No Donnybrooks during the holidays, please

We had 12 out of town guests. Ten cousins who don’t see each other very often. A six pack of (the aptly named) In-Law Invasion Ale. Four pies. Three of my children, in various stages of launching, who came home for the holiday. One 16 pound turkey, and one fruit turkey. (I’ll explain later.) But NO Donnybrooks, thank goodness.

Wait? You don’t know what a Donnybrook is? Well, neither did I, until my word nerd friend asked me, in light of the holiday chaos at my house,

Make it through Thanksgiving without any Donnybrooks?

Donnybrook is a fun word, isn’t it? Well, its etymology is too.

Donnybrook is often capitalized (even when not appearing at the beginning of a sentence.) It means a dispute, usually occurring in public, or an all out brawl. Donnybrook is actually a city near Dublin, Ireland that hosted an annual fair known for its many brawls. Things got so bad that the event was cancelled in 1855, but by then the use of the word Donnybrook to describe a ruckus had already been firmly planted in the vernacular. See this quote from the mid 19th century:

Some received severe blows from persons who wielded their sticks with such agility as to do no disgrace to a Donnybrook fair.
—Commercial Advertiser [New York], 19 Oct. 1843

So there you have it! Over the Thanksgiving holiday, our family, all 19 of us, played lots of games (Code Names and Poetry for Neanderthals were favorites), shared lots of laughs and a few pitchers of sangria, but we did not have any Donnybrooks.

And back to that fruit turkey… It was what it sounds like: