For the shorter version, try it as Gaeilge

EDWARD HORGAN (Irish Examiner letters, March 19) notes a Spanish socialist’s unflattering description of Tony Blair as a ‘gilipollas,’ or dickhead, and he wonders if there is an Irish language equivalent. Indeed there is, and very precisely so.

‘Breall’ (to rhyme with growl) is explained in both the Dinneen and Ó Dónaill dictionaries as ‘the glans penis’ and is used colloquially to mean an ‘idiot’ or ‘blunderer’. It is, or at least used to be, a common abusive term in Cork parlance. It is interesting that ‘langer’, another disparaging Cork description, has a similar dual meaning (see Seán Beecher’s ‘A Dictionary of Cork Slang’).

And that’s my scholarly contribution to Seachtain na Gaeilge!

John A Murphy,

Rosebank,

Douglas Road,

Cork.