Girl's name
Aoibheann
“EE-van”
from aoibhinn, 'beautiful, radiant, of pleasing form'
Why it is said that way
Two rules at once. The ao is ee and the bh is v, which gets you EE-van. The o, the i and the h are all doing something other than making a sound of their own.
- bh, mh → v — or w in the middle of a word
- ao → ee, or ay in Munster
The story behind the name
The name of the mother of St Énda and of several medieval princesses, including a daughter of the king of Tara. The poet Eavan Boland carried its anglicised form into modern Irish letters.
Meanings follow Ó Corráin & Maguire's Irish Names and Woulfe; pronunciations give the commonest Irish-English form. Know this name better — a dialect pronunciation, a family tradition? Tell us. · All Irish names A–Z