Booley or Boley?

With the Booley fair under way, perhaps the old qestion of whether it should be pronounced booley or boley will once again rear its head.

Lets look at it, the word booley is derived from the Irish buachailleacht, the practice of cow herding.


Youn may notice the word buachaill in there, buachaill is the normal Irish word for boy, it originally meant cow herd.

The word booley does not derive DIRECTLY from 'bó', a milking cow but buachaill is ultimately related to it.

Basically, the word buachailleacht would be pronounced 'BOOX-all-taxt' in Irish, much more similar to booley than boley.

HOWEVER, in Clonduff Irish, buachtailleacht would seem to have been pronounced 'BO-al-at', a little more similar to boley.

Therefore, it is not an open and shut case, and both arguements have merit.

If I personally had to chose between the two however, I would go with booley, it is simply alot more simple.