The Goddess Ataecina and the Name of Night in Old Ireland

In the last few years, the number of known inscriptions devoted to the Hispanic goddess Ataecina has greatly increased due to new findings. They have provided us with some new variations of her name, which can serve as the basis for a reconsideration of the etymologies so far proposed for it. A connection with Old Irish adaig 'night' has sometimes been advocated, which after analyzing all the evidence now available proves to be right. Nevertheless, the etymology of that Irish word was itself in need of revision. Both seem to have been built on *adak-, analyzable as the prefix ad- followed by the IE root *ak-. We would thus have here an innovation common to a Hispano-Celtic dialect & Goidelic languages. 69 References. Adapted from the source document