Transcript

"Pósfaidh mé thú seachtain ó inniu." (An cailín bocht). (An) dtiocfaidh tusa agus do bhean 'na[1] bainse?"

"Tiocfaidh muid chuig an oíche. Tiocfaidh muid chuig an oíche."

"Cailín... Tá an cailín... Tá rud beag contráilte go sea. Tá an cailín mór agus (tá) an leaba beag.

(Teanamuid[2] baol). Agus goidé bheas a'd ag an bhainis?"

"Beidh leath bolóige. (Rachaidh mise) amach agus ceannóidh mé leath bolóige... leath bolóige."

Rinn sé sin. D'imigh sé 'na mbaile[3]. Tháinig sé ar ais an darna maidin agus an cailín leis agus d'fhág sé ansin í.

"Tá rud beag contráilte..."

Thug sé an stocaí óir daoith'. Thug sé an stocaí óir daoith'.

"Tá rud beag contráilte go sea. Char cheannaigh tú fáinne domh."

"(Ag an) deabhal t'anam! (...) Tabhair cúpla punta domh agus rachaidh mé amach."

Chuaigh sé amach agus cheannaigh sé an fáinne. Agus na[4] a tháinig sé ar ais, cha rabh haet[5] aige ach leath na bolóige agus an fáinne ar shon bhean. Chaoin sé goil na gcuach.

Translation

"I'll marry you a week from today." The poor girl (?). "Will you and your wife come to the wedding feast?"

"We'll come that night. We'll come that night."

"The girl... the girl is... There's one problem. The girl is big and the bed is small."

"Let's make a (...). And what will you have at the feast?"

"A side of bullock. I'll go out and buy a side of bullock... a side of bullock."

He did that. He went home. He came back the next morning and the girl was with him and he left her there.

"There's something wrong..."

He gave her the sock of gold. He gave her the sock of gold.

"There's something a little bit wrong still. You didn't buy me a ring."

"The devil take you! (?) (...) Give me a few pounds and I'll go out."

He went out and he bought the ring. And when he came back, he had nothing but the side of bullock and the ring instead of the woman. He cried his heart out.

Footnotes

Commentary

There are a number of international folktales relating to theft, which regularly include deception or elaborate trickery as part of the plot. For example, ATU 1525 The master thief is one such tale, as is the miscellaneous variant, ATU 1525Z Other tales of thefts. See Hans Jorg Uther, The types of international folktales: a classification and bibliography (3 vols, Helsinki, 2004). The current story may be related to these folktales, given that ATU 1525 is one of the most popular narratives in Irish tradition, with a great many examples coming from all over the country. See Seán Ó Súilleabháin and Rieder Th. Christiansen, The types of the Irish folktale (Helsinki, 1968). This example may employ a number of international motifs, such as K311.16 Thief disguised as girl, K1836 Disguise of man in woman’s dress, and K1321.3 Man disguised as woman courted (married) by another man. See Stith Thompson, Motif-index of folk literature (rev. and enlarged ed., 6 vols, Bloomington, Ind., 1955-8).

This story is transcribed also in Heinrich Wagner and Colm Ó Baoill, Linguistic atlas and survey of Irish dialects (4 vols, Dublin, 1958-69), vol. 4, 291, and in Róise Ní Bhaoill, Ulster Gaelic voices: bailiúchán Doegen 1931 (Belfast, 2010), 234-7.