> João Simões Lopes Filho wrote:
> Whats the etymology/meaning of the children of
> Diancecht:
> MIACH
> CIAN
> AIRMED
All three names exist as common nouns in Old Irish.
"Cian" means "long (in time); ancient; far away".
Interestingly, "miach" and "airmed" are both terms
for dry measures of grain, along the lines of English
"bushel".
As for etymologies, LEIA suggests attaching "cian"
to either *keino- (Gk. ekeinos, Lat. cis, citra) or
*kweino- (Lat. quies, Eng. while); says that "miach"
is "sans étymologie"; and identifies "airmed" as a
compound of "air" and "med" of the verb "midithir"
(weighs, measures).
There, that's a start, anyway. I'll look at the
others after dinner. By the way, if you or anyone
else on the list is interested specifically in Old
Irish, there is an active list, with archives and
subscription info at:
http://listserv.heanet.ie/old-irish-l.html
Dennis King