From my experience of it, no!

It varies quite a bit though for some reason, for instance:

The foirm tháite can be accepted so:

Thugas instead of Thug mé (Caighdeán), I really don't get why the caighdeán has a foirm tháite rule for some tenses and then a forim sgartha rule for others!

and inniuimh/ inniuibh instead of inniu

but:

I kept getting corrected for writing Gaoluinn, untill I just decided to write Gaoluinn/Gaeilge.

I wouldn't think that Tá dhá bhoin a(i)ges na Fearaibh wouldn't be accepted.

Though we were never corrected for some reason for writing "dosna", putting in the "s" staireamhail, even though the "s" staireamhail here isn't historically accurate. So in that case I can't see why "a(i)gesna" wouldn't be. But then again how many teachers from outside Munster would have heard "aigesna", yet again how many teachers within Munster would have heard "aigesna" either- very few I would think. Never mind "Fearaibh" the tuiseal tabharthach iolra "fearaibh". Which is sometimes even used as the nominative plural in Kerry and as the Accusitive plural in Connacht and I've heard it in a recital of a Déise poem that Mick sent me as a the Accusitve as well. Also, Kerry uses "A Charu/aid" instead of "A chara" for the Accusitive- I remember hearing that in the pub. Just jumped off point a bit. Though I would love to have a system where all dialectal forms are allowed, the problem with Irish is there is so much regional variation it would be difficult for teachers to correct mistakes. Still if we impliment one of the original dialects as a standard that will still not stop the decline in dialectal diversity. You'll just replace the standard with a different standard- though a real stndard would probably be better than a fake one.



I suppose, maybe its the same reason they choose "conas 'tá tú" (as it was said in Leinster), maybe to keep remanants of the dead dialects or sub-dialects alive. The Caighdeán sometimes shows a bias towards historical features that are archaic in the dialects but ignores, to a certain degree, historical features that are still alive, or just about, in modern dialects. Maybe, they thought that these features, that are dying out now (because of the standardisation of Gaeltacht Irish and the halt in the passing on of the language) would continue to be part of Gaeltacht Irish.

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Because it hasn't been created in a clever way



Why not "Gaelainn"? which is closer to "Gaeilge" and "Gael" etc

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

I think this may partly have to do with how much the synthetic forms remain in other dialects.

I think Connemara writers like Pádraic Ó Connaire, etc., used a mixture or subset of synthetic forms, including -as but not -ais.

In more recent colloquial Connemara Irish you have an even further reduced set, and some forms like -fad are only used in answering questions.

So if a Connemara dialect was chosen as a standard, then a similar situation to the present standard would exist in that there would be a mixture of synthetic and independent forms but at least the remaining forms would be real, not artificial, and where to "draw the line" might be somewhat easier to pin down and explain?


FGB has Gaolainn pointing to Gaeilge. Under Gaeilge, it lists Gaedhealg, Gaedhilg(e), Gaedhealaing, and Gaeilic as variations.

Scooby, if these are in FGB, are the others officially acceptable? or only Gaeilge?

(@An Cionnfhaolach - Since Gaoluinn with a u is in Dinneen (under Gaedhealg), but not FGB, I'd consider it old spelling, but then it is interesting that FGB does give Gaedhealg, Gaedhilg(e), Gaedhealaing, and Gaeilic. Perhaps if you'd used one of those spellings, there might have been a case against the correction?)

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Múinteoir Gaeilge - Irish Teacher
My "specialty" is Connemara Irish, particularly Cois Fhairrge dialect, but I can also speak Ulster and Munster Irish with native-level pronunciation.
Is fearr Gaeilge ḃriste ná Béarla cliste, cinnte, aċ i ḃfad níos fearr aríst í Gaeilge ḃinn ḃeo na nGaeltaċtaí.
Gaeilge Chonnacht (GC), go háraid Gaeilge Chois Fhairrge (GCF), Gaeilic Uladh (GU), Gaelainn na Mumhan (GM), agus Gaeilge an Chaighdeáin Oifigiúil (CO).

Cha rabh cuimhne agam go rabh "Gaeilic" le faghbháilt i bhfoclóir Uí Dhomhnaill!

Cha dtuigim cad chuighe a bhfuil "Gaedhealaing" ann agus mar sin, cad chuighe a sgríobhann muinntir na Mumhan "Gaolainn/Gaoluinn" seachas "Gaelainn"...

Gidh go bhfuil Gaedhealg le faghbháilt ins an fhoclóir, chan dóigh liom go n-abrann duine ar bith inniu é. Is í sean-fhoirm na Gaedhilge Clasaicighe atá ann, an bhunfhoirm ainmneach. Is é Gaedhilg an tuiseal tabharthach agus is é Gaedhilge an ginideach.

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

It is my view that if it's in FGB it's acceptable. That's what I was taught in college (although I was told I was wrong to write Sacsanaigh by a part-time tutor). In the end, I have a degree in Irish and did my teacher training. Most of what teachers believe is acceptable comes from what they learned in college, and in grammar/translation classes the focus was always on standard Irish. Nicholas Williams (translator of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) taught me most of my grammar and he was always of the opinion that if it's in FGB then it's acceptable.

So, what I'm saying really is that as a teacher (and former student) the focus has always been on standard Irish - but what exactly is acceptable as standard is not so clear and I never remember ever being given guidelines by An Roinn Éadóchais about this. Different teachers may have different interpretations. There may even be a case for recognising non-standard Irish - but as it stands, that does not happen.

Words like Gaoluinn make me wonder about the whole issue. Is this an individual interpretation of the sound of the word? Perhaps a lot of people spell it this way in one area - perhaps only a few. Perhaps it's a misspelling (if that's possible in the 'non-standard world!). How many different ways of spelling a word should be acceptable? Should there be a 'free for all' with regard to spelling. Isn't there a need for a written standard just like in English? I believe so, but I don't believe we'll ever have one that pleases everybody.

but the variants you can find in FGB have been chosen at random, why do they give some variants and not others?
In my experience, in Coleraine University we weren't allowed to use the variants, for example we couldn't use "Gaeilic" or "Gaedhilg" but only "Gaeilge" all the time (in writing).



ok, but now, why only what is in FGB is acceptable? Gaeltacht people use other things that aren't in FGB, why isn't it accepted? Sin an fhadhb.



I don't think so, to me, scholars should find and publish what is the correct way to spell all the words that exist in the Irish dialects, and that should be also taught in the Gaeltacht areas so that native speakers area are able to write what they say -- which they aren't always able to do nowadays, since they are taught standard Irish at school, so they have to make a spelling up whenever they want to write a word that isn't "standard", because nobody tells them.
Concerning Gaolainn, the -ao- part may be right since one old spelling was Gaoidhealg, but in my opinion, it would be better to write "Gaelainn" with -ae- because Gael, Gaelach, Gaeilge etc are written with -ae-. For the ending, I think it's better to write "-ainn" rather than "-uinn" because in the modern spellings the ending "-ainn" is the most common.



of course ; to me, a standard is needed but only in certain cases, in stuff that is meant to be learnt by all Irish citizens. In schools, I think there should be 3 standards as before 1950, so that pupils (in the Gaeltacht) learn a kind of Irish that isn't completely different from what they hear and say. If you only teach standard Irish everywhere, native speakers will stop transmitting Irish because they'll think standard Irish is better or at least, more useful, and then Irish will become like Latin, ie. a language that is only learnt from school and with no (traditional) native speaker left...

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

I have to say that I agree with Lughaidh that limiting acceptable usage in standard Irish to what's in FGB is not good enough. This dictionary was never meant to encompass everything in the language, even at the time it was written. So, that's a contradiction to what I said earlier, but FGB still remains a useful (and official) tool despite its limitations.

www.focal.ie is a newer tool to complement this, but it has inaccuracies and inconsistencies so I don't trust it yet.

Yeah, that makes sense!



I spell it with the "u" rather than the "a" because I feel the "u" is the vowel that best represents my pronunciation of it. It is also how many speakers in Ring spell it. I wasn't trying to be archaic with it at all! For instance if I were to spell Siamsaíocht, I would prefer to spell it as siamsuidheacht rather than "siamsaidheacht". Both spellings were in existance and the same time roughly and both are correct. It just shows that there are two ways to represent the broad ee sound in Irish. As uidh/ uí as in suidhe or suí and saí/ saoi. However, I wouldn't have a problem spelling it Gaelainn or siamsaidheacht. I wouldn't mind spelling "Gaol" as "Gael" either, as I can see how people could confuse it with "Gaol" relative. Though Gaodhalu/ainn/ Gaoidhealu/ainn/ Gaedhealaing etc... are all legitimate ways of spelling "Gaelainn". Peadar Ua Laoghaire spelled it Gaelainn, but Cork scribes before him had a bias towards the "u" instead of the "a"- "a charuid" instead of "a charaid/ a chara" etc... Many of them favoured the "a" (such as Gáidhlig) instead of the réamhfhocal "i" as well ach do tháinig an "i" slán, is dócha gur tharlaidh an rud céadna le aidheacht/ uidheacht and ainn/ uinn. But like I said I spelled it "uinn" even before I realised this and its how native speakers spell it locally. I don't mind having to write Gaeilge/ Gaoluinn, once I'm not restricted to just Gaeilge.

Irish is a very phonetic language, it has it anomalies though, but these anomalies also have a pattern.



Cia ná deirtear Gaedhealg a thuilleadh, fós foghruighthear Gaelainn mar "Gaedhealaing" i Rinn Ó gCuanach agus i gCorcadha- ina ndeirtear an "n dúbailte caol "ainn" mar "ing an Bhéarla" (ní dóigh'l go ndeirtear é mar ing i gCiarraidhe). Mar sin, deirtear "in Éirinn" mar "in Éiring" srl...

Crossed with Scooby!

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actually, unstressed -ai-, -ui- and -oi- are all pronounced the same way (and have for centuries, because it was already this way in Classical Irish), ie. /i/ while the u, o or a are only there to show that the preceding consonant is broad. But in the modern spelling they chose to use mainly -ai- as a convention.



There are 2 mysteries there:

- why has old "aoi" become /e:/ in all dialects only in the words Gaoidheal (Gael), Gaoidhealach (Gaelach), Gaoidhealg (Gaeilge) etc? Even in Ulster and Connachta, where aoi is always /i:/ in other words... They should have been /giː(ə)l/, /giːlaχ/ and /giː(ə)lg/

- where does the -ainn/-uinn come from, in the Munster form Gaelainn/Gaoluinn etc? How can -ilg (Gaedhilg) become -lainn?

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne