{"id":23203,"date":"2023-12-13T13:40:13","date_gmt":"2023-12-13T13:40:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=23203"},"modified":"2023-12-17T14:30:53","modified_gmt":"2023-12-17T14:30:53","slug":"goosnargh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=23203","title":{"rendered":"Goosnargh"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>What does the word <strong>goosnargh<\/strong> suggest to you?<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/omniglot\/30476247294\/in\/photolist-DgQf5V-Nr5Jxy-NykZqb-PCuidf-RYV37U-WrPHSK-2aFU2fc-2aFU2Lx\" title=\"Gertie and Bertie\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/5564\/30476247294_0804ab79f6_z.jpg\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" alt=\"Gertie and Bertie\"\/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\n<em>A couple of geese that I encountered unexpectedly when walking around Bangor.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>When I first came across this word the other day, I guessed it might be an exclamation you make when encountering an unexpected goose. Goosnargh!<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/rpsmithbarney\/8417587832\/in\/photolist-dPQkAG-KNSSNz-2eidcES-KVDEue-2D23rM-cEPFn-6rMbru-2eidcGW-cUyE9u-dW8MFk-2D2326-9WUoCD-LWXpF6-dcY7sm-dcY5z3-roPevY-FYi5qC-2oo7seH-56hnc2-FSqc4f-2nMm11V-56hngR-56ms5E-92LsGM-56iS5x-56mYzS-8FGDbR-56mvAE-56nPqy-56msMm-56ipZt-9vrYP8-n5XV5-56hhaV-587ene-56n7ds-56iSEK-56mFFN-56hik4-56nhSN-56hWHP-56npHL-58brt9-56nok9-56of2J-56ixFX-56iy4R-587h9R-Lvp6zf-56ncrf\" title=\"The Village, Goosnargh.\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/8497\/8417587832_eebab31c99_z.jpg\" width=\"640\" height=\"418\" alt=\"The Village, Goosnargh.\"\/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Somewhat disappointingly, <strong>Goosnargh<\/strong> [\u02c8\u0261u\u02d0zn\u0259r] is in fact a village between Broughton and Longridge in the City of Preston district of Lancashire in the northwest of England, not far from where I grew up. It\u2019s apparently famous for its <strong>Goosnargh cakes<\/strong>, a type of caraway seed shortcake biscuit traditionally sold at Whitsun (the seventh Sunday after Easter). <\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s a recipe: <a href=\"https:\/\/bakingforbritain.blogspot.com\/2005\/09\/goosnargh-cakes-from-lancashire.html\">https:\/\/bakingforbritain.blogspot.com\/2005\/09\/goosnargh-cakes-from-lancashire.html<\/a><\/p>\n<p><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/maps\/embed?pb=!1m18!1m12!1m3!1d75362.83698770766!2d-2.7677586304151096!3d53.82349861026491!2m3!1f0!2f0!3f0!3m2!1i1024!2i768!4f13.1!3m3!1m2!1s0x487b704a883e37c7%3A0xd318047c588194fe!2sGoosnargh%2C%20Preston!5e0!3m2!1sen!2suk!4v1702231776090!5m2!1sen!2suk\" width=\"600\" height=\"450\" style=\"border:0;\" allowfullscreen=\"\" loading=\"lazy\" referrerpolicy=\"no-referrer-when-downgrade\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The name comes the Old Irish name <em>Gosan<\/em> or <em>Gusan<\/em> and the Old Norse word <em>erg<\/em> (hill pasture), which is thought to come from the Old Irish <em>\u00e1irge<\/em> (a place for milking cows). Alternatively, it might come from the Old Norse <em>gudhsins h\u00f6rgi<\/em> (&#8220;at the idol&#8217;s (god&#8217;s) temple\u201d). <strong>Goosnargh<\/strong> appears in the Domesday Book as <strong>Gusansarghe<\/strong>, and by 1212 it had changed to <strong>Gosenargh<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><em>\u00c1irge<\/em> became <strong>\u00e1ir\u00ed<\/strong> (milking-place, herd (of cows), ground manured in previous year; ground from which potatoes have been cropped) in Irish,  <strong>\u00e0irigh<\/strong> [a\u02d0r\u02b2\u026a] (hill pasture, bothy, sheiling, pastoral summer residence, sheiling (knitting pattern)) in Scottish Gaelic, and <strong>eairee<\/strong> (hill pasture, shieling) in Manx. The Faorese word <strong>\u00e6rgi<\/strong> [\u02c8a\u0279t\u0361\u0283\u026a] (a pasture for cattle to graze over the summer with a hut where the people tending them live meanwhile; a shieling, saeter) also come from the same roots.<\/p>\n<p>According to Douglas Adams in his novel <em>In So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish<\/em>, <strong>goosnargh<\/strong> is a Betelgeusian word used by Ford Prefect &#8220;when he knew he should say something but didn&#8217;t know what it should be.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>However, in <em>The Meaning of Liff<\/em>, in which Douglas Adams\u2019 gives comic meanings to British place names, <strong>goosnargh<\/strong> is defined as &#8220;Something left over from preparing or eating a meal, which you store in the fridge despite the fact that you know full well you will never ever use it.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>I certainly have a few goosnarghs (leftovers) in my fridge. How about you?<\/p>\n<p> Sources: <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Goosnargh\">https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Goosnargh<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/Goosnargh\">https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/Goosnargh<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.teanglann.ie\/en\/fgb\/%c3%a1ir%c3%ad\">https:\/\/www.teanglann.ie\/en\/fgb\/\u00e1ir\u00ed<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.faclair.com\/\">https:\/\/www.faclair.com\/<\/a\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What does the word goosnargh suggest to you? A couple of geese that I encountered unexpectedly when walking around Bangor. When I first came across this word the other day, I guessed it might be an exclamation you make when encountering an unexpected goose. Goosnargh! Somewhat disappointingly, Goosnargh [\u02c8\u0261u\u02d0zn\u0259r] is in fact a village between [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104,108,127,10,23,35,36,56,78],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23203","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english","category-faroese","category-irish","category-language","category-manx","category-old-irish-goidelc","category-old-norse","category-scottish-gaelic","category-words-and-phrases"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23203","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23203"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23203\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23208,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23203\/revisions\/23208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23203"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23203"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23203"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}