Long story short: I'm writing an urban fantasy story, it has leprechauns in it, and they're the financial powerhouses of the secret magical world. Several powerful leprechaun families jointly run the bank that nearly all American magical creatures use, they help coordinate the sale of goods and services that the mundane world isn't supposed to know exist, and they are an aggressively neutral power amidst a bunch of clans squabbling for territory. They don't try to influence the surrounding political landscape (much), but they do not take kindly to being stolen from, and they have a payroll of supernatural hired guns ready to reclaim what is rightfully theirs the second the need should arise. I was wondering a bit about what this group of hired guns should be called, and then a random thought occurred to me: "Why don't you just Google what "Loss Prevention" is in Irish? Wouldn't it be hilarious if that sounded cool?" ...And... apparently... it kinda does. Google told me that the Irish translation of "Loss Prevention" is "Cosc Caillteanas", pronounced "Cosk Caltinous". Now, if that's true, that actually sounds pretty cool to my American ears (the alliteration especially is really nice), but I also know the minefield of perils that come from relying on Google translate, so I wanted to check with someone who knows better than I do. I could be mispronouncing it, or I could be using the wrong definitions of "loss" and "prevention" simultaneously, or any number of things that would make using this term utterly ignorant and laughable, so I'd better ask about it here before I get too excited.
Bing translator gives me "cosc ar chaillteanas." DeepL translator, which I trust more than Google and Bing combined, doesn't do Irish or Gaelic.
That does sound cool! It's likely they have a different phrase than a literal translation of "loss prevention," though. Like how "asshole" in Spanish refers to a anatomical anus and not a person who's a jerk, but screw it. Especially if the leprechauns rejoice in screwing over Americans, they might co-op the American "loss prevention" as a subtle screw-you, of which, ignorant Americans won't get the irony.
Yeah, Irish seems to be unavailable for a lot of translation services, unfortunately. I tried what you did, and while you are correct when you translate English to Irish, strangely "Cosc Caillteanas" did in fact still get translated into English as "Loss Prevention" anyway when I tried Irish to English.
To anyone familiar with the language though it might be one of those really awkward phrases like 'The meat wishes it so" in place of 'The flesh is willing."
I'm Irish enough for a passport and nothing else, but I'll point out that if this post is the first result on a Google search for the phrase, and after that you just get pages that happen to have both words in there separately, it's probably not the phrase you're looking for.
I have to wonder if "loss prevention" is really the appropriate term for a group of hired guns. I have far more Scots ancestry than Irish, but somewhere in the back of my brain I hear the notion rattling around that in Irish history there must have been -- at some time or other -- a group of "enforcers" of some kind and, if I'm right, that's the name you're looking for. For example, Wikipedia has an article on the Irish Mafia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Mob Unfortunately, the article doesn't offer much in the way of names for "enforcers."
Echoing what was just posted, 'Loss Prevention' is sort of a weird phrase even in English. Do Brits use it? It honestly sounds like some new term PC culture influenced. I don't think I ever heard it prior to maybe the mid-90s.
It seems to be the term these days for security. Not used by normal people, but it does seem to be the technical term used in the biz. I saw a video once on YouTube about loss prevention at a target store. It was security cam footage of people shoplifting and getting caught by security.
Sounds good to me but haven’t had much to do with Irish since leaving school. There’s a department in the Justice Ministry called Cosc that addresses domestic violence so it’s an accepted term in the context. Caillteanas to my untrained ear would be pronounced keyowltenass but said quickly. Loving the idea of badass leprechauns, but history tells us they’re usually depicted very badly.
loss prevention is usually a management term in retail meaning the procedures to prevent or at least reduce shop lifting, accidental breakage, pilferage by staff and like that... that said i could see it as cover phrase for a bunch of hired guns, in the same way that the assassin in my later Dusty Miller books works for the Office of Risk Assessment and Strategic Protocol...
Yeah, that's the idea. Their main job is to deal with and prevent the theft of company assets, so it's sort of a euphemism/in-joke.
