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Finsceal Beo!!!!!!!
That’s the one Slewman!
What does it mean?
Think it means a Legend in life or living legend or something along those lines,the same owner(Micheal Ryan) always has his horses As Gaeilge the likes of Al Eile,Penthesilea Eile,i’d say it could be frustrating for Commentators from outside Ireland trying to pronounce them!
But sure hey that’s probably half the reason he does it
"Living Legend"
If we knew what these names meant then they’d be instantly more memorable. Same with arabic names.
Although on the other hand, "Finscael Beo" doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue (at least to the English) like "Living Legend".
Whether the English name of Living Legend is available for owners, suapect it’s already been snapped up. Which is probably another reason for other languages being used.
Another aspect is betting. If I had to name a horse, would not want a memorable name as they are often over-bet. Beaver Patrol at the height of his powers seemed to be well backed in every race.
Value Is EverythingI can just about cope with the Arab and Gaelic names – the ones that are beginning to annoy me are those which run all the letters into a single word, without using spaces.
Last night at Stratford there was (a non-runner thankfully) Notabotheronme (Not a bother on me)and that was one of the easier ones to decipher.
What are the rules on reserving horse names?
Ballydoyle/Coolmore always to have a stream of related names and I wondered how they managed to get them all – so there’s been Beethoven, Mozart, Handel, Strauss; Yesterday, All My Loving, Magicalmysterytour (all out of Jude); Yeats, Alexander Pope; Roderic O’Conor, Boris Grigoriev, Jan Vermeer to name a few.
As these horses weren’t all one season I was impressed they managed to get them all.
When I read this thread, I thought I’d gone back 25 years.
Then, there was a daily column in the Sporting Life written by "Monty Court". The Maktoum brothers were placing more and more horses into training and Shekih Hamdan in particular was naming his horses in arabic.
The old guard, led by the Sporting Life, weren’t happy about this – very much the sentiments of the OP here – and the Monty Court column became more and more outspoken. I vividly remember the Life’s TV representative, John McCirick, getting hot under the collar about a Tom Jones horse called Alchasibeyah (apologies for spelling) one afternoon at Newmarket. His comments were offensive.
There’s a school of thought which purports that the Life’s attitude to arabic naming was one of the factors which led to Sheikh Mohammed’s decision to fund the new Racing Post as a direct competitor to the Sporting Life.
Well, SA owners don’t name their horses in Afrikaans, Japanese horses mostly have recognizable English language names, even German horses are recognizable to all. If they can do it then the Arab owners can.
They are running on UK courses, in UK races for UK racegoers, they should be named in English. If they are going to be campaigned at Meydan or Abu Dhabi then call them something in Arabic.What are the rules on reserving horse names?
Ballydoyle/Coolmore always to have a stream of related names and I wondered how they managed to get them all – so there’s been Beethoven, Mozart, Handel, Strauss; Yesterday, All My Loving, Magicalmysterytour (all out of Jude); Yeats, Alexander Pope; Roderic O’Conor, Boris Grigoriev, Jan Vermeer to name a few.
As these horses weren’t all one season I was impressed they managed to get them all.
Nick Dundee, Ned Kelly, Rhinestone Cowboy, Wichita Lineman…
Racing Daily
They are running on UK courses – yes
They are running on UK courses – yes
They are running for UK racegoers – absolutely not !They are running for their connections whatever their nationality or mother tongue. We merely get the benefit of watching the cream of their bloodstock, and long may it remain so
Sorry guys.
In my previous post the second point should have readThey are running in UK races – yes
My knowledge of the grammar and construction of Semitic Languages is somewhat limited
but as I understand it many Arabic words may look similar to we speakers of Indo-European languages because Arabic is a fusional language in which articles and pronouns are appended to verbs and nouns as affixes and prefixes to form a single ‘phrasal word’.It is also a generally a VSO (Verb Subject Object) language ‘See I Him’ unlike English which is SVO – I See Him
So, in essence, many Arabic horse names may look similar to us but may actually mean wholly different things
Don’t have a problem with it myself, it all adds to the rich library of horse names built up over 200 years, some of which are marvellous, some not
As someone else says, he who pays the piper calls the tune – but – i do tire of some of Hamdams names, as i struggle to remember them as some are so similar.
I know they were not Arabic names, but the Aga Khan’s horses had none European names & although I wasn’t alive then I have never read that Tulyar, Mahmoud, Masaka, Bahram, Taj Akhbar, Firdaussi et al were not accepted by UK racegoers.
Criticising the Arab owners choice of names could be conceived as bordering on racism, they are after all their horses. I agree with an earlier poster that they are nicer than some of the run together words & names that advertise businesses.The Aga’s euphonious names are generally as attractive as his lovely horses but I’ve long suspected they’re actually fictitious and don’t mean anything at all, be it in Farsi, Urdu, whatever
Anyone know for sure?
What is a Shergar and what is a Zarkava
I know they were not Arabic names, but the Aga Khan’s horses had none European names & although I wasn’t alive then I have never read that Tulyar, Mahmoud, Masaka, Bahram, Taj Akhbar, Firdaussi et al were not accepted by UK racegoers.
Criticising the Arab owners choice of names could be conceived as bordering on racism, they are after all their horses. I agree with an earlier poster that they are nicer than some of the run together words & names that advertise businesses.The horse names you mention are phonetically acceptable names, and memorable. Laajooj is not phonetically pleasing at all, it is just two syllables tied together to make a nonsensical word.
I’m not sure why you chose to play the race card Crepello1957, my grievance lies wholly with a scenario where you are trying to do some form study and can’t remember wtf the name of that horse was that won the maiden at Yarmouth? Lahood? Lajool? Damn, what was that horse called now???
I agree on the other point of lots of words tied together to a degree, it can take a minute to translate some of them and must be a commentators nightmare, but horses like Thethingaboutitis do still sit on the tongue quite easily. Horses used to advertise company names bug me more, ie. OI Oyston, Oyston Estates, Tees Components, Bathwick Tyres etc. The primary incentive is not to own a horse and have the pleasure of seeing it win, moreso getting the company branding out there. Annoying.Sheikh Mohammed must agree with some of us as I read when they found out that Dubai Millenium was gonna be a bit tasty they re-registered his name.
All Arabic names I’ve seen are in fact actual words or phrases. Arabic, like Hebrew, has no written vowels, so there’s a lot of variation in transliterating.
Laajooj=Detailed ArgumentsLahudood=No Limits
Sakhee=Generous
Nashwan=Mellow
Shadayid=Strong
Iffraaj=Release
Harayir=Silk
Intidab=Mandate
etc.They are running on UK courses, in UK races for UK racegoers, they should be named in English. If they are going to be campaigned at Meydan or Abu Dhabi then call them something in Arabic.
It’s a disgrace, these Arabs come over here and buy our horses and take our prize money and can’t even give them proper English names. Send ’em back to their own country if they want to choose names in their own language I say. Lets hope ‘Er Majesty, gawd bless her, wins the Derby with a good old English horse this year.
Laajooj is not phonetically pleasing at all, it is just two syllables tied together to make a nonsensical word.
Er, not quite. According to the Godolphin website Laajooj is Arabic and means Pressing/Insistent/Fresh/Aggressive.
If you were lucky enough to be able to afford to have several horses in training in Dubai, would you insist on naming them something Arabic?
but as I understand it many Arabic words may look similar to we speakers of Indo-European languages because Arabic is a fusional language in which articles and pronouns are appended to verbs and nouns as affixes and prefixes to form a single ‘phrasal word’.
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