# MUSHA RINGUM DURAM DA? What do it mean?? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 13, 2006, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330 "2006-07-13T15:09:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2006, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/1 "2006-07-13T15:09:08Z")
I’m sure it’s been asked here before but of course a search yields nothing. What is the translation of “MUSHA RINGUM DURAM DA” as it is sung in the traditional Irish/appalachian tune “_Whiskey in the Jar_?” I guess this question presupposes that there _is_ a translation. I wondered if it was some sort of misinterpretation of actual Gaelic. Oh yeah, and what about the whole “Whack fol da daddy-o?” ---
**Author:** ![DonutSprinkle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/0ea827/32.png) [@DonutSprinkle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DonutSprinkle)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2006, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/2 "2006-07-13T15:48:49Z")
Check out this [looooong page](http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=3116) . > [@](#): > > Anybody know why the song is called “Whiskey in the Jar”? More specifically, why do they say, “There’s whiskey in the jar” in the chorus when not one of the versions of the song has anything to do with Whiskey or Jars? > The last stanza in a lot of the versions has the bit about “the juice of the barley” but all of the songs are about this outlaw guy getting betrayed by some girl, so why is the chorus a bunch of nonsense and a random bit about booze? > Some of my thoughts: > I keep looking but everywhere I look tells me the same thing: the words in the chorus are just nonsense. But I find that hard to believe. It sounds very much like the little Irish I know: > > “Musha ring um a do um a da” is very very similar sounding to these Irish words: > Musha =\> M’uishe (my whiskey) > ring um a =\> rinne me/ (rinne = past tense of “de/an” which is “do, make, perform, carry out, commit, turn out, reach, establish”; me/ = “I, me”) > do =\> don (from “do” + “an” = “to the, for the”) > um a da =\> amada/n (fool) > > which translates to “I made my whiskey for the fool.” Which, as a translation, has the nice qualities that it follows correct Irish grammar and also follows stress rules for both sentences and individual words. It also has to do with whiskey, which is nice. > > my whiskey made a fool of me would translate to, I think: > Rinne se/ m’uishe me/ amada/n. Which doesn’t work as a translation because the subject has to follow the verb. > > “Whack for the daddy-o” is sometimes said to be a mistranscription of “work of the devil-o” which makes some sense as far as my first translation goes in an “alcohol is the devil’s brew” sort of sense. It is also in keeping with the story line revolving around a highwayman. > > A possible anternative Irish translation is as follows: > uacht failte ta/ diobh, > which sounds like “whack fol cha ta jiov” which is pretty close. Unfortunately, I don’t think it makes any sense since it translates to “It is a testament of welcome for them”. > > My last thought is that maybe it has ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with whiskey at all. Maybe the line “there’s whiskey in the jar” is actually the mistranscribed line. Maybe the chorus never had anything to do with whiskey. > > The Irish word for whiskey, “uisce” (pronounced “ish-keh”), is also the Irish word for water. And many of the versions of the song have his girl filling up his cartridges with water as a main plot point. > > * * * > > Those are some ideas. Does anybody else have any helpful suggestions? (Aside from the suggestion that it is just nonsense…) > Does anyone know where this chorus originates? (There is a very similar sounding chorus in “Whiskey, you’re the divil” which the Clancys cover, I think, and that song has a bit more to do with whiskey but still not much as it’s mainly a war song.) > Any leads on what’s goin’ on here? > > - Very confused, > Patrick Sheehan > > [sheehan@brown.edu](mailto:sheehan@brown.edu) And that’s just a little bit 😃 ---
**Author:** ![The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_chao_goes_mu/32/3191_2.png) [@The\_Chao\_Goes\_Mu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Chao_Goes_Mu)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2006, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/3 "2006-07-13T16:22:05Z")
[QUOTE=DonutSprinkle] Check out this [looooong page](http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=3116) . And that’s just a little bit 😃 [/QUOTE] Yeah I saw that long winded post. Just wondering if there was any validity to it. That’s the only thing I’ve ever found that even gave a possibility of the meaning. Most sites say it means nothing at all. Shoot. ---
**Author:** ![Ichbin\_Dubist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/51bf81/32.png) [@Ichbin\_Dubist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ichbin_Dubist)\ **Post date:** [July 13, 2006, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/4 "2006-07-13T17:01:43Z")
[QUOTE=The Chao Goes Mu] Most sites say it means nothing at all. Shoot. [/QUOTE] It’s not uncommon for folk songs to have parts that don’t fit all that well logically. Like “The Coo Coo Bird” has a verse about a bird, a couple of verses about a woman, a couple of verses about gambling. The verses usually sung to “Soldier’s Joy” are the same way. There is an Irish tune called “Whiskey in the Jar” (my old standby The Fiddler’s Companion lists a G major reel with that title); my guess is that at some point words got set to it, and some of the words floated away and got attached to another song entirely, in this case an old ballad about a highwayman, and then that song passed through enough non-Irish-speaking ears and throats so that the Irish part got hopelessly mangled. The song that’s sometimes titled “Whiskey You’re the Devil” also has the “whiskey in the jar” line without the musha-ringa stuff but with a lot of skiddly-idle stuff. Do a Google search on the meaning of the chorus of “Iko Iko”/“Jock-o-Mo” and you realize that once a song in another language gets corrupted it’s hard to wind back the tape. It even happens to songs in English (look at the lyrics for most bluegrass versions of “Wildwood Flower” for an example). ---
**Author:** ![Stevo7771](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Stevo7771](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stevo7771)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2025, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/5 "2025-06-02T03:27:48Z")
I think the title of the song should be Whiskey in the Jarro, not Whiskey in the Jar, as this is how it’s sung in the lyrics and I agree that whiskey in the jar doesn’t really have much to do with the song. I googled what does Jarro mean in gaelic and it said “Pilgrim” and whiskey could mean “Water of Life”. So that would make better sense. The singer is the pilgrim and he has the water of life in him, or he still has life in him yet. The musha rein part, I googled musha and it said it could be an expression of disbelief. So that would make sense too, he’s in jail and has disbelief over his predicament, ie that Marley betrayed him and that he shot the guy and is in prison. Whack for my Daddy-o - I didn’t google it but my own idea is that he’s ended up with nothing. So, the lyrics could mean: He has disbelief over his predicament -Musha rein durum do durum da He’s ended up with nothing - Whack for my daddy o But he still has life (hope) in him yet - There’s whisky in the jarro Not saying it’s not true, but I don’t go for the idea that the chorus is just goobledly gook. Cause 3 lines is a lot of goobledly gook and the other lyrics tell the story quite well. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2025, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/6 "2025-06-02T13:05:10Z")
Everyone’s making it too complicated. Nonsense words are a common part of Irish folk music. They don’t need to mean anything. ---
**Author:** ![JoseB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/joseb/32/1530_2.png) [@JoseB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JoseB)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2025, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/7 "2025-06-03T08:22:34Z")
I must say that this surprises me a lot. “Jarro” by itself is also a Spanish word that simply means… “jar”. I checked the main Celtic languages for the word “pilgrim”, and it does not look like “jarro” at all in any of them: oilithrigh (Irish Gaelic) eilthirich / deòra Dhè (Scottish Gaelic) pererin (Welsh) pirc’hirin (Breton) pergherin (Cornish) pirgrin (Manx) Where did you find that “jarro” thing? ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2025, 10:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/8 "2025-06-03T10:05:29Z")
A lot of folk songs include a “folderoladooda” nonsense refrain at some point. ---
**Author:** ![Stevo7771](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Stevo7771](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stevo7771)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2025, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/9 "2025-06-03T11:01:43Z")
I typed in: “What does Jarro mean in Gaelic” into google and it said: Jarro was a name for a pilgrim from the Gaelic word deoradh. The deoradh kept the relics of saints. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2025, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/10 "2025-06-03T13:36:44Z")
Oh, and the “water of life” that whiskey can be a synonym for isn’t anything metaphysical like the soul. It’s just a different kind of booze, as in, a solution of mostly ethanol and water, intended to be drunk as an intoxicant. And the “jar” is a glass or clay container for holding a liquid, such as the aforementioned booze. It’s also not “whack for the daddy-o”, it’s “clap”. As in, make a sharp sound by putting your hands together. The singer and audience traditionally clap at that point. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Dr.Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Drake)\ **Post date:** [June 3, 2025, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/musha-ringum-duram-da-what-do-it-mean/364330/11 "2025-06-03T13:49:09Z")
> [@Stevo7771](#): > > I typed in: “What does Jarro mean in Gaelic” into google and it said: > > Jarro was a name for a pilgrim from the Gaelic word deoradh. The deoradh kept the relics of saints. First of all, _deòradh_ is a word in Scottish Gaelic, not in Irish. The Irish cognate is _deoraí_, which lost its -dh in a spelling reform. It means “wanderer” or “exile.” It doesn’t mean “pilgrim,” except in the expression _deoraí Dé_, which is literally “God’s wanderer.” Both come from Old Irish _déorad_, which means “exile” but can mean “pilgrim” in some contexts. Google, especially Google’s AI results, are not always accurate.