I had a team at the Tolbooth the other night named Tir Na Nog.

The fascinating thing wasn’t that they managed to spell their team name about five different ways in five different rounds, but the name itself.

I was sure I’d seen Ti-Na-Nog several times before in my life and I knew it was something or other Gaelic.

So I just looked it up and it turns out that.

Tír na nÓg

(that’s the Wikipedia way of spelling it, so I’m trusting it) is a “supernatural realm of everlasting youth, beauty, health, abundance and joy.^“

It’s Irish Gaelic and it comes from an Irish story where a human man (Oisin) falls in love with a woman from Ti Na Nog (Niamh) and travels with her to the land on a magic horse that can fly across water.

After three years he becomes homesick and asks to go back to Ireland, but when he gets back to Ireland he finds that 300 years have passed, falls off his horse becomes very old as soon as he touches the soil and dies, but not before meeting Saint Patrick and rejecting Christianity.

For the full story, youtube provides: