Aisling

The s sits beside an i, which makes it sh. ASH-ling — the same sh you hear in Sinéad and Seán.

• s before e or i → sh

All seven rules, and every name with a respelling →

Not an ancient personal name but a literary form: the aisling was a genre of 18th-century Irish poetry in which Ireland appears to the poet as a beautiful woman in a dream, foretelling deliverance. Poets like Aogán Ó Rathaille made it the vehicle for hope under the Penal Laws; the 20th century turned the word into a girl's name.