name Generator

Irish spelling looks impossible and is actually consistent. The rule that unlocks most of it is the broad/slender pairing: every consonant has two forms, and the vowels around it are there to tell you which one you are looking at. That is why Saoirse has an "ao" (SEER-sha) and Caoimhe has one too (KEE-va) — the vowels are doing grammatical work, not phonetic work. "bh" and "mh" are both a v or w sound, which is how Niamh becomes NEEV and Aoibhinn becomes EE-vin. "dh" and "gh" usually go silent between vowels, which is how Tadhg becomes TYG.

Surnames are patronymic and they are gendered. Ó means "descendant of" and Mac means "son of": Ó Súilleabháin, Mac Cárthaigh. A woman does not use Ó — she uses Ní (from iníon Uí, "daughter of the descendant of") or Nic: Máire Ní Shúilleabháin, not Máire Ó Súilleabháin. She also lenites the following consonant, which is where that extra h comes from. Getting this right instantly separates a written Irish name that a reader will trust from one that will not survive contact with anyone who speaks the language.

The anglicised forms most of the world sees are phonetic approximations made by clerks: Ó Súilleabháin became O'Sullivan, Ó Murchadha became Murphy, Mac Gabhann became both McGowan and Smith, because the name means "son of the smith" and some families translated it instead of spelling it out.

For meaning, Irish given names split into three groups. Some are ordinary descriptive words — Fionn is "fair", Ciar is "dark", Rónán is "little seal", Oisín is "little deer". Some are compounds from the heroic tradition — Órlaith is "golden sovereignty", Cathal is "battle-rule". And a large third group are Irish forms of imported Christian names: Seán and Eoin are both John, Siobhán is Joan, Pádraig is the Latin Patricius. Mixing eras is the commonest mistake — a pre-Christian saga name beside a Norman import will read oddly to anyone who knows the tradition.