An Irish-English dictionary - National Library of Scotland

THE AUTHORS TREFACE.
price of a single copy, I have none to name but tlic Earl of Chavlcmout, Baron Smitli, tlic Rev.
E. O'Reilly, principal of the Academy at Navan, and Sir W. Betham, King at Arms. Of
lltcraiy assistance towards completing my Dictionary, I have none to acknowledge to the living,
except to my invaluable friend, the Rev. M. P. Kinsela, late chaplain to the nunnery at Harold's
Cross, and now retired to a convent of his order in Spain. He kindly pointed out to me the
most of the Hebrew words which are found to agree with the Irish in tlic course of my book.
But if my acknowledgments to the living be few, I am ready to confess my obligations to the
dead. My collection of words from ancient glossaries, vocabularies, and otlier documents, is
copious, and several hundreds of those words wliich I have added to the collections published in
the Dictionaries of my predecessors, were collected, with a view to publication, by the late Mr.
William Haliday, junior, of Arran Quay. That young gentleman, after acquiring a knowledge
of the ancient and modern languages usually taught in schools, enriched his mind with the acquisi-
tion of several of the Eastern languages, and made himself so perfect a master of the language
of Ills native country, that he was enabled to publish a Grammar of it in Dublin, in the year
1808, vmder the fictitious signature of E. O'C, and would have published a Dictionary of the same
language, If death had not put a stop to his career at the early age of twenty three. To the liberality
of Doctor Elrington, the present Provost, and to the Fellows of Trinity College, who gave me
the privilege of their library, I am indebted for a great number of words to be found in the body
of my Dictionary, besides the principal part of the words now in common use, that are to be
foimd ill my Supplement. These I collected from a large MS. Dictionary in the possession of the
College, compiled by Teig O'Nachten for publication in the year 1739. "When I was making
my collection. It never occurred to me, that the words dally used in common conversation, and
familiar to myself, might have been omitted by former compilers ; and taking it for granted tliat
they were not omitted, I never examined further into the matter, but proceeded with the printing
of my work, and had nearly finished it before I perceived the omission. As I was desirous to
make my book as full and perfect as I could, I determined on publishing a Supplement, and to
insert In It such words from O'Nachten's Dictionary as had been omitted, and a number of other
words that I had collected since my beginning to print, and wliich, of course, could not have
been Inserted in their proper places. Upon every occasion when I found it necessary to eonsvdt
the MSS. in the Library, I have experienced the most obliging attention from the Librarians, the
Rev. Doctors Barret and Wilson, for which they have my sincere thanks.
As my work was Intended to answer In some degree for a Dictionary of the Scottish Gaelic,
as well as the Irish, I have retained in It several words from Shaw's Dictionary, and a number
of others which I collected from modern Scottish publications. Some of these I have marked
Sh. and Sc, and others that are not so marked will be discovered by their orthograj)hy. It Is to
be observed, however, that all those words so marked are not confined to the Scottish dialect
many of them I have since found in O'Nachten's Dictionary, to which Shaw hal access, and in
other modern books, particularlj' those written by authors of the North of Ireland.