I'm currently reading Lady Gregory's work "Cuchulain of Muirthemne,"
which, like any other mythic tale, is full of names and terms in the
language of origin.  Lady Gregory, an Englishwoman, dedicated her
compilation and rework of the tales to the people of Kiltartan, where
she resided.  She wrote:  "My friend and your friend the Craoibhin
Aoibhin has put Irish of to-day on some of these stories that I have
set in order, for I am sure you will like to have the history of the
heroes of Ireland told in the language of Ireland."  "Today" was 1902.

Being an American with but a smattering of Scottish Gaelic to aid me,
I need some help.  I have found several resources online (including
Lady Gregory's notes) that tell me how to pronounce certain character
and place names and a few other expressions and translate some of
them.  What I'd like is a modest glossary (preferably with a
pronunciation guide) that helps me with other expressions:  "dun," for
example, and "slieve," as well as well-known names such as "Tuatha de
Danaan."  I think these are expressions that would be familiar to an
Irish audience and therefore not require any explanation in text.

But I don't want to purchase a $75 or $100 dictionary of the Irish
language.  Something much more downscale than that ought to serve my
purpose, perhaps an Irish-English dictionary about on the scale of a
traveler's French dictionary.

Can you locate a resource for looking up words that are likely to
appear in Irish myths and folklore as terms that would need no
translation for a native Irish reader?

Thank you,
Archae0pteryx

Hi, again (coincidence)

From the ridiculous (118118) to the sublime...as a Scot i couldnt resist this one.

http://www.rampantscotland.com/gaelic.htm

kind regards

Tryx,

This is a very useful site which includes links to numerous resources,
plus a busy forum full of helpful folks who are willing to answer
questions about Irish Gaelic pronunciations and translations:

http://www.irishgaelictranslator.com/translation/

Hi, Pink,

Thanks for your contribution.  This does look like an ample resource. 
Unfortunately none of the dictionaries and glossaries here fits my
need.  I want a small or medium-sized *book* (one that has genuine
paper pages and does not have to be plugged in).  I read in bed, and I
would like to keep the book by me to look words up on the spot, not
hop up and down consulting my computer or save them to search for
tomorrow.  At least one of these is a downloadable, printable
glossary, which might well do, but it's all contemporary language and
usage and does not offer much about fortresses or fairies, which were
two of the words I wanted to translate.

A couple of the old ones look good--particularly MacBain's and
MacFarlane's, which I'm sure I could find as used books--but they're
for Gaelic learners and don't give phonetic pronunciations.

And of course the English-to-Irish ones aren't for me at all.

Maybe, as so often happens, I am on a quest for something that doesn't exist.

Tryx

rwc37,

Thanks for your suggestion.  This is one of the ones I looked at, and
I thought about purchasing from Amazon.com for $45.  But without the
pronunciation aid, it won't satisfy the desire to know both the
meaning and the approximate sound of the non-English words I'm
reading.  The expressions--such as "dun"--are embedded in English
text, so I am not making a translation, much less learning the
language.  I am just trying to compensate for the fact that the
intended audience had a different vocabulary from mine.

Thanks,
Archae0pteryx