The Daltaí Boards: Trying to learn some grammar.

I haven't helped anyone with basics for quite a long while, so maybe it's my turn. All three sentences are understandable as they stand, but could use a little work.

>> "Maraím mé an dúnmhartóir". = "I kill the murderer".

Maraím an dúnmharfóir.

The ending -im or -ím of the first person singular present tense unambiguously specifies that the subject is "I", so "mé" is not added. (And note that "dúnmharfóir" has an 'f', not a 't'.)

>> "D'ith mé mo dinnéar". = "I ate my dinner".

Good. But "mo" always lenites, so "mo dhinnéar". Note that this past tense form has no ending to specify person and number, so you have to add "mé, tú, sé" etc. to indicate the subject.

>> "Suaithfidh mé an deic". = "I will shuffle the deck".

Excellent! No correction needed, although I'd most likely say "na cártaí" rather than "an deic".

>> 1.) How do you make nouns plural in Irish?

Lots of ways! The plural of "cárta" is "cártaí". Quite a few nouns that end in -a have -aí as the plural: siopaí, piontaí, cótaí, nótaí, hataí, málaí.

>> 2.) How do you tell the difference between the two conjugation of verbs?

It would take a while to lay down rules that would capture every single odd verb, but for starts: the great majority of second declension verbs have two (or more) syllables and end in -igh in the dictionary. The verb "kill" above is a typical example: "maraigh". The form that is cited in dictionaries is the imperative, so "Maraigh!" = "Kill!"

(Message edited by dennis on May 28, 2005)