This is a French proverb that could just as easily be an Irish one
Une bonne conscience est un doux oreiller
There's no pillow as soft as a clear conscience
here's my attempt at it -
ní piliúr chomh bog le coinsias glan
or - Is coinsias glan piliúr bhog

That one’s backwards—it should be is piliúr bog é an consias glan, not the other way around.

I like this phrasing. Feels very Irish.

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Not a native speaker.

Always wait for at least three people to agree on a translation, especially if it’s for something permanent.

My translations are usually GU (Ulster Irish), unless CO (Standard Orthography) is requested.

Bog means soft (as opposed to hard), mín is soft (as opposed to rough).
bog = mou i bhFraincis
mín = doux

To make it sound more like other Irish proverbs, you may say:

Is mín an piliúr coinsias glan.

or in Ulster: Is mín an babhstar coinsias glan.

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

I suppose that’s a different cultural view on pillows …

I would never consider the ‘soft’ used to describe a pillow as the opposite of ‘rough’ (what pillows are rough? [*]), but the opposite of ‘hard’, since some pillows are actually quite hard—and therefore, quite uncomfortable (for me, anyway).






[*] The answer being obviously traditional Irish straw pillows!

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Not a native speaker.

Always wait for at least three people to agree on a translation, especially if it’s for something permanent.

My translations are usually GU (Ulster Irish), unless CO (Standard Orthography) is requested.

No, bog means "soft" (as opposed to "hard"), mín means "smooth, fine" (as opposed to "coarse").

We can't draw a distinction based on French any more than we should on English. The real test is which words get used together with bog and which with mín in Irish.

Examples with mín:

talamh mín "smooth land"
craiceann mín "smooth skin"
éadach mín "smooth cloth"
teanga mhín "a smooth tongue"
cíor mhín "a fine comb"
créafóg mhín "fine clay"


Examples with bog:

adhmad bog "soft timber"
leathar bog "soft leather"
talamh bog "soft yielding ground
éadach bog "soft cloth"
cathaoir bhog "an easy chair"
craiceann bog mín "soft smooth skin"

Here's a case where if you stick to the original, it could end up being just plain weird in Irish.

Which would the native Irish speakers prefer: piliúr bog? or piliúr mín? Would the latter combination be likely? A wrinkle-free pillow, perhaps?

I think the following more likely:

Is bog an piliúr coinsias glan.

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Múinteoir Gaeilge - Irish Teacher
My "specialty" is Connemara Irish, particularly Cois Fhairrge dialect, but I can also speak Ulster and Munster Irish with native-level pronunciation.
Is fearr Gaeilge ḃriste ná Béarla cliste, cinnte, aċ i ḃfad níos fearr aríst í Gaeilge ḃinn ḃeo na nGaeltaċtaí.
Gaeilge Chonnacht (GC), go háraid Gaeilge Chois Fhairrge (GCF), Gaeilic Uladh (GU), Gaelainn na Mumhan (GM), agus Gaeilge an Chaighdeáin Oifigiúil (CO).

Go raibh maith agaibh go léir
- I'm also interested in how the idea of smooth and rough land can be expressed in Irish as it's in the story I'm trying to translate - but that would be for another thread.

In the French sentence, the pillow is soft, ie. not rough. Soft, like a cat's fur or whatever.
And that is "mín" in Irish, as it is given in De Bhaldraithe's dictionary.

I know bog and mín may mean other things, but here we were talking about what is "doux" in Irish, talking about a pillow, and "doux" is "mín".

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

Doux just means ‘pleasant to the senses’, basically—it’s not necessarily the opposite of ‘rough’.

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Not a native speaker.

Always wait for at least three people to agree on a translation, especially if it’s for something permanent.

My translations are usually GU (Ulster Irish), unless CO (Standard Orthography) is requested.

I have a radical (possibly very Irish) solution to this "problem" - use both adjectives:

Is bog mín an piliúr é coinsias glan.

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Múinteoir Gaeilge - Irish Teacher
My "specialty" is Connemara Irish, particularly Cois Fhairrge dialect, but I can also speak Ulster and Munster Irish with native-level pronunciation.
Is fearr Gaeilge ḃriste ná Béarla cliste, cinnte, aċ i ḃfad níos fearr aríst í Gaeilge ḃinn ḃeo na nGaeltaċtaí.
Gaeilge Chonnacht (GC), go háraid Gaeilge Chois Fhairrge (GCF), Gaeilic Uladh (GU), Gaelainn na Mumhan (GM), agus Gaeilge an Chaighdeáin Oifigiúil (CO).

So do I - sleep directly on the mattress...... and after a night or two, you'll be grateful for any pillow at all!

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