St. Paddy’s Day
Happy St. Paddy's Day! For today's Fraud Friday, let's talk about a different kind of fraud. A fraud perpetrated by big corporate and stereotyping. The scam that is "St. Patty’s Day." That's right folks, today we will be setting straight some myths and facts about our favorite drinking day. From the name we call it, the plants that we associate it with, and even the drinks made in honor of it, we will be taking a dive into the farce that is St. Patrick’s Day! Today's post may become rather long but stick around if you'd like to learn a thing or two about the etymology and history behind St. Paddy's Day! As a short disclaimer, in no way do I intend on dissuading the celebration of St. Paddy’s Day. The intent here is strictly informative and geared towards correcting what we know about this holiday.
Firstly, as alluded to above, it's "St. Paddy's Day" not "St. Patty's Day." While this may seem like a small inaccuracy, it is on the same level as spelling "Jack" as "Jak." Why? Well, I'm glad you didn't ask! “Paddy” is the shortened version of “Padraig” (pronounced PAW-RICK). For those of you who don’t know, the name Patrick is the anglicized form of the Gaelic Padraig. This is where the will of D’s comes in. The shortened version of Patrick or Padraig is exclusively Paddy. That is if you ask the Irish and the actual history surrounding this day. To put it more plainly, there isn’t a sinner in Ireland who would refer to a Patrick as “Patty.” A patty, by Irish standards, is either a burger patty or the shortened form of “Patricia.” So, how did this happen? How did 1500+ years of etymology get so muddled? Well, because it’s 1500+ years. We know spellings and history because of what has been recorded by generations preceding us. We know pronunciation because this name has persisted for 1.5 millennia. Through research and sleuthing, historians have been able to uncover much of what we didn’t know before.
Now, let’s talk about the Shamrock. If you’ve ever seen the hat of a leprechaun, you are certain to have seen the dastardly four-leaved clover pasted to the band. That is not a shamrock. A shamrock must be a three-leaved clover. This is because, according to tradition, St. Patrick used the three leaves of the Shamrock to teach of the Holy Trinity. He’d have no luck with a Four-leaved clover on that Leprechaun Derby.
While we’re on the topic of misappropriated names and symbols, let’s talk about Irish Car Bombs. Now, I don’t have an issue with calling them Irish because all the ingredients are Irish. Even if the drink was first invented in Connecticut, it uses a shot of one-to-one Irish cream to Irish whiskey that is dropped “bomb-shot style” into an Irish stout. Now, if that were the end of our etymology lesson on this drink, I’d be happy. Unfortunately, it’s not. The term “Car bombs” is a direct reference to the Car Bombings that took place during the Irish Troubles. The Irish Troubles were a conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from 1960-1998. The Irish Troubles saw a series of bombings that are responsible for the deaths of 16,209 people throughout the conflicts. Internationally, we refer to these events as the Northern Ireland Conflict. Effectively, calling the Irish Car Bomb by that name is akin to calling a Jaeger Bomb the London Blitz, or a Sake Bomb the Japanese Atom Bomb. The name is uncouth and disliked by many who know the history of it. My recommendation is to refer to this drink as an Irish Slammer, Irish Bomb Drop, or the Dublin Drop. 95% of barkeeps will know exactly what you want. If they don’t, find a better bar.
Finally, I would like to discuss the Patron Saint of Ireland and his legend. We all know that “St. Patrick drove the snakes out of Ireland,” but did he? Short answer, they weren’t the reptile. We know now that post-glacial Ireland never had snakes. Any time that Ireland was warm enough to support the lives of snakes, Ireland was surrounded by water. Of course, when the water around the country froze in the last ice age, snakes could totally cross, right? Also no. Snakes, as you may know, are cold-blooded. It is simply impossible for these cold-blooded creatures to have crossed miles of ice sheets to arrive in Ireland. This immediately discounts the possibility of real snakes being driven out. So, where did this idea of St. Padraig driving off the snakes come from? Simply, the Pagan-Christian “fusion.” Really this was an elaborate scam pulled by St. Paddy to convince the Pagans that Christianity was a rebranding of Paganism. He flawlessly executed his plan by slowly drawing parallels to the two systems of belief. Merging the Irish lore and celebrations with Christianity. He moved the dated of early Christian celebrations to dates that were sacred to the Pagans while also merging the two systems’ symbols and gradually normalized the mild similarities of the two systems of belief. This process is detailed thoroughly in the Annals of the Kingdom of Ireland which are the chronicles of medieval Irish history which reads “Nothing is clearer than that Patrick engrafted Christianity on the Pagan superstitions with so much skill, that he won the people over to the Christian religion before they understood the exact difference between the two systems of belief.”
This is not an exhaustive list on the topic, but I hope we’ve been able to shed some light on St. Paddy’s Day and the historic inaccuracies we celebrate. Again, this post is in no way to dissuade you from celebrating St. Patrick’s Day. The fact is this holiday has drastically changed over time as all celebrations do. I am an avid enjoyer of the holiday who happens to think that we, as a society, can do better to honor the real history and culture of this day and other holidays. Thank you very much for stopping by to read this deviation from our regular Fraud Fridays!