3 Phrases for St. Patrick’s Day … and 1 to Avoid

St. Patrick’s Day is coming up March 17. With that in mind, today we’re going to talk about three phrases you’re likely to hear on that holiday.

Before we dive in, here’s a refresher on St. Patrick. His life was pretty eventful. He was born in Great Britain in the 5th century and then kidnapped as a child and enslaved by Irish raiders. He escaped back to his home country after six years.

Later, as an adult, he dreamed that a group of Irishmen were calling him back to their land. Believing he’d received a message from God, he returned to Ireland as a one-man missionary, spreading word of the Christian faith across the pagan island and baptizing people left and right. 

Legends surround his stay there. He’s best known for having driven all the snakes out of Ireland (which is probably a metaphor for driving out the druids). He’s also said to have raised 33 people from the dead, some of whom had been buried for years.

He’s even said to have placed a curse on an Irish clan who didn’t take kindly to his promotion of a new deity. Their spirit animal was a wolf, and they howled at Patirck when he came close. Patrick retaliated. The legends say he put a curse on them that turned one couple, every seven years, into wolves—wolves that spoke like humans and craved human flesh. You could say he turned them into werewolves.

On a more peaceful note, St. Patrick is also supposed to have illustrated the Holy Trinity of Christianity by using a shamrock, showing its three leaves growing from a single stem. Partly due to this legend, shamrocks have become the national flower of Ireland, and are symbolic of all things Irish, especially St. Patrick’s Day.

Now that you know who St. Patrick is, let’s get back to words you might hear on this holiday. We’ll start with “Begorrah.”

What Does 'Begorrah' Mean?

Begorrah is a euphemism for the phrase “by God.” You sometimes hear it in the phrase, “faith and begorrah.” It’s the Irish equivalent of an American saying, “by golly” or “by gosh.”

Its first recorded use was 1839. An English newspaper published in 1885 made fun of the word, suggesting that the Prince of Wales, when visiting Ireland, should familiarize himself with Irish slang such as “arrah,”’ “begorra,” “be jabers,” and “spalpeen.” 

“Arrah,” by the way, is an expression of disbelief. “Be jabbers” means “by Jesus.” And a...

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