Hello again,

I don't know if you've heard about The Summoner's Tale. Nevertheless, it's kind of a big deal to me and my brother, since father used to tell it when we were kids.

We intend to tattoo it (just the tittle) together and he intend to do so in Irish.
I've been here before and you mates were of a great help, so here I am once more to ask you, how do you write and pronounce these in irish:

- The Summoner's Tale
- Summoner

Thanks in advance, you guys are lifesavers.

The problem you may have is that legal terms, especially titles, don't always translate well from one language to another. Irish does have a word for a summons, which is gairm (or toghairm), but I don't think there's actually a specific name for a person who serves summonses (at least I couldn't find one in any of my dictionaries). However, it so happens that Scottish Gaelic does have a name for that position, which is maor gairme . A maor is a kind of bailiff and a gairm is a summons (same origin as the Irish word), so with gairm placed in the genitive case as gairme, the result is "bailif of a summons" or "summons bailiff" (="summoner").

Since Irish also has the word maor as one of the terms for a bailiff, maor gairme works logically in Irish as well, although as I said the term may never have been used in Ireland (it is quite archaic even in English). Taking that as the term for summoner, you could then have:

Scéal an mhaoir gairme
The summoner's tale

Note that maor is changed here to put it in the genitive as well, so the literal meaning is more or less "[the] tale/story of the summons-bailiff". Do wait for other input, though, because for one thing I'm not sure whether gairme here should be ghairme.

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I'm not a native (or entirely fluent) speaker, so be sure to wait for confirmations/corrections, especially for tattoos.

Great detective work CaoimhínSF. I think it works well for the title of this ancient work. Like you I looked in my dictionaries without luck and I was playing with perhaps using the words Seirbheálaí próiseanna.

I wouldn't think he means that kind of summoner.
More like the kind that summons spirits, or magic or something.
But I could be way wrong.

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It is recommended that you always wait for three to agree on a translation.
I speak Connemara Irish, and my input will often reflect that.
I will do an mp3 file on request for short translations.
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I thought it was one of the Canterbury Tales, but I wasn't certain, so I looked it up:


Sounds like Caoimhín is on track, though it hard to know what the parallels might have been in fourteenth century Ireland. Although the Normans ruled, Fenian law was retained.

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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).

I've been thinking about this one - in French it would be un huissier, which is a word that goes back to the Middle Ages - and let's not forget that the English that Chaucer uses was strongly influenced by Norman French. Originally it would have meant a doorman, but obviously his role evolved into a kind of official messenger and having to go out and bring back people who needed to be brought before a court. A summoner could also work for the religious authorities. The (Norman) French word huissier has become usher in English and has also gone directly into Irish as uiséir.
http://www.cnrtl.fr/etymologie/huissier

I'll still wait for further corrections and agreements but I must thank you all for the effort.
Thanks a million you guys.