Contribution of scholar to language is honoured

A HEADSTONE to mark the last resting place of a celebrated Baile Mhúirne story teller and collector of words has been unveiled in the Múscraí Gaeltacht village’s cemetery during the annual Éigse festival at the weekend.

Mícheál Ó Loingsigh was one of the renowned ‘Na Ceithre Máistrí’ of Baile Mhúirne, a group of local scholars, teachers and story tellers who made a notable contribution to the landmark Duinníneach dictionary published in the 1920s, republished frequently since.

Sunday’s event – at the culmination of the annual Éigse traditional music festival in honour of the late singer and journalist, Diarmuid Ó Súilleabháin – is the latest in a series of such unveilings to local personalities who made an impact in the history of the literature of the Irish language.

The event was organised by Dáimh Staire of Acadamh Fódhla, a hedge school/university established at the beginning of millennium, which has commemorated many local literary and historic personalities over the years.

Speaking at the graveside, local historian Liam Ó hÉigeartaigh told the assembled descendants of Mícheál Ó Loingsigh and the other guests about the late scholar’s life and times.

He gave an insight into how the Ceithre Mhaistrí of Baile Mhúirne came into being.

The Ceithre Mhaistrí began when schoolteacher Mícheál Ó Briain moved in 1898 from Béal Átha’n Ghaorthaidh to teach in Scoil Abán Naofa in Baile Mhúirne.

Not being a native speaker as he hailed from Ballinora, he set about getting a mastery of Irish, and he did this by meeting with local scholars and storytellers – including Mícheál Ó Loingsigh, who described himself as a courier of goods from Macroom Railway Station in the Census of 1901, and the other two ‘masters’, Tadhg Ó Riordáin and Concubhar Ó Deasúna.

Together they contributed well over 1,000 words to the 1924 edition of the Irish-English Dictionary published by an tAthair Pádraig Ó Duinnín, the book known to generations of students of Irish as An Duinníneach. Their contribution was marked in this book by the abbreviation in italics, which followed every one of the words they contributed.

They were also prolific prize winners at the annual Oireachtas festival, particularly for their storytelling between the years of 1899 and the late 1920s.

“They contributed 1,438 words to the second edition of the Duinníneach, published in 1927, and they provided the bulk of the words for Cnosach Focail Bhaile Mhúirne which is 287 pages long,” said Liam Ó hÉigeartaigh. “Their contribution to the Irish language can only be described as immense.”

The headstone for the grave was unveiled by the granddaughters of Mícheál Ó Loingsigh.

It names him as ‘Micheál Mór Ó Loingsigh’ and describes him as a ‘Scéalaí’. It gives his address as Baile Mhic Íre and gives his life span as 1852-1929.