Irish names starting with F

The F names in brief

• Fachtna · “FAKH-na” · Boy's name · also Fachnan, Faughnan
  Possibly 'hostile' or 'malicious' in origin. St Fachtna founded the monastic school at Ross Carbery in west Cork, which became one of the great teaching centres of early medieval Munster.
• Fáilbhe · “FAWL-va” · Boy's name · also Falvy
  An ancient name; Woulfe records no meaning for it. Borne by fourteen Irish saints, which is a great many for a name almost nobody now uses.
• Faoiltiarna · “FWEEL-teer-na” · Girl's name · also Whiltierna, Faoiltighearna
  Faol, 'wolf', and tiarna, 'lady' — the wolf-lady. An Irish virgin saint whose feast day was 17 March — the same day as Patrick, which is not a good day to share if you want to be remembered.
• Faolán · “FWAY-lawn” · Boy's name · also Felan, Phelan, Whelan
  From faol, 'wolf' — 'little wolf'. St Fáelán preached in Scotland, where Strathfillan and St Fillan's Pool are named for him — the pool was used to treat the mentally ill into the 19th century. The surname Whelan comes from the same root.
• Feardorcha · “far-DOR-a-kha” · Boy's name · also Fardoragh, Frederick, Ferdinand
  Fear, 'a man', and dorcha, 'dark' — the dark-complexioned man. A description that hardened into a name, common in the sixteenth century and in use for long after. Often written An Feardorcha, 'the dark man', with the article still attached.
• Fearghal · “FAR-gal” · Boy's name · also Fergal, Farrell, Fergus (distinct)
  Fear + gal, 'man of valour'. Fergal mac Máele Dúin was a high king killed in a catastrophic defeat in 722. The name lives on in the surname Ó Fearghail, O'Farrell, the princes of Annaly whose fortress gave County Longford its name.
• Fearghas · “FAR-gus” · Boy's name · also Fergus, Ferghus, Fearghus
  Fear + gus, 'man of vigour' or 'manly strength'. Fergus mac Róich, deposed king of Ulster, goes over to Medb's side in the Táin and fights his own people — and it is he who, in one telling, dictates the whole epic back to the scribes from beyond the grave. Fergus Mór is claimed as the founder of Dál Riata in Scotland.
• Fedelm · “FE-delm” · Girl's name · also Fidelma, Feidhelm
  Borne by a prophet and a poet of the Ulster Cycle. A fili, a trained poet, and a seer. In the Táin she meets Medb's army setting out and is asked what she sees.
• Feichín · “FEH-heen” · Boy's name · also Fehin, Festus
  From fiach, 'a raven'. Five Irish saints, of whom one was abbot of Fore in Westmeath and patron of west Connacht. His day is 20 January, and the seven wonders of Fore are still counted off for visitors.
• Ferdia · “fer-DEE-a” · Boy's name · also Fear Diadh, Ferdiad
  'man of God' or 'man of smoke'; disputed. Ferdia was Cú Chulainn's foster-brother and equal, forced by Medb to fight him at the ford. They fought for three days, tended each other's wounds each night, and on the fourth Cú Chulainn killed him with the gae bolga and wept.
• Fiachna · “FEE-akh-na” · Boy's name · also Fiachna
  Possibly from fiach, 'raven'. Fiachna mac Báetáin was a 7th-century king of the Ulaid whose reign is remembered in both Irish and Scottish sources — one of the last kings of the old Ulster before the Uí Néill ascendancy.
• Fiachra · “FEE-akh-ra” · Boy's name · also Fiachra, Fiacre
  Possibly from fiach, 'raven', or 'battle-king'. St Fiacre, a 7th-century Irish monk who settled in France, became the patron saint of gardeners — and, because a Paris hotel bearing his name hired out carriages, the French word for a cab became 'fiacre'. Also one of the Children of Lir.
• Fiadh · “FEE-a” · Girl's name · also Fia
  'wild, of the wild' — also 'deer', and in older usage 'respect'. The great surprise of recent Irish naming: almost unknown before 2010, Fiadh climbed to the very top of the girls' charts in the Republic within a decade. Its meaning (wildness, wild nature) clearly suits the mood of the moment.
• Finghin · “FIN-een” · Boy's name · also Fineen, Finnin, Florence
  Read as 'fair birth' or 'fair offspring'. Common among the MacCarthys, O'Sullivans, O'Mahonys and O'Driscolls of west Munster — and anglicised, in Woulfe's word, absurdly, as Florence. Generations of Munster men were christened Finghin and registered as Florence.
• Fintan · “FIN-tan” · Boy's name · also Fionntán, Fiontan
  Fionn + tan, 'white fire' or 'fair offspring'. Fintan mac Bóchra, in the mythological tradition, survived the Flood in Ireland and lived five thousand years as the island's memory — a one-man archive. Some seventy saints share the name, chief among them Fintan of Clonenagh.
• Fionn · “FYUN (also FIN)” · Boy's name · also Finn, Fionnan, Fintan
  'fair, bright, white'. Fionn mac Cumhaill, leader of the Fianna, gained all knowledge by burning his thumb on the Salmon of Wisdom and sucking it — and thereafter had only to put thumb to mouth to know anything. Folklore made him a giant who built the Giant's Causeway to reach Scotland.
• Fionnabhair · “FIN-oor” · Girl's name · also Findabair, Finnabair
  'white phantom' or 'fair spirit'. Daughter of Medb and Ailill, offered again and again as a prize to warriors who would fight Cú Chulainn, until she died of shame at what her mother had done with her. The name is the same word as the Welsh Gwenhwyfar, which is to say it is the same name as Guinevere.
• Fionnbharr · “FIN-bar” · Boy's name · also Finbar, Barra, Bairrfhionn
  Fionn, 'fair', and barr, 'a head'. Patron of the diocese of Cork, whose monastery on the marsh became the city. Shortened to Barra, which is how Corkonians say it.
• Fionnuala · “fin-OO-la” · Girl's name · also Finola, Nuala, Fenella, Fionnuala (full form)
  Fionn + guala, 'white shoulder' — 'the fair-shouldered one'. The eldest of the Children of Lir: turned into a swan with her three brothers by their jealous stepmother Aoife, she sheltered them under her wings for nine hundred years, three hundred on Lough Derravaragh, three hundred on the Sea of Moyle, three hundred on the Atlantic. Nuala is its everyday short form.
• Flann · “FLAN” · Boy's name · also Flainn, Florence
  'blood-red, ruddy'. Flann Sinna was a high king of the 9th century whose cross still stands at Clonmacnoise. Brian O'Nolan borrowed it for his pen name, Flann O'Brien, under which he wrote 'At Swim-Two-Birds' — a book Joyce admired and almost nobody understood at the time.
• Flidais · “FLID-ish” · Girl's name · also Fliodhas
  Known by the epithet Foltchaín, 'beautiful hair'. A goddess of cattle and of fertility, with a herd that could feed an army and a cow that gave milk for three hundred men at a milking. In a country where cattle were the currency, a cattle goddess is not a minor figure.
• Fódla · “FOE-la” · Girl's name · also Fódhla, Fola
  Thought to be from Old Irish fót, 'sod' or 'land'. The third of the three sister goddesses, with Ériu and Banba, and married to Mac Cecht. Her name means the ground itself.

Also spelled with F

Listed on the atlas under another spelling, but the F form is the one many families carry — they are the same name.

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