v1.0
Published 01/10/24
fastaidh vb [ˈfas̪t̪aj]
Cf. (Glengarry) [fasd(ai)] (Dieckhoff 1932). AFB˄ gives /fasdi/, perhaps on the analogy of the independent future ending of regular verbs, e.g. fàgaidh [ˈfaːɡ̊i] /fɑːɡi/ ‘will leave’.
‘to hire, engage; to bind, secure, make fast, tie’ (Dwelly 1911) and its verbal noun fastadh m. [ˈfas̪t̪aɣ]
Cf. (Glengarry) [fasdaG] (Dieckhoff 1932), (Barra) [fɑstɑɣ] (Borgstrøm 1937, 97). AFB˄ gives /fasdəɣ/, perhaps on the analogy of the common verbal noun ending also spelt -adh, e.g. pòsadh [ˈpʰɔːs̪əɣ] /pɔːsəɣ/ ‘marrying’.
‘hiring, binding, as a servant, for a stated term; stoppage, seizure’
For fastadh in the sense ‘mooring line’, s.v. feist.
(ibid.) are sometimes spelt with medial -sd-. While current Scottish Gaelic spelling conventions recommend using -st-, both -sd- and -st- represent [s̪t̪] /sd/.
Craigie (1894, 158: fasdaidh) derives SG fastaidh ‘to attach, fasten, secure’ from ON festa vb ‘to make fast; to hang up; to fix in the memory; to betroth; to stipulate to undertake something’ (NO); so also de Vries (1962). However, as Marstrander (1915a, 123) points out, the form fastaidh goes back to EG astaiġiḋ (which in turn goes back to OG ‧astai, the prototonic form of the compound verb ad‧suiḋi ‘stops, holds back, detains, hinders; fixes, makes permanent or legal, binds, establishes’), hence EG fastaiġiḋ with prothetic f- (eDIL˄), represented in Scottish Gaelic by fastaidh and in Irish by fastuighim (or fostuighim, with a ~ o alternation). Meanwhile, the Early Gaelic verbal noun (f)astóḋ ‘holding back, detaining; retaining, keeping (in service); engaging, hiring’ yields SG fastadh and Ir. fostódh (fostú).
So also MacLennan (1925). McDonald (2009, 352) considers the question uncertain: ‘[i]f a loan then a loan in meaning accommodated by an existing similar Gaelic word’.
On the analogy of other verbal forms, SG fastaidh yields fastaich and fast (AFB˄).
MacBain (1911: fasdadh) links fastadh to SG foisteadh ‘wages, hire’, and the latter to EG foss ‘servant’, a native word cognate with W gwas ‘boy’. However, SG foisteadh is from Shaw 1780 and/or HSS 1828, where it is adopted from Ir. foisteadh (via Lhuyd 1707: ‘hire, hiring’, and/or O’Brien 1768: ‘hire, hiring, wages’), a variant of fostódh.