Bad Gaelic Tattoo translations

[Finistere]

As a fluent Irish speaker, I have seen my share of bad translations and have had many requests -- usually from fellow Americans -- for tattoos in Irish. Worse than a bad tattoo, in my opinion, is when state services (Republic of Ireland) use Google Translate to provide documentation and support to the Irish speaking community instead of using actual Irish speakers.

Ádh mór a chairde,
Seanachán

I quite agree, Google translate is not the best tool for Celtic languages, I'm a Welsh speaker and Welsh mutates if your talking about yourself, your parents or grand parents, this is just one example there are many many more, Google translate can't do this as its a program, only a native speaker can do this. Kit

[OC Richard]

I did a thread a while back- I can't find it now- about how so many American Fire Department Pipe Bands have incorrect Gaelic slogans as part of their logos or what have you.

When I started playing in a Fire Department Pipe Band I did some research and reached out to Gaelic speakers here for help. I didn't want to commit the same errors!

It was quite a learning experience.

Here's the beginning of my thread on this topic, on another forum:

A student, who is a firefighter, had on his binder a fire logo that said onior do na mardh.

I said that it couldn't be spelt that way, as it violates Gaelic spelling conventions and besides there's no such word as "mardh".

Anyhow I got out both Irish and Scots Gaelic dictionaries and it seems that it should be onoir do na mairbh, "onoir" being, like English "honour", a borrowed French word, and "mairbh" the plural for dead.