Updated! I should have the story file updated tomorrow!


Good catch! A 'nín ó is also correct, but for a very important reason which I've added
to the notes.


You're absolutely right, dative singular.


I wanted to convey how De réir has the basic meaning of in accordance with. I've left my sentence as a literal
translation and yours as a natural one.


Since timcheall is in the story, but timpeall is more common today, I've timcheall as a classical spelling.


I've corrected this, but added a note on ortha to Cuid a ceathair.

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The dialect I use is Cork Irish.
Ar sgáth a chéile a mhairid na daoine, lag agus láidir, uasal is íseal

Absolutely! Thanks very much!

_________________
The dialect I use is Cork Irish.
Ar sgáth a chéile a mhairid na daoine, lag agus láidir, uasal is íseal

, great!

Pg. 2

(g) Its my understanding that the older subjunctive termination "aidh" is still used in Munster Irish,

go dtagaidh do ríoghacht/ ríocht

Although, in quick speech, the "aidh" ending may be báidhte (I don't know the technical term in English), just like when the verb is used with the foirm sgartha:

Chuai' me and raghai' me (the "e" in mé/me is not emphasised)

not Chuaidh/ Chuaigh mé and Raghaidh mé.

It interesting to see the conditions that brought about change in Old-, Middle- and Classical Irish are still at play in modern and "post-modern" Irish i.e trying to say things as quickly as possible makes words and sounds clash together creating séimhithe, uruithe and bádhaithe/ bádhtha.

(h) Subjunctive past/ Imperfect subjunctive (used after the conjunct particle "dá"), is identical to the habitual past except in the second person singular, where its:

dá nglanthá or dá mbeirtheá

This may have led to a confusion in Ring Irish where the Conditional, second person singular is "thá".

An bhféadthá Could you srl...

pg 3

7. Verbal noun, I think you should mention it introduces the genitive and lenites the following noun in Munster and Old Irish (or are you mentioning that later?) i.e ag priocadh/ baint phrátaí, ag baint fhéir. Also, Rith is spelled as "ruith" in Ring and in the phonetical spelling of Seanachas Amlaoibh í Luínse. The "ith" in ruith is pronounced as a guttural sound in Ring, almost like a "ch" as ruch.

This is because the genitive of "ruith/ rith" is "reatha" and anywhere there is leathnú in the genetive, the nominative noun's "th" produces a guttural sound. Another example is Luath early , genitive luaithe, pronunciation of luath is "luach", likewise doth early, genitive doithe, pronounced as "doch". The "th" genitives luaithe and doithe etc... are pronounced as the "ch" in the genitive "cloiche".

I'll work away at it see if there is anything I can help with

_________________

Please wait for corrections/ more input from other forum members before acting on advice

Oops, I think you missed a space, Lon Dubh – On page 17, in the Cíoram section: … In this case Cíoram é [space] Let's card it.

I've just gone through the notes for Cuid a seacht and found a few typos:

*page 22:
In the Le cíoradh section: … This structure of: Le + verbal noun [there should be a space here after the word "noun", there's no need to start a new line here.

An áit 'n-a raibh an bhean abhrais The place in which the spinning woman was [I think bean abhrais translates better as " a spinning woman" because she doesn't do any sewing, right?

A little further down in the same paragraph: This being the past tense, [comma] you might expect the ar form, but remember dependent forms like raibh …

At the bottom o' the page: Do shás an leitir suas im' mhuinichle

*page 23: The dual is more rarely heard; there would be few speakers … [I would recommend a semicolon instead of a comma on this one]

** One quick question:
Thiomáin sé leis i dtreo an Daingin. He pressed on in the direction of Dingle
Does leis mean "with it" in this sentence or does Thiomáin sé leis i dtreo an Daingin mean the same thing as Thiomáin sé i dtreo an Daingin?

That's all for to-day. I'll start on Cuid a hocht to-morrow or the next day.

p.s. Oh, I almost forgot to mention this:
I noticed that you decided to use "The Official Wee Falorie Man Dialect" on page 21 for: There's not a bit of (something). – Very cool!

Thanks for your input A Chionnfhaolaigh! You're a wealth of information!


I usually hear just -a, or -(a)í for second conjugation verbs. Of course I've heard "subjunctive + noun" very rarely
(in fact except for asking a few people directly I haven't heard it at all). Diarmuid Ó Sé says that it's just -a now in
Corca Dhuibhne, however I really couldn't say for definite what somebody would say in Cork. Have you heard -aidh yourself?


Elided is the English equivalent, I think. In Irish you can also say téann an foirceann "aidh" ar ceal.


Just so I understand, in Ring do you have:

Do glantá - Habitual past - you used to clean
Dá nglanthá - Past subjunctive - If you were to clean

In Cork the past subjunctive and the past habitual are only different for the verb bí.


Do scríobh an Criomhthanach -thá ins an módh coinníollach uaireanta leis.


Very interesting! I will definitely say something about lenition, the only problem is that the lenition now only occurs in stock phrases.
For example:
ag crú bha (bhó for more conservative speakers)
ag briseadh chloch
ag baint mhóna

But,
ag tabhairt solais
ag cur suime
ag déanamh buartha

Basically it's only in common phrases where the action and noun are almost thought of as a single action that the
noun gets lenited by a single action, I roughly mean:

ag baint mhóna Turfing.

So, there's quite a lot of variation here. I'm not sure what to write, any suggestions? Is it more regular in An Rinn, i.e. you just lenite regardless.


I first noticed this feature in a recording you made a while ago.

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The dialect I use is Cork Irish.
Ar sgáth a chéile a mhairid na daoine, lag agus láidir, uasal is íseal

a few changes for Cuid a hocht:

page 24, toward the bottom:
For example, [comma] Is dóigh liom is very common …
These types of sentences are emphasised …

page 25:
Ina bheartaibh In bundles. [should this be ina beartaibh, without the séimhiú?]

An rud a dubhradh The thing which has been spoken of/mentioned before. [italics]

Sin a bhfuil agam.

p.s. I'll be starting on Cuid a naoi on Sunday, I hope.

, nowhere near as much as yourself



Could you give an example subjunctive + noun?

I have heard it to a certain degree, especially in the Ring version of the prayer “Ár nAthair athá ar neamh”, it fluctuates between “go dtagaidh” and “go dtaga”. Unfortunately, this tense is so uncommon that you very rarely hear it except during prayers so it’s difficult to be 100% certain or draw any definitive conclusions. I had a look at Seana-Chaint na nDéise II and found:

Pg. 422, text 7; “Go ndéanai’ Dia grásta is trócaire eirthi”

Pg. 427, text 12; “Go bhfóiri’ Dia ar do chloigean”

The use of ’ indicates the missing foirceann “dh”, that can be elided often in rapid speech. The use of an apostrophe to illustrate eliding is used throughout e.g. tháini’ etc... Though, the presence of the apostrophe also indicates that the “dh” may also have been pronounced as well, as tháinig is written as tháinig when it is not proceeded by a pronoun. The apostrophe is not present at all in the following phrase:

pg 418, text 5; “Go maraí ‘n Riach thú”,

probably due to the fact that the termination “aí” was pronounced as “aí” always , the lack of the apostrophe here, in my opinion, only supports the notion that the céad réimniú ending was pronounced as /ig’/ sometimes, as it doesn't make sense to use an apostrophe unless eliding is occurring.

As regards Cork Irish, I have a Cork version of the same prayer (or what I presume to be a Cork version, its definitely Munster Irish, maybe you can verify) that we were given as part of our Léamh agus litriú class (where we studied the basics of manuscript reading, editing and history; the old script and nodanna; a touch of IPA; Cumann Um Leitiriú Shimplí and the Caighdeán). Unfortunately, I am not sure when it was taken down, definitely pre-50s I’d say, due to the older Spelling. Unfortunately, we were just using it to get a grip on the seana-litriughadh and the IPA not to discuss its grammatical content.

“Ár nAthair atá ar neamh go naomhuighthear t’ainm, go dtagaidh do ríoghdhacht, go ndéintear do thoil ar an dtalamh mar a déintear ar neamh. Ár n-arán laetheamhail túir dúinn aniogh, agus maith dhúinn ár gcionta mar a mhaithimíd do chách a chiontuigheann in ár n-aghaidh, ná léig sinn i gcathaíbh ach saor sinn ón olc. Amen

The IPA rendering of go dtagaidh is /gə dɑgig’/

What led me to believe that it was a Cork version is the leniting of “t” in naomhuighthear*; a very strong Cork trait. That and I think your man said it was from Cork.

*that said I found this in Seana-Chaint na nDéise ll:

pg. 419, text 5; “go mbeannaío*thar doit a Mháire”

Here we can see the leniting of "t" in this tense.

But I know it’s not a Ring version due to the use of “atá” and the use of túir for tabhair. Tabhair is much closer to the standardised spelling, pronounced similar to the “abhair” in “leabhair”.

On a side note (from naomh:

* also, wasn’t that what you were on about earlier, when you PMed me. I think you were saying that Munster Irish tries to make the foirceann of this tense, in the Céasta, broad, even if it should be slender? I also found:

pg.422, text 8, Agus sa sgioból a thórraítaí gach éinne ar an am san”

and in Seana-chaint na nDéise I, pg.137, (6):

“In the present passive the ending is usually –tar, not –tear, the t being broad no matter what precedes. So, also, in the imperfect the t is broad: bhuailtaoi, not bhuailtí.”

Also, Seana-chaint na nDéise I, pg.137, (9):

“The f of the future and conditional passive is always pronounced, and is always broad, thus thuicfaidhe, not tuicfidhe. Thus, it will be observed that in the Déise the tendency is to make letters slender in the active and broad in the passive.“

I typed go dtagaidh into Google and came up with http://dho.ie/doegen/LA_1078d2 , Eascaine Mhuireann na nAmhrán a recording of Mícheál Ó Laoghaire of Co. Cork, recorded in 1928. I cannot fully make out how he, himself pronounces it. I hear it differently each time. Mícheál tends to get lazy towards the end of his pieces and doesn’t really bother . Interestingly, I think the speaker says /niv’/ here for nimh, /ni:/ being the more common pronunciation of it in Cork now I believe.



GRMA



Yep, but in the case of the past subjunctive, the conditional is far more common now at least, and has been for quite awhile*1, after the particle “dá”*2; as it is with most dialects. Both the normal fá/ófá endings are in use in the conditional, but certainly, at least in the time of Maidhc Dháith and the older generation, the “thá/óthá” terminations were certainly more popular (see: Leabhar Mhaidhc Dháith, pg 89- “Chuirtheá, Dhéanthá, Thosnóthá” etc... and also see footnote 4 on the same page. Nowadays however, “fá and ófá” are the prefered endings amongst younger speakers for the conditional; this is due to the influence of school Irish.

*1 Seana-Chaint na nDéise makes no mention, by name, of the past subjunctive after “dá”- “the conditional is used in both clauses” (Seana-Chaint na nDéise, pg 133 (3))

*2 The particle “dá” used to be, until very modern times, pronounced as ghá/dhá or more communally as ‘á. Maidhc Dháith pronounced “dá” as “á” most of the time “á mbaintheá” (pg 119) etc (pg.177). Funny enough “má” can be used with the conditional sometimes (see Seana-Chaint na nDéise, “dá” pg 133 (3); “má” pg 132 (2) )

I believe, when the past subjunctive collapsed, the 2nd person singular termination got assimilated into the conditional second person singular, to be used alongside the usual conditional 2nd p. sing. It is not really surprising this occurred as the past habitual, conditional and past subjunctive endings are all very similar; added to this is the fact the conditional was adopted to be used after “dá”. Eventually “thá” would have transgressed into the conditional. Certain features from collapsed tenses and cases have been adopted into other cases and tenses, sometimes wiping out the original base form completely. Irish/ Gaelic is well accustomed to this.

As you know yourself, many nouns in the dative singular have been adopted as the nominative singular, especially in other dialects i.e guala>gualainn; aos>aois; muinntear>muin(n)tir; aimsear>aimsir srl... Munster seems to be the only dialect that has kept strong ties with the dative.

Sometimes it occurred with the genitive (old.Ir) adaig (gen. aidche)> aidche>oidhche>oíche. The collapse of the foshuiteach chaite of Old Irish had a similar effect in shaping the language and many of the irregularities we know today:

Old Irish: Co n*-accae (he saw), ad-condairc*2 (he had seen);

Collapse of the preterite perfect,

ad-condairc Chonaic sé (he saw), Ní*3 accae Ní f(h)eaca*4 (he didn’t see)

Similarly, do- Luid (he went), do*5-cóid/do-cuaid*6 (He had gone)

Collapse of preterite perfect forms leads to their substituting into the simple past, subsequently bring about the loss of the old simple past forms (do-lod, do-Luid etc..).

*From ad-cí (to see). This is a special case as the conjuncion “co n-“ (so that) carries no meaning here and is only used to create a briathar spléach in the form of “accae”, this is done for no apparent reason. Accae (3rd person singular, acca 1st and 2nd person singular is from which “feaca” is derived.

*2 Ad-condairc, modern day Chonaic, this has a different root than ad-cí. That of darc, meaning the eye or the area encompassing the eye (the indent) (see Dineen pg. 318, under dearc (both meanings are relevant), its also where the word “dearcadh” and “do dhearcas” comes from). The 1st person and 2nd person singular of ad-condairc is ad-condarc. This is possibly why the synthetic form “Chonac” is considered to be the more “correct” past synthetic form in comparison to Chonacas in the 1st person singular past tense. The “s” terminations were also common markers of past tense verbs in Old Irish. Ad-condairc may be made up of the ad- (from ad-cí) and the conjunction co- ndairc, ad-co ndairc (see co n-accae).

*3 Ní/ Nícon (modern “cha”) are the typical negative particle for the Old Irish past tense. Níor is made up of Ní + ro (Níro>Níor) (known as ro na foirfeachta/ ro of the past perfect- though a lot of the time ro may be dropped from the verb when preceded by “Ní”) that precede verbs in the past perfect. The collapse of the past perfect created confusion and the mír ro managed to remain and be used with the negative particle. The use of “Ní” with verbs in the past tense, a lot of the briathra neamhrialta, may be down to the fact that these verbs did not contain the particle ro- in their past preterite tense in Old Irish.

*4 fheaca, the replacement of co n-accae with ad-condairc for the simple past meant that accae was only used with the negative particle Ní (which inflects lenition later on in Irish) or Nícon (which inflected even during the Old Irish period). This may have led to the creation of a false “f” in f(e)aca. That said false “fs” are common developments in Irish, sometimes actual “fs” were lost and other times “fs” were forced upon words that never had them, such as ása (fás). Even today, the use or the non-use of “fs”, in the beginning of words, are indicators of dialectal difference i.e. foscailt (Ulster/ Scottish Gaelic)/oscailt; faill (Déise)/ aill; fiolar (Munster)/ iolar etc...

*5 the particle “do”, is that of “do” in modern Irish preceding the simple past, past habitual and conditional tense, causing lenition later on in Irish. And also, as you’ve pointed out to me the “do/ a” in other tenses such as a/d(h)’fháilt or a/do dhéanamh/dhéanadh etc...

*6 modern day Chuaidh/ Chuaigh.



Interesting, has the conditional overtaken the past subjunctive after “dá” as well in Kerry, do you know?



In old Irish, lenition after the verbal noun was very common “the initial consonant of a noun immediately following the dative singular of a verbal noun is lenited-

oc marbad Chonairi” (Quin E.G., Old Irish Workbook, pg. 49)

With this statement in mind, combined with the examples I read in Maidhc Dháith e.g.
From the Cúlra section, I presume written by Máirtín Verling (himself from Waterford), where traits of Déise Irish are found e.g Dh’fhan, maighistir etc.. nearly all the nouns following the verbal noun are lenited where applicable e.g.

“Ag aoidhreacht bhó” (pg. 44)
“ag ceangal Choirce dó” (pg. 47) –

(Does Verling know something I don’t?)

And from pieces of Maidhc himself:

“Ag baint phrátaí”

All this led me to believe the misconception that all nouns are lenited after the verbal noun when the noun itself is not preceded by the article, where applicable i.e. nouns beginning with b, c ,f, g, p. I wasn't sure about s, t or d

It is difficult to say “ag cur shuime” (suim pronounced like the “Sim” in the first name Simon in English), not so difficult to say “ag cur shneachtaidh” though.

However, after a good look at various sources, Seana-Chaint na nDéise I and II, Leabhair Mhaidhc Dháith and Cín Lae Amhlaoibh Uí Shuilleabháin and with specifically searching for lenition proceeding the verbal noun in mind, I discovered, as you have pointed out that its usage is highly irregular as if, as you said, only used when it is as if the phrase used is all one word or one meaning or not even then.

“Ag baint phrátaí*” (pg. 103) was the only example I could find of lenition after the verbal noun as said by Maidhc Dháith (it happened to be the first example in the book).

“Ag baint phrátaí fadó” (pg. 422, text 8) was also the only example I could find of lenition (in any other source (SC na nD II, see below) and again it was tied to the sense of picking potatoes.

Other examples from Maidhc Dháith (himself) include:

“Ag baint trioscar” (pg. 128)
“Ag crú bó/ ba” (pg. 134 ,137)
“Ag marú Muc” (pg. 149)

Seana-Chaint na nDéise II:

“Ag tabhairt Cúraim” (pg. 153)
“Ag tabhairt géille dho thaidhríonta” (pg. 418, text 5)
“Ag baint phrátaí fadó” (pg. 422, text 8)

Cín Lae Amhlaoibh (Tomás de Bhaldraithe do chuir i n-eagar)

“Do chuaigh ag fiosrú séimhshíne” (pg.4)
“Ag nochtah muinéal chomh geal le heala ar linn” (pg.6)
“Ag bothán balla fidín eile” (pg. 9)
“Ag suaitheadh móna” X2 (pg.11)
Ag tosach fearainn Mhic Chormaic ag an gCuailleach” (pg.12)
Capaill nú eich ag treabhadh branair samhraidh” (pg. 34)

No example of lenition found after verbal noun in CLA.

A look in Seana-Chaint na nDéise I under verbal nouns pg. 168-170

It does not mention anything about lenition after the verbal noun, although one could deduce from the examples given that lenition wasn't that common. It did mention something interesting about the use of the genitive proceeding the verbal noun:

Verbal noun pg. 170 (16) and the adjective pg. 171 (3):

Adjectives (3) “The tendency of Irish at present seems to be to regard all phrases as indivisible, thus, while we say (in the Déise) “ag déanadh na hoibre”, we say on the other hand “ag déanadh obair mhaith”, the explanation being that obair mhaith is regarded as one thing, as a phrase, and therefore, as having no inflections...”

(16) [“On the principle stated (above)- see adjectives (3)- a phrase following a verbal noun will be treated as a unit. Thus although a verbal noun is usually followed by the genitive, the genitive does not appear (a) if the noun be joined to an adj. , as ag treabhadh páirc bhocht (not páirce), (b) if the noun be followed by a gen. of its own, as ag déanadh cruach féir, (c) if preceded by gach aon, as ag gearradh gach aon ghéug, (d) if connected with another noun by a preposition, as geurughadh sgian liom-sa, “sharpening a knife a knife belonging to me.” So, too, in many other cases. In fact, it may be stated as a general rule that the genitive is used only when the noun stands alone after the verbal, unconnected with any word except its own article.-O’C.]

Seemingly, viewing the adjective and the noun as a separate phrase proceeding the verbal noun and thus the noun being placed in the nominative, has been common practice since the time of Amhlaoibh Ó Suilleabháin (see (iv) below, under Modh Eagarthóireachta):

Modh Eagarthóireachta, 5. An Díochlaonadh (pg. 121)

“Is léir go raibh eolas agus meas ag an údar (Amhlaoibh) ar cheart na gramadaí traidisiúnta, agus fonn air í a leanúint, go háirthe nuair a chuireadh sé de stróbh air féin giota “liteartha” a scríobh. Tá neart samplaí de cheartfhoirmeacha infhillte le fail sa téacsa e.g inín scolóige saibhre; leite mine coirce...ag iarraidh aráin mhacánta; leath cinn muice moiré....Ach ba mhinic nár leanadh don ghramadach “cheart.” Is é is dóiche go léíríonn an ghramadach “chontráilte“ a bheag nó a mhór de ghnáthnósanna cómhra Amhloaibh féin agus mhuintir a linne....(iv) An t-ainmfhocal uatha den ainmfhocal is den aidiacht a úsáíd le chéile sa ghinideach uatha, e.g. ag iarraidh féar glas; ag bualah iarann dearg lasrach, tosach oiche chiúin; ag tabhairt min bhuí amach”

Again, no mention from de Bhaldraithe about lenition inflection on the noun proceeding the verbal noun.

As for the other sub-dialects I found:

“Ag baint fhéir” in Sgéal Mo Bheatha (in the chapter Splanc)

My opinion now is, in Ring Irish at least, lenition does not occur after the verbal noun, except in certain phrases, or stock phrases as you called it. “Ag bhaint phrátaí” being the only example I could find within the corpus of literature. However, “ag baint phrátaí” seemed to be lenited in every example, as there is about a dozen instances were I have seen it in Leabhair Mhaidhc Dháith. Although, my findings or opinion is no way conclusive or definitive, all I can really say it’s a lot more varied and complex that I had previously thought or hoped.

I think what you should say is precisely what you’ve told me: that lenition may occur in certain phrases that are thought of as being stock or whole phrases by themselves and are used as way of conveying a certain thought or action. Lenition in this case, is not a concrete grammatical rule and Ring is no exception. This is unlike Old Irish, where the tendency to lenite was nearly always present where applicable.

Cian

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Please wait for corrections/ more input from other forum members before acting on advice

We may just have a new winner for the longest post ever! My guess is that Cian has now pushed himself into second and third place! If ILF crashes, Breandán will know who to blame!

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Táim ag obair ar seol anois le cuid a naoi!

I didn't find very many typos in the notes:

page 26: Literally: The first one of them who spoke always. [I think … a labhradh is in the past tense]

page 27: … go dtiocfadh sí chúithi … [it's spelled chúithi in both versions of the story that I've got, instead of the grossly non-phonetic chuici]

Ní foláir dúinne [síneadh fada over the "u"]

Sin a bhfuil agam anois. Now it's back to work for me on cuid a naoi.

Okay, so the easy updates are in the file now. I've a few comments to make on some of your corrections
WeeFalorieMan and a load on your post Cionnfhaolach!

Here it is, I've combined the two files:
The Story and Notes.

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The dialect I use is Cork Irish.
Ar sgáth a chéile a mhairid na daoine, lag agus láidir, uasal is íseal