Ogham

//ˈoʊ.əm// name, noun

Definitions

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    An ancient Celtic alphabet historically used to write Primitive Irish.

    "The rectangular sandstone rock that Graham Senior had discovered was inscribed in ogham, an alphabet used in the early medieval period primarily for writing in the Irish language."

  2. 2
    Alternative form of Ogham. alt-of, alternative
Noun
  1. 1
    A single character in this alphabet.
  2. 2
    Alternative form of Ogham. alt-of, alternative

Etymology

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Irish ogham, from Middle Irish ogam, from Proto-Celtic *ogmos (“furrow, path”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂óǵmos. The Irish word is frequently folk-etymologized as og-úaim, referring to ogham being supposedly made by the point of a sharp weapon, but this approach faces serious phonological and morphological problems in that: * The name of ogham and the supposed second element (úaimm (“seam”)?) inflected very differently in Early Irish, "ogham" being an o-stem and the second element being a neuter n-stem. * Middle Irish ogmóir (“skilled in ogham”) should have a vowel in between the g and m because vowels lengthened by compensatory lengthening after consonant loss are usually not syncopated in Early Irish.

Etymology 2

Borrowed from Irish ogham, from Middle Irish ogam, from Proto-Celtic *ogmos (“furrow, path”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂óǵmos. The Irish word is frequently folk-etymologized as og-úaim, referring to ogham being supposedly made by the point of a sharp weapon, but this approach faces serious phonological and morphological problems in that: * The name of ogham and the supposed second element (úaimm (“seam”)?) inflected very differently in Early Irish, "ogham" being an o-stem and the second element being a neuter n-stem. * Middle Irish ogmóir (“skilled in ogham”) should have a vowel in between the g and m because vowels lengthened by compensatory lengthening after consonant loss are usually not syncopated in Early Irish.

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