{"id":5785,"date":"2020-10-03T15:12:53","date_gmt":"2020-10-03T15:12:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/?p=5785"},"modified":"2021-03-24T15:42:29","modified_gmt":"2021-03-24T15:42:29","slug":"word-of-the-day-blarney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/2020\/10\/03\/word-of-the-day-blarney\/","title":{"rendered":"Word of the Day: Blarney"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Today\u2019s word of the day, courtesy of the website wordgenius.com, is blarney<\/em>. The noun means, according to the website, \u201cTalk that aims to charm, pleasantly flatter, or persuade\u201d or \u201cAmusing and harmless nonsense.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Blarney is the name of a town (population: 2,539) in County Cork, Ireland, a few miles northwest of the port city of Cork, in Southern Ireland. Cork County was the home of the MacCarthy clan, one of the powerful clans in Ireland throughout the Middle Ages. Blarney is a bit of a tourist stop in southern Ireland; people go there principally to see Blarney Castle, which contains the famous Blarney Stone, and the Blarney Woolen Mills.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Blarney Castle was built in the 1440s by Cormac L\u00e1idir MacCarthy, though it is thought that there may have been a wooden structure on the site as early as the 1100s. A stone building was erected on the site around the year 1210, but it was destroyed in 1446, upon which occasion MacCarthy built the current castle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One explanation for the meaning of blarney, and there are at least a few, involves the castle and a lawsuit that Cormac L\u00e1idir MacCarthy was involved in. MacCarthy asked Cl\u00edodhna for advice before going to court. Cl\u00edodhna, in Irish mythology, was the Queen of the Banshees of the Tuatha D\u00e9 Danann, the goddess of love and beauty, and the patron goddess of County Cork. She told him to kiss the first stone he found on his way to court; he did, and the result was that argued his case eloquently and won. Giving credit to the stone, he took it and placed it in the battlements in Blarney Castle. The legend then is that whoever kisses the stone will be given the gift of gab, or the ability to deceive without offending people, or the ability to tell tall tales.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another tale comes from a bit over 100 years later. Queen Elizabeth of England, at a time when the English \u201cruled\u201d Ireland, want the various Irish clan chiefs to sign documents indicating that they occupied their lands with her permission. As www.irishcentral.com<\/a> says, \u201cCormac Teige McCarthy, the lord of Blarney, was able to use his words and wit to keep the queen satisfied without officially signing over the rights to his land. Some assert that the stone gave Cormac the gift of eloquence after an old woman told him of the stone\u2019s power while others believe no magic to having gone into Cormac\u2019s ability to avoid the Queen\u2019s wishes without offending her.\u201d The situation annoyed her immensely, and \u201cQueen Elizabeth said: \u2018Blarney, Blarney, I will hear no more of this Blarney!\u2019\u201d (https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-ireland-castle-blarney\/irish-stone-of-eloquence-may-be-just-blarney-idUSL2047743820080221<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here are so more legends about the Blarney Stone, courtesy of the official website for Blarney Castle (https:\/\/www.blarneycastle.ie\/pages\/kiss-the-blarney-stone<\/a>):<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Some say it was Jacob\u2019s Pillow, brought to Ireland by the prophet Jeremiah. Here it became the Lia Fail or \u2018Fatal Stone\u2019, used as an oracular throne of Irish kings \u2013 a kind of Harry Potter-like \u2018sorting hat\u2019 for kings. It was also said to be the deathbed pillow of St Columba on the island of Iona. Legend says it was then removed to mainland Scotland, where it served as the prophetic power of royal succession, the Stone of Destiny.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

When Cormac MacCarthy, King of Munster, sent five thousand men to support Robert the Bruce in his defeat of the English at Bannockburn in 1314, a portion of the historic Stone was given by the Scots in gratitude \u2013 and returned to Ireland.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Others say it may be a stone brought back to Ireland from the Crusades \u2013 the \u2018Stone of Ezel\u2019 behind which David hid on Jonathan\u2019s advice when he fled from his enemy, Saul. A few claim it was the stone that gushed water when struck by Moses.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Whatever the truth of its origin, we believe a witch saved from drowning revealed its power to the MacCarthys.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

So, if you go to Blarney Castle, you can climb to the battlements and kiss the stone. Like many people over the years, including statesmen from around the world, you may then be given the power of eloquence, though, truthfully, your eloquence may be deceitful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One example of an American who is famous for blarney is former Vice President Joe Biden. Valerie Richardson, writing in the Washington Times, recounts numerous examples of Biden telling stories that turned out to be tall tales (https:\/\/www.washingtontimes.com\/news\/2020\/sep\/27\/say-it-aint-joe-biden-has-failed-curb-penchant-tal\/<\/a>). For instance, \u201cLast year, Mr. Biden told voters in South Carolina that he \u2018got started\u2019 at Delaware State University, a historically Black college. There is no record of his having attended.\u201d On the other hand, Robert Frump, in his blog (https:\/\/frumpblog.com\/2019\/08\/30\/the-difference-between-bidens-blarney-and-malevolent-malarky\/<\/a>), says there is a difference between Biden\u2019s blarney and \u201cmalevolent malarkey.\u201d Frump quotes an anonymous \u201cwise old public relations\u201d person as saying, \u201cBut there\u2019s a difference between well-intended blarney and malevolent malarky. Joe may get carried away but it\u2019s all toward a sincere point about something he sincerely believes \u2014 and people sense that. On the other hand XXXX just dishes out lies that hide real truths and issues \u2014 in other words, he\u2019s full of malarkey.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It sounds to me as if whether something is benevolent blarney or malevolent malarkey is a matter of personal or political opinion. Elizabeth didn\u2019t think of MacCarthy\u2019s blarney as particularly helpful, but she was a queen, so maybe she cannot be trusted. On the other hand, I can never imagine a situation in which a politician\u2019s lying should be counted as benevolent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The image of Blarney Castle is from https:\/\/www.globalfieldtrip.com\/blarney-castle-kissing-stone\/<\/a>. If you ever go there, understand that you have to lie down and lean way out (there are now safety devices to facilitate this) to kiss the stone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s word of the day, courtesy of the website wordgenius.com, is blarney. The noun means, according to the website, \u201cTalk that aims to charm, pleasantly flatter, or persuade\u201d or \u201cAmusing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":5786,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[179,294,184],"class_list":["post-5785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-word-of-the-day","tag-biden","tag-blarney","tag-politics","clearfix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5785"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5785\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5788,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5785\/revisions\/5788"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}