{"id":6183,"date":"2023-01-01T16:23:58","date_gmt":"2023-01-01T16:23:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/?p=6183"},"modified":"2023-01-01T16:26:34","modified_gmt":"2023-01-01T16:26:34","slug":"word-of-the-day-qualtagh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/2023\/01\/01\/word-of-the-day-qualtagh\/","title":{"rendered":"Word of the Day: Qualtagh"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Today\u2019s word of the day, courtesy of Wiktionary, is qualtagh<\/em>. According to the website, the qualtagh (or quaaltagh) is the first person one meets after leaving their house on New Year\u2019s Day. The word derives from the Manx language (the Celtic language on the Isle of Man) and from a Manx tradition, though its background is somewhat complex. The pronunciation is \u201c\/\u02c8kw\u0251\u02d0lt\u0259x\/, \/\u02c8kw\u0251\u02d0lt\u0259k\/\u201d in RP (received pronunciation, the officially correct pronunciation of the English language in England), \u201c\/\u02c8kw\u0251lt\u0259k\/\u201d in General American speech, or \u201c\/\u02c8kwe\u026a(\u0259)lt\u0259x\/\u201d in Manx. (If you want an explanation of the IPA letters, feel free to write a comment.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is no entry for qualtagh<\/em> on the www.etymonling.com<\/a> cite, but I found a very interesting discussion of the back of the word by Paul Anthony Jones at the Haggard Hawks website (https:\/\/www.haggardhawks.com\/post\/quaaltagh<\/a>). Jones writes that<\/p>\n\n\n\n

at the root of quaaltagh<\/em> is the Manx word quaail<\/em>, meaning \u201cto meet\u201d or \u201cto assemble\u201d; despite appearances, the name of the Irish parliament,, D\u00e1il \u00c9ireann<\/em>, is an etymological cousin. The \u2013agh<\/em> ending, as the Oxford English Dictionary<\/em> explains, is used in Manx to form \u201cnouns expressing belonging\u201d, with an extra T thrown in to the mix perhaps with a nod to an ancient Irish word, comaltae<\/em>, meaning \u201ccompanion\u201d or \u201cfoster-brother\u201d (which makes the modern Irish word comhaltacht<\/em>, meaning \u201cfellowship\u201d, another distant relative).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jones then goes on to explain that there is an old Manx tradition whereby a group of men goes out caroling at the homes of wealthier people. After singing, they are invited in for refreshments. \u201cBut as they entered the house they had totally just gatecrashed, one more local tradition came to bear: the first person across the threshold had to be of a dark complexion. Fair-haired guys\u2014and girls of any complexion, for that matter\u2014were strictly off limits<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On these occasions, a person of dark complexion always enters first, as a light-haired male or female is deemed unlucky to be a first-foot or quaaltagh on New Year\u2019s Morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

John Brand, Observations on the Popular Antiquities of Britain<\/em> (1873).\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This person became the \u201cfirst foot,\u201d or first person into the house, and the meaning of the word gradually changed to refer to the first foot one encountered on a special day, particularly on New Year\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On this date 205 years ago, the publishing firm of Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones published a short, anonymous novel entitled Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus<\/em>. It had a foreword by Percy Bysshe Shelley, the English poet, and a dedication to the English philosopher William Godwin. The author turned out to be Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, the daughter of Godwin and the wife of Percy Bysshe Shelley.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The story is fairly well known, and the story behind the story is also well known. Residing in Geneva with her husband and George Gordon, Lord Byron, Shelley participated in a competition to see which of them could come up with the best horror story. At that time, theories about galvanism were prevalent. Specifically, Luigi Galvani believed, early in his career, that animals had animal electric fluid; he was eventually convinced by Alessandro Volta to revise his theories. But the image of a scientist using electricity to galvanize a dead body was intriguing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the novel is clearly a product of Romanticism and of the Gothic tradition, famous science fiction author Brian Aldiss asserted that Frankenstein<\/em> was the first true science fiction story. He argued that the notion of a scientist deliberately experimenting in a laboratory to produce something is what makes it science fiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But whether the novel is science fiction or horror, I\u2019m pretty sure that I would not want Frankenstein\u2019s creature to be my qualtagh; not this year, and not any year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today\u2019s image is from \u201cEverything you need to know about holidaying on the Isle of Man\u201d by Christian Kramer (May 25, 2020) on The Points Guy website (https:\/\/thepointsguy.co.uk\/guide\/holiday-isle-of-man\/<\/a>). The photo is of Port Erin and is credited to Roelf Odendaal\/EyeEm\/Getty Images. And I have to say that, based on this website, the Isle of Man is on my list of places to visit even if Frankenstein\u2019s creature is waiting for me there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today\u2019s word of the day, courtesy of Wiktionary, is qualtagh. According to the website, the qualtagh (or quaaltagh) is the first person one meets after leaving their house on New […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":6185,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[395,430,129,429,239],"class_list":["post-6183","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-word-of-the-day","tag-etymology","tag-frankenstein","tag-language","tag-manx","tag-words","clearfix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6183","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=6183"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6183\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6186,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6183\/revisions\/6186"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6183"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.freedomshillprimer.com\/institute\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}