I see that Guinness is about to introduce a new beer called Breo, a name decided upon "after some consultation with Bord na Gaeilge and a number of fluent Irish speakers", according to a report published recently in this paper. It is to spend £5 million marketing the product. I wish it well. "Breo, pronounced Bro [it isn't, darlings], is a Celtic word meaning glow", we were informed, and the name was chosen "as it reflects the original attributes, colour and look of the product".
Breo (also breo, monosyllable and breo, disyllable), a flame, a blaze, is an Irish word of unknown origin, used extensively of saints and heroes in our early literature in a complimentary sense: Patraicc . . . breo batses genti: Patrick, a flame that baptised the heather; A Stefan, a breo naob, O Stephan, holy fire. Breo- shaighead, arrow of flame, is a later conventional metaphoric name for Brigid - a kenning is what the scholars say, Joxer, an Old Icelandic word meaning a mark of recognition, from Kenna vith, to name after. Breoad, earlier breud, was the act of burning, injuring: and, according to my friend Father Dinneen, breo also meant "a fire that proceeds from putrid matter, as fish, etc." and also the act of getting sick and enfeebled. I wonder did Uncle Arthur and his fluent advisers take this into account as they cogitated?
Sean O Briain, of Clonmel and of RTE Radio's splendid drama department, gave me the word doornick recently. Last night I heard the word again, when a young lady, dressed as William Morris might have dressed her, entered a Wicklow hostelry in a breo of loveliness. Doornick to Sean O Briain was a coarse damask formerly used to make altar cloths and ecclesiastical hangings: old-timers who live between the Willow Grove and Roundwood call richly decorated clothes doornicks. The word is from Doornik, the Flemish name of Tournai, the Belgian town famous for its carpets and tapestry work.
Lastly an interesting trawlerman's word, sent to me by Tom Carr from Killybegs. "He ate the whole loaf of bread when he came in from the pub. Not a smool did he leave us for the breakfast." Is smool Irish, my correspondent asks?
It is of Norse origin and is found as smuil, smill and smyle in northern Scotland and in Orkney, and as smjillo in Shetland. Compare the Swedish smule, a crumb.