Talk:Séamus

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Correct spelling[edit]

seamus — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:D:3100:CEE0:DA30:62FF:FE4C:6481 (talk) 18:17, 17 May 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Per WP:MOS, I'm moving this article to "Séamus". GeneralBelly (talk) 08:10, 15 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Corrections[edit]

I corrected the origins of the name Seamus. It was incorrectly cited as deriving "ultimately from the Hebrew חַיִּים (Chayim) (meaning "life")." It has no relationship to the Hebrew word Chayim, but rather to the Hebrew name Ya'akov which in English is Jacob. Seamus and James are both variants of the name Jacob. Jm3106jr (talk) 20:08, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree with this. I accept that it is a "well known fact" but assertion is no substitute for argument. It does not stand scrutiny. Josephus has the name "Iacomo" or some such - so the assertion that it is "late Latin" cannot be stood up. The move Iacobo => Iacomo is presumed but not demonstrated - and it is an unexplained subsequent leap from "iacomo" to "Haime" etc..

It seems to me that there are three separate names which have been confused by non-Jews. The potential reason for this is that it was a custom to give a sickly infant the name Chayim in the hope of fooling the Angel of Death. So it is probable that there was a key Jacob who had the soubriquet Chayim from whom the confusion stemmed. [The form Iacomo has then been interpolated.] There are many other examples where two names of completely different origins and meanings have been falsely conflated - usually but not necessarily by speakers of a different language (for example Greg/Gregory, Archibald/Gillespie etc.). Freuchie (talk) 14:33, 3 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that the pronunciation of spanish Jaime with a H (so Haime), that you're referring to, is modern. In Cervantes' time that would have been pronounced Shaime with a sh of shoe (see eg. Mexico today Mehiko in Spanish but Meshiko back then, going back to the Aztec name Mexica pronounced Meshika, or Quixote, now Kihote but back then, Kishote, the pronunciation still preserved in the Italian translation), and before that, with the french j (still preserved in Portuguese), so Zhaime. From there, it's easily tracable back to j, as we have the English j as interim, also seen in Italian Giacomo. So we have Iacomus -> Giacomo -> Jaime (with French/Portuguese J) -> Jaime (with sh) -> Jaime (with h). Nothing unexplained there.

The conflation with Chayim is impossible because at the time you're saying it would have happened, noone pronounced Jaime with a H and the shift of the J sound to H happened happened thoughout Spanish, see also the word jarabe (syrup, from Arabic), originally pronounced sharabe (and then see, I believe, Catalan xarope, pronounces sharope, from there, to Italian sciroppo and then syrup is not far), but now harabe as another example (and the orginal Arabic word there definitely did not start with a h).

If anything, had a confusion with Chayim happened, it would have become Caimo or Caime in Spanish, as ch / kh tends to become c (k) in Romance.

So basically, the fallacy being committed here is completely ignoring the evolution of Spanish pronunciation and incorrectly positing the modern Spanish pronunciation of the name as being ancient. - OBrasilo (talk) 11:19, 1 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I also forgot to mention that a variant of Jaime is Jaume, see eg. movie director Jaume Balaguero, which indicates a consonantal elision: Jacome -> Jaome -> Jaume -> Jaime. Even u -> i makes sense, since i is nothing but fronted, unrounded u. So it's even less unexplained there. - OBrasilo (talk) 11:24, 1 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Further to my comments above, I find the phraseology "It entered the Irish and Scottish Gaelic languages from... " baseless and far too assertive. English people will tell you this, but French onomasticians will tell you the opposite - ie that it came from English. So I propose to alter the text to read "It is supposed by some to have entered the Irish and Scottish Gaelic languages from...." Freuchie (talk) 12:46, 10 May 2021 (UTC)[reply]