abhsadh

v1.1

Publishing history:
v1.0: 01/10/24
v1.1: 26/01/26

abhsadh m. [ˈaus̪əɣ], gen. abhsaidh [ˈaus̪i], ‘slackening sail, tug at a sheet (rope); easing, ceasing, restricting; heeding’ is frequently

MacBain 1896; Henderson 1910, 127–28, 138; McDonald 1972; McDonald 2009, 361; Ó Muirithe 2013, 13.

derived from ON hálsa vb ‘to clew up or slacken sail’, recte ON halsa with a short stressed vowel (Marstrander 1915a, 61, 114; de Vries 1962). ON halsa yields EG allsaḋ (Meyer 1906, 81; Bugge 1912, 292; Marstrander ibid.; eDIL^˄), with loss of initial h- and the addition of a final Gaelic fricative ḋ after the verbal noun morpheme ‑aḋ of weak a-verbs in Early Gaelic (Thurneysen 1975, 446–47); hence SG allsa, allsadh,

MacBain 1896; Dwelly 1911; MacLennan 1925; represented by Marstrander’s transcription (?Argyllshire) allsa [ɑʟsə] (ibid.).

which develops into abhsadh with vocalisation in Gaelic of the lateral (Cox 2002b, 15–16 and fn 14) in more northerly and westerly dialects, cf. the Lewis village name Gabhsann derived from ON *Galt-sund ‘(the) hog-crossing’ (Cox 2022, 718–22).

Falk (1912, 69 – noted by Vendryes 1913, 231) compares Ice. *halsan f. (leg. hálsan; Cleasby 1874: ‘a clewing up the sail’) with Ir. allsadh; Mohr (1939, 170: halsan) suggests Ice. hálsan is a borrowing from Old Norse or Low German.

Derivatives: allsaich vb ‘to suspend, reprieve; jerk; lean to one side’ (HSS 1828; Dwelly 1911).