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Following the success of An P?irt? Ceilteach in the recent Voom elections, I have decided to present to you a Course in Modern Irish. This is loosely based on . Please ignore the apparent plagiarism, and enjoy!

If you have any questions about the course, or indeed any other aspect of the Irish Language, don?t hesitate to PM or email me. I would be happy to help in any way ? grammar tips, vocabulary, minor translations, etc.

Ceacht a hAon
?ire

Is oile?n in aice le Sasana ? ?ire. Is t?r cheilteach ? ?ire. Is ?ireannach ? Se?n. T? s? ina ch?na? in ?irinn. Labhrann s? B?arla. Labhrann s? Gaeilge freisin. C?ard ? teanga dh?chais She?in? Is ? B?arla teanga dh?chais She?in. T?ann s? chuig scoil Ghaeilge. T? s? ag foghlaim na Gaeilge mar is ?ireannach ?.

Focl?r - Dictionary

Is ? ? ?ire = Ireland is ?
oile?n = island
in aice le = beside
Sasana = England
t?r f = country
ceilteach = Celtic
Is ? ? Se?n = Se?n is ?
?ireannach = Irish person
T? s? ? = he is
ina ch?na? = living (lit. in his living)
in ?irinn = in Ireland
labhrann s? = he speaks
B?arla = English (language)
Gaeilge f = Irish (language)
freisin = aswell, also, too
c?ard ? ?? = what is ??
teanga f = language
teanga dh?chais = mother-tongue (lit. native language)
Is ? A B = A is B
t?ann s? = he goes (irregular)
chuig = to
scoil f = school
ag foghlaim = learning
mar = because
is ? ? = he is ?

Gramadach - Grammar

1 - To Be/Copula
Two important constructs have been introduced in this lesson:
a) T? s? ?
b) Is ? ?
Both of these mean ?He/it is ?? The difference between the two is that (a) is used for adjectives and participles, and (b) is used for nouns.
For example:
a) T? s? ag foghlaim. = He is learning.
b) Is oile?n ?. = It is an island.

2 - Gender
Irish nouns are either one of two genders: Masculine and Feminine. In the vocabularies of this course, only Feminine nouns will be marked ? all others are Masculine.

Masculine and Feminine nouns work in different ways:
a) Feminine nouns lenite (see below) a following adjective. Masculine nouns don?t change the adjective. (There are exeptions, such as in the genitive case, but they will be addressed later.)
b) Feminine nouns are lenited when preceded by the definite article, ?an? .
c) Feminine nouns take ? in the 3rd person. Masculine nouns take ?.
For example:
a) T?r cheilteach = Celtic country . Oile?n ceilteach = Celtic island
b) an Ghaeilge . an B?arla
c) Is t?r ? = It is a country . Is oile?n ? = It is an island

3 - Lenition
There are two kinds of consonant mutation in Irish - lenition and eclipsing (nasalisation). Eclipsing will be introduced later. Reasons for lenition will be told as they occur in the lessons. So far, two reasons have occurred - (a) and c) above. Here is a complete table of lenition patterns: (h, l, n and r are not lenited)
b -> bh
c -> ch
d -> dh
f -> fh
g -> gh
(h -> h)
(l -> l)
m -> mh
(n -> n)
p -> ph
(r -> r)
s -> sh
t -> th

4 - Verbs, Present
Two forms of the present tense have been introduced in this lesson. The first form is An Aimsir L?ithreach. The second form is An Gn?th-L?ithreach. They are the equivilent of English ?I go? and ?I am going? respectively.

The Aimsir L?ithreach verbs introduced above are:
T? s? = He is
T?ann s? = He goes
Labhrann s? = He speaks

The Aimsir Gn?th-L?ithreach is formed using this formula:
TO BE + ag + VERBAL NOUN
T? s? ag foghlaim na Gaeilge = He is learning Irish
The ?ag? is a particle with no translation. It must be remembered that if a noun follows the Verbal Noun, it appears in the Genitive Case, hence na Gaeilge above, and NOT an Ghaeilge.

Dia dhuit!

Marta is ainm dom. T? m? iCorcaigh anois ach is as an gCatal?in dom. Ok, that's enough!! ?ire is a beautiful country! I'm an Erasmus student, but I would like to stay longer!!

See you! Sl?n!

Marta.

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Tornarem a lluitar, tornarem a sofrir, tornarem a vèncer! Lluís Companys
Un poble, una llengua, una nació: Visca els Països Catalans!

An Explanation of Irish Orthography

Irish orthography uses 18 letters of the Roman Alphabet. J, k, v, x and z are used in loan-words only. The Irish Language makes to distinctions in its consonant inventory: velarised vs palatised (broad vs slender) consonants. This is indicated in the orthography using the vowel letters. Don't worry if you dont make the broad/slender distinctions - you will be understood. Most people in Dublin ignore the distinctions, and instead add a /w/ after broad consonants in front of /i/ and /e/; and a /j/ after slender consonants in front of /u/, /o/ and /a/.


Broad:
b /b_G/
bh /v_G/
c /k/
ch /x/
d /d_G/
dh /G/
f /f_G/
fh /zero/
g /g/
gh /G/
h /h/
l /l_G/
m /m_G/
mh /w/
n /n_G/
p /p_G/
ph /f_G/
r /4_G/
s /s_G/
sh /h/
t /t_G/
th /h/

Slender:
b /b_j/
bh /v_j/
c /c/
ch /C/
d /d_j/
dh /j/
f /f_j/
fh /zero/
g /J\/
gh /j\/
h /h/
l /l_j/
m /m_j/
mh /v_j/
n /J/
p /p_j/
ph /f_j/
r /r_r/
s /S_j/
sh /C/
t /t_j/
th /C/

Vowels:
/i/ /i:/
/e/ /e:/
/a/ /a:/
/o/ /o:/
/u/ /u:/
/aI/
/aU/
/i@/
/u@/
/@/

An acute accent over a vowel lengthens the sound. The vowel system is fairly simple. However, it is the spelling that throws most people. The reason for all those strange vowel combinations is that it is the surrounding vowels that indicate whether a consonant is slender or broad. I shall attempt to display all possible combinations here.
Remember that the "slender vowels" are i and e. The "broad vowels" are u, o and a.



(The rest will be added later - the file is elsewhere ATM. T? br?n orm!)

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Nek vatar s-voli nasnap migi dmuxa k ti

->

Thanks for all of your comments, the've been very helpful!
I've decided not to give a list of all possible vowel letter combinations, and just tackle them as they crop up. (can't find the file I wrote anyway).
I think i underestimated people's level of Irish, and I have officially decided to write a "Genitive Case Crash Course"!!

Coming soon to a forum near you.

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Tornarem a lluitar, tornarem a sofrir, tornarem a vèncer! Lluís Companys
Un poble, una llengua, una nació: Visca els Països Catalans!

The whole slender/broad thing is weird to me. When I was learning Irish (in grad school, as well as at Oideas Gael in Donegal, there were a couple of places where the glide thing you mention seemed to be backwards. For example, toghair 'to summon'. According to your rules (which are pretty good, I think) it would be /'to.Gar_j/, which seems reasonable enough. My professors and teachers, however, tended to say /'to.G_wIr_j/. Now, I know there's enormous amounts of dialectal variation, but still...

Anyway, Maith th? for doing this at all! T? ranganna de dh?th orainn!

Do the endings have irregular pronounciations? Because I've read in some places that they are, and in others that they aren't. For instance:

tuigim /tig_ji:m_j/
tuigeann /tig_ja:n/
tuigimid /tig_jim_jid_j/
tuigtear /tig_jt_jar/

I think that's how they're pronounced. But:

?laim /o:lim_j/
?lann /o:la:n/
?laimid /o:lim_jid_j/
?ltar /o:ltar/

But isn't ai typically /a/ with the palatalized consonant following it? So you'd expect ?laim to be /o:lam_j/, but I've heard it's /o:lim_j/.

Relative Clauses

In Irish, relative clauses are made by placing a or ar (restricted to certain past tense usage) after the substantive, then the subclause with either lenition or eclipsion to the verb, depeding on the subject:

Sin an bhean. Bhuail s? m?. ~ "That's the woman. She hit me."
Sin an bhean. Bhuail m? ?. ~ "That's the woman. I hit her."

Of course, nobody speaks like that. It is more common to say "That's the woman who hit me". Notice that the "she" is not present in the second clause, as it is the same subject as the first one. In Irish, this is quite simple:

Sin an bhean a bhuail m?. ~ "That's the woman who hit me."

However, when you change the subject to "I", you change the particle, just as you change English "who" to "whom". In addition to this, Irish specifies that the object pronoun be included as well:

Sin an bhean ar bhuail m? ?. ~ "That's the woman whom I hit."

<hr>

Now for an irregular verb

Sin an bhean. Chonaic s? m?. ~ "That is the woman. She saw me."
Sin an bhean. Chonaic m? ?. ~ "That is the woman. I saw her."

Relativise to ...

Sin an bhean a chonaic m?. ~ "That's the woman who saw me."
Sin an bhean a bhfaca m? ?. ~ "That's the woman whom I saw."

<hr>

I'm sure I've forgotten something; let me know if you have a question!

Unfortunately, I am completely confused.

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<Rhob> I have a fetish for women.