Bíonn Gaeilge labhartha anseo
(Irish spoken here)

or would it be Tá Gaeilge labhartha anseo

and under what circumstances is An Ghaeilge used instead of Gaeilge?

Labhraítear Gaeilge anseo.


"Gaeilge labhartha" means "Spoken Irish"

An Ghaeilge - rarely used. Very formal.

By the way, the signs in Ireland usually say "gaeilge agus fáilte"

Aonghus, a chara, agus saoithíní eile...

Is "labhraítear" what the grammar texts call the autonomous verb form? If so, what is it's English counterpart? It looks like what I would call the present tense in the passive voice.

"Irish is spoken here."

no, I believe it is the verbal adjective. autonomous form english counterpart is "[some]one speaks irish here"

Saorbhriathar atá ann. Passive voice.

labhraítear = a verb (Yes, the autonomous form)
labhartha = an adjective.

Irish is spoken here.
[subject] [verb] [other stuff]
[Irish] [is spoken] [here]
Labhraítear Gaeilge anseo.

Spoken Irish is here.
[subject] [verb] [other stuff]
[Spoken Irish] [is] [here]
Tá Gaeilge labhartha anseo.

Sentence 1: Labhraítear Gaeilge anseo.

This is the same as "Labhraíonn Seán Gaeilge anseo." -- it's just that the subject isn't specified. It can be translated many ways:

One speaks Irish here.
Irish is spoken here.

Sentence 2: Tá Gaeilge labhartha anseo.

"Spoken Irish" isn't really a tangible object, so it can't be "here". But let's say you have a tape recording, you could point at it and say "Tá Gaeilge labhartha anseo.".

There's one example I particularly like for explaining this:

The door does be open in the morning time = Bíonn an doras oscailte ar maidin.
The door is opened in the morning time = Osclaítear an doras ar maidin.

The key difference here is that while in English, you can use the adjective as a verb, eg.

The window was broken.

You can't do this in Irish. If you were to say:

Bhí an fhuinneog briste.

in Irish, it would imply that the window was in a state of brokenness. It would not imply however that the action of breakage was executed upon it. To imply such in Irish, you have:

Briseadh an fhuinneog.

so, to be ultimately pedantic, I'll translate the two following sentences to English:

Bhí an fhuinneog briste. = The window was in a state of brokenness.
Briseadh an fhuinneog. = The action of breakage was performed upon the window.

Obviously, people don't speak like the above -- both sentences in English become:

The window was broken.

and which form is intended is determined from the context. If there's still confusion though, you'll hear people repeat the sentence like as follows:

The window was actually broken yesterday, you mean some-one broke it yesterday?

But 8 times out of 10 in English, you can determine it from the context; the 9th time it doesn't matter which one's intended. The 10th time there's some ambiguity and confusion.

10 times out of 10 you know what's going on in Irish!

Go raibh maith agat!

Now that's as good as -- nay better than -- any textbook explanation I've been able to find. Thank you, well shod pedantic man.

Tá míle fáilte romhat, I'm eager to share the little knowledge I possess ;-) !

Another thing to know about: Take a few verbal nouns:

dúnadh (closure)
briseadh (breakage)
labhairt (speaking)

The genetive form of these nouns (ie. the possessive case) is identical to the adjective, so:

...because of the closure...
...de bharr an dúnta...

...beside the breakage...
...in aice an bhriste...

...the way of speaking...
...an chaoi labhartha...


Taking the following two:

a) The breakage report
b) The broken report

You'll notice that they might end up the same in Irish...

An Tuairisc Bhriste

although it's possible that the former may be translated as:

Tuairisc an Bhriste


When you're dealing with indefinite nouns though (indefinte = not "the"), they'll end up the same:

Closing Time / Closure Time = Am dúnta
Closed time = Am dúnta

The destroyed house = An Teach Millte
The house of destruction / The destruction house = An Teach Millte
but...
The destructive house = An Teach Millteach


This is another of my "Favourite little neat double meanings!".

So... inevitably the topic of... ambiguity... is going to come up.

"An Teach Millte"

How do you know if it means:

a) The destroyed house
b) The destruction house


The answer is... context, and only context. So if you look at the cover of a book and see its title as:

An Teach Millte

You simply don't know which... so read on!

Overall though, you know that the house has some sort of general relationship with "destruction", whether it has been destroyed or not.

I'm not completely fluent in Irish, so I wouldn't know how people work with this, but I suppose there's a few other precise ways of saying it:

Teach an Mhillte = The Destruction House
An teach a mhilleadh = The house that was destroyed