Dia daoibh a ghach duine , tá ceist eile agam oraibh.

I use irishdictionaryonline a lot as a reference for verb conjugation
However I think I have been teaching myself wrongly .
the format of the site is like this

théinn
I used to go;
théiteá
you used to go;
théadh sé
he used to go;
théadh sí
she used to go;
théadh sibh
you used to go;
théimis
we used to go;
théidís
they used to go;
Autonomous : théití
used to be gone;
Negative (Diúltach): ní théadh sé
Question (Ceisteach): an dtéadh sé


Now given that they only gave one form for the Interogative ( 3rd person singular ) I had assumed , wrongly now Ithink , that this was the form for all tenses.
IE Did we used to go , I would write an dtéadh muid?
I have the feeling this is wrong and that the conjugation would be based on the form given for we used to go , ie an dtéimis ? did I used to go ? An dtéinn ? etc etc

COuld someone please tell me if this is the case ?
If so I have a lot of unlearning to do.AAAAAARGH!

it does not matter, if you give:

http://www.msn.ie
www.msn.ie (mostly works)
msn.ie (works most of the times, but not always)

as long as it works..
irishdictionaryonline does not connect to a site..

i dont know if 'mostly' is applyable in this way..
but i know what i want to express- as a foreigner to english.

i had (and have!) my 'times' with making the plural forms, most of the times only 'sraid' is given, it gets an t-sraid (the street) and na sraide (the streets).

(Message edited by akidd on December 12, 2004)

Akidd , Im not sure what you are saying to me.
If you need the whole url for the dictionary page , it is http://www.englishirishdictionary.com/

i do not want to learn wrongly, so i am interested to 'hear' about traps..

the dictionary belongs to irishgaelictranslator.com

(Message edited by akidd on December 12, 2004)

(Message edited by akidd on December 12, 2004)

ah , ok . yes you have to be careful especially online , some sites although they mean well are very badly thought out and sometimes there are a few mistakes on some pages. I think the link I gave you is one of the much better sites and the problem Im having is one arising out of confusion and perhaps lack of explanation rather than being badly taught.
Im still waiting to find out from someone whether Im doing it wrong Im not sure.

A Phoblachtaigh, a chara,

http://www.csis.ul.ie/focloir/ is another online dictionary that will give you the complete interrogatory form of the verb, mar shampla,

an dtéinn?		an dtéimis?
an dtéiteá?		an dtéadh sibh?
an dtéadh sé?		an dtéidís?
an dtéadh sí?
	an dtéití?

However, if you followed the pattern given, namely an dtéadh sé = an + urú, then you would have been correct, e.g.,

téimis	▬(an + urú)▬►	an dtéimis?
téadh sibh	▬(an + urú)▬►	an dtéadh sibh?
téidís	▬(an + urú)▬►	an dtéidís?

I do not know where you got an dtéadh muid? Téadh muid was not given in your original conjugation.

(Message edited by lúcas on December 12, 2004)

(Message edited by lúcas on December 12, 2004)

Lucas you have my gratitude , thanks for that , it was very helpful , of course it now means I have to go over all the verbs I have been working on for the last month and correct them , still better to catch it now than to be two years down the line and realise I was completely on the wrong track.
:)

You're welcome. It seems progess in learning a language is a dance with two steps forward and one step back. I have to look up a word several times in a dictionary before it becomes part of my vocabulary.

Let me make a couple of suggestions. If you are going to go back and study the questions, you might also consider studying the answers that go with them, e.g.,

	an dtéimis?
théimis		ní théimis

	an dtéimid?
téimid		ní théimid

Note how both examples above are third person plural. Ron Crow suggests learning the conjugations by person instead of by mood and by tense. That way you can see how the moods and tenses relate to each other.

I think a question and answers drill is a good exercise to condition you for conversation later. It should help you see the relationship between the question form and the answer forms. With enough practice, whenever anyone asks you a question, you will instinctively give a grammatically correct answer.

(Message edited by lúcas on December 13, 2004)

I much prefer http://www.csis.ul.ie/focloir/ for verb conjugations...it's irish-irish, but it gives a table layout à la briathra na Gaeilge for all verbs, which is a layout I much prefer

An dtéadh muid?

is correct; as are:

An dtéimis?
An dtéadh sinn?

'Bhfuil tú cinnte faoin ceann deiridh sin?

Nílim lánchinnte, ach ní fheicim fath nach mbeadh sé ceart go leor. Arbh fhéidir:

Briseann mé

a rá in ionad:

Brisim

?

Tá 'fhios agam gur "brisim" an leagan ceart, ach go fóill an bhfuil aon rud mícheart le "briseann mé". An mbeadh sé cosúil le "cannot" a rá in ionad "can't". . . ?

Is féidir Briseann mé a rá in áit Brisim.

Ach táim amhrasach faoi "sinn" in áit "muid"

FnaB,

Yes, of course, you are right about an dtéadh muid? being correct, but you missed the point I was trying to make. As Poblachtach pointed out above, the caighdéan oifigiúil gives théimis as the first person plural of the habitual past tense. The web page he used only gave one example of the interrogatory form, namely, an dtéadh sé? I thought he was asking how to follow that pattern to form the interrogatoty form in other persons and numbers.

However, the example given is enough, if you see the pattern, to reconstruct all the interrogatory forms. The implicit pattern is to change the séimhiú to urú, put the interrogatory particle an in front of the new verb form, and leave the ending of the verb the same. Take the word théimis, change the séimhiú to an urú form, dtéimis, and put the interrogatory particle in front of it, an dtéimis? You can not go wrong with this pattern, but you can go wrong with the pattern implicit in your substitution of an analytic form.

Introducing the analytic form instead of the synthetic form adds unnecessary and sometimes erroneous complexity when starting to learn conjugations. Using an analytic form instead of the synthetic form for the third person plural is correct, but it is not correct in all cases. For example, you can not use the analytic form in the

• first person singular, théinn,
  
• second person singular, théiteá, and the
  
• third person plural,théidís,
  

in the past habitual tense. Eventually, a learner will have to learn when they can and can not make such a substitution, but, I think it is an unnecessary burden for them in the beginning. Most of us have to take little steps.

BTW, I thought the pronoun sinn fell out of use a long time ago. Like the English pronouns thee and thou, sinn is grammatically correct. Just like you do not hear thee and thou in today's English, I do not think you hear sinn in today's Irish.


(Message edited by lúcas on December 14, 2004)

Sinn is still used, just not in all contexts it used to be.

sinn [forainm]
muid, focal a úsáideann daoine agus iad ag tagairt dóibh féin; iolra ar mé

---

But the only use I can think of just now is "Sinn Féin".

No, wait

Sinne a rinne é sin.


(Message edited by aonghus on December 14, 2004)

Maybe sinn is used more than I thought. I was curious so I looked up sinn in Ó Dónaill:

sinn, 1 pl. prop. We, us.

1. We.

(a) (With copula) Is
~ is cúis leis, we are the cause of it.
Nach ~ a bhí amaideach! How foolish we were!
~ féin a rinne é, we did it ourselves.
(b) (With autonomous vb.)
Buaileadh ~, we were beaten.
(c) (Virtual subject of vn.)
Cad é a tharla? ~ a bheith rótheann asainn féin.
What happened? (That) we were too cocksure of ourselves.
(d)(After agus)
Dá dtiocfadh sé agus ~ as baile,
if he were to come whilst we were away from home.
(e) (Subject of vb.)
Tá ~ go léir anseo, we are all here.
Chuir ~ deireadh leis, we put an end to it.

2. Us.

(a) (Direct object)
Mhúin an saol ~, life taught us a lesson.
(b) (After preps. that have no pron. form)
Ach ~, but us.
Gan ~, without us.

3. Mod. Hist: S~ Féin, Sinn Féin political party.

sinne, t pl. emphatic pron.

1. We, us.

~ a dúirt é, it was we who said it.
~ ad sé a mhaíomh, it is to us he is referring.

2. (Used as emphatic suffix)

Ár gcuid ~, our portion.