boreen
English edit
Alternative forms edit
Etymology edit
Borrowed from Irish bóithrín, diminutive of bóthar (“road”).
Pronunciation edit
Noun edit
boreen (plural boreens)
- (Ireland) A narrow, frequently unpaved, rural road in Ireland, often characterised by a ridge of grass growing in the middle.
- c. 1900, “Star of the County Down (traditional folk song)”:
- Down a boreen green came a sweet colleen \ And she smiled as she passed me by.
- 2002, Joseph O'Connor, Star of the Sea, Vintage, published 2003, page 63:
- A boy in a disguise nobody believed in, an actor playing a part he didn't understand, he would trudge every rocky field and quaking bog, every pot-holed road and tortuous boreen, each of the thirteen villages on his father's estate, speaking the Irish he had learned from his father's servants.