Gaelicisms

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Expressions, grammatical features or turns of phrase borrowed from the Gaelic languages and used in another language, such as English
2. Words or constructions characteristic of Irish or Scottish Gaelic that appear in speech or writing in a different tongue
3. Idiomatic traits originating in Gaelic that have been carried over into the vocabulary or grammar of another language

Etymology: Gaelicism is a plain formation: the adjective "Gaelic," from the Irish and Scottish name for the Gaels, plus the suffix "-ism," borrowed through Ancient Greek "-ismos" by way of Latin and French. The word entered English in 1815, and "gaelicisms" is simply its plural. Its meaning follows the usual pattern for a word built on "-ism": it names a feature or idiom characteristic of the Gaelic languages, carried over into another language. The base word has a deeper ancestry. "Gaelic" comes from Old Irish "Goídel," the name of the Gaels, which passed through Brythonic forms that trace back to a Proto-Celtic root meaning roughly "wild" or "pertaining to the forest," so the people's name is linked to ideas of wildness. That root is many thousands of years old, far older than any English use.