in a district where Abbey O'Dorney has perpetuated the ancient designation; while a certain family called O'Cuirres, connected with the barony of Kerrycurrihy in the county of Cork, are also styled Clann Torna, 'Children of Toranis,' in an old poem,[1] and the name seems to have been pretty widely spread in the kingdom of Munster.[2] The genitive Toranjas implies a nominative Toranis, differing only in its o from Lucan's Taranis, which with its a is probably less original than the Irish one. Now the later form which Toranis should take in Irish would be Toirn, and that is also the nominative which should have as its genitive Torna. But just as the Welsh word gwynt, corresponding etymologically to Vintios, the name of the Gaulish god associated with the wind, has lost all reference to the divinity, and become simply a masculine noun meaning wind, so Toirn, the Irish equivalent of the older Toranis, Gaulish Taranis, has ceased to be a proper noun, and come down to modern times in the signification of 'a great noise or thunder;' and it is noteworthy that it is feminine.[3]
- ↑ By O'Huidhrin: see The Topographical Poems, edited by O'Donovan (Dublin, 1862), p. 102, and note lxiv (555).
- ↑ There was also a poet called Torna supposed by some to have lived in the 4th century, and it has become usual to trace the Ui Torna to him as their ancestor. This is probably an error dating from the time when a nominative Torna would be Torna also in the genitive; the former would presuppose an early Toranjo-s, an adjectival form of the same origin as the words here in question, but parallel with such Latin formations as Jovius, Martius, Veneria, and the like. However, it would matter little here if one were forced to suppose some of the Torna families descended from the poet alluded to; the rest may still be regarded as deriving their name from Torna = the genitive of Toranjas.
- ↑ O'Reilly's Irish-Eng. Dict. s. v.; see also Foley's English-Irish Dict. s. v. thunder.
