Misspelt sign in Bute welcomes visitors to 'Penis Island'

A Scottish council has been left red-faced after it has emerged that ferry passengers arriving in Bute are being welcomed to "Penis Island' thanks to a spelling error on a Gaelic sign.

The sign at the Bute ferry port has been there for six years, but the mistake has only just come to light.

See also: Funny road signs around the world

A vital piece of punctuation is missing, meaning that instead of reading: "Welcome to the beauty of the Isle of Bute", the sign says: "Welcome to the Beauty of Penis Island".

A missing accent on just one word changed "Bhòid meaning "Bute" to "Bod" - which is Gaelic for penis.

Speaking to the Scotsman, Isle of Bute independent councillor Len Scouller said: "It makes us look bloody stupid.

"I'm not a Gaelic speaker but I would apologise to people who are Gaelic speakers and we will rectify it right away.

Of course, a number of people have been joking about the, erm, cock up, on social media.

Gaelic coach for the TV series Outlander, dhamh Broin, told the Daily Record: "It's meant to be the genitive case, not the genital case.

"A genitive case is when one noun follows another and its form changes. "Bhòid is Bute but Bod is penis. You would need the accent over the "O".

"It says, 'Welcome to the doorway to the beauty of Penis Island'.

"You know when people speak Chinese the wrong way and they end up saying 'Your mother is a dog' instead of 'The rice is nice.'? It's like that."

Coinneach Combe, who took the photo, said: "I actually live in Johnstone in Renfrewshire, I just noticed it when I went across for the Highland Games.

"I'm a native Gaelic speaker and I've seen wrong spellings before but I was gobsmacked."

He added: "It's quite widespread. There's a similar problem with the Gaelic word for festival -Fèis. Without the accent it means "sex".

%VIRTUAL-TripAdvisorWidget%

Related articles

Penis-shaped road marks left by bungling council workers

Are these the world's silliest place names?