just wondering how a) one treats a strong plural of a masculine declension 1 noun in the vocative, just lenite, but leave the a off the end as one has used a strong external plural? and b) for vowel initial nouns, what occurs to Null Plural Strong, Genitive Plural Strong, and Dative Plural Strong (which are of the same form in the caidhdeán, which is where I got the data for this table) when preceeded by the definite article?

	Initial consonant
Case	Indef state	Def articles
Null Sing	FCB ICM	[an] ICM
Null Pl Wk	(N Sg) FCB ~ FCS	[na] ICM
Null Pl Strg	[1/6] ICM	[na] ICM
Gen Sing	(N Sg) FCB ~ FCS	[an] ~ Len
Gen Pl Wk	[1/3] FCB	[na] ~ Ecp
Gen Pl Strg	[1/6] ICM	[na] ~ Ecp
Dative Sing	[Prep] N Sg ~ Len	[Prep] [an] ~ Ecp
Dat Pl Wk	[Prep] N Sg ~ Len ~ FCS	[Prep] [na] ICM
Dat Pl Strg	[1/6] [Prep] Pl Strg ~ Len	[Prep] [na] ICM
Voc Sing	[a] G Sg ~ Len ~ FCS
Voc Pl Wk	[a] N Sg ~ Len ~ final ‘a’
Voc Pl Strg	UNFILLED
	Vowel Initial
Case	Vowel Initial	Def articles
Null Sing	VI FCB	[an] VI [t-prefix]
Null Pl Wk	(N Sg) FCB ~ FCS	[na] VI [Pro]
Null Pl Strg	[1/6]	UNKNOWN
Gen Sing	(Null Sing) FCB ~ FCS	[an] VI
Gen Pl Wk	[1/3] FCB	[na] ~ n-Ecp
Gen Pl Strg	[1/6]	UNKNOWN
Dative Sing	[Prep] N Sg ~ [Pro]	[Prep] [an] VI
Dat Pl Wk	[Prep] G Sg ~ [Pro]	[Prep] [na] ~ [Pro]
Dat Pl Strg	[1/6] [Prep] Pl Strg ~ Len	UNKNOWN
Voc Sing	[a] G Sg
Voc Pl Wk	[a] N Sg ~ [final a]
Voc Pl Strg	UNFILLED

Can you give examples, please?
Normally, a noun with a strong plural is a noun whose plural form is the same in the nominative and in the genitive (ex: daoine/daoine, scéalta/scéalta, scoileanna/scoileanna in Standard Irish).

(Message edited by Lughaidh on September 15, 2005)

Yeah, examples would be best. That chart is just gobaldygook(spelling?) to me I'm afraid.

I don't understand the abbreviations in it, ina theannta sin. Where have you found that table?

Sorry, the table is superflous as it is from excel and is part of the tables I am creating for coding into Mathlab as a spelling and conjugation program for the caigdeán. I will do dialects when I learn about grammar.

I should have pointed out that 'UNFILLED' or 'UNKNOWN' were the problem areas. The rest are just codes.

Pacific examples:

An blasanna; a bhlasanna
An soithí; A shoithí

I see no addition of final 'a' here (unless one were to front load the 'a' onto the strong plural ending). but 2 B shure i asked.

A strong plural noun that is vowel initial is aerárthachaí, so 'hey aeroplanes!' would be 'a aerárachaí!'.

Is this so?

I am aware that strong plurals are the same in each case, or what goes for cases these days. Were they always around, or are they the beginning of the loss of weak plurals?

>A strong plural noun that is vowel initial is >aerárthachaí, so 'hey aeroplanes!' would be 'a >aerárachaí!'.

>Is this so?

Lol yes


>I am aware that strong plurals are the same in each >case, or what goes for cases these days. Were they >always around, or are they the beginning of the loss of >weak plurals?

In Old Irish, as far as I know (Dennis will say), there was no strong plural. Actually, you need to know what is a strong plural for the agreement of the adjective.

Na daoine móra
Hataí na ndaoine móra

Strong plural, so even in the genitive plural, the adjective is in its nominative plural form.


na mná móra
Hataí na mban mór

Weak plural,so in the genitive plural, the adjective is in its genitive plural form (most of the time, the same as the nominative singular form).

I don't know when the "strong plural" forms have appeared, but I'm almost sure they didn't exist in Old, Middle and Classical Irish. It might be very recent.

In Donegal older people 's speech, the strong plural is very rare: people use the singular nom. form for the Gpl, so:

an cailín, hata an chailín, na cailíní, hataí na gcailín
so: hataí na gcailín óg, beag, mór, bán, srl.

And some words have a special Gpl form that doesn't exist in the standard (and that you won't find in recent books) :
an scoil, doras na scoile, na scoltacha, doirse na scol...

Nowadays, in younger speakers's speech in Donegal, I think there 's a tendency to have a strong plural for most nouns, even in the 1st declension

cf in the song "Eoghainín O Ragadáin" by Altan (sung by Máiréad Ní Mhaonaigh, native speaker from Gweedore), she says

"'S Ailín na rúin
Na rúin is na rúin do Una Ní Ailleagáin
Corraigh do chroí"

Note: Gpl. "na rúin", instead of "na rún", so same form for nominative plural and genitive plural.

"Note: Gpl. "na rúin", instead of "na rún", so same form for nominative plural and genitive plural."

Which is why i wrote in that other post about what is the point in all the rigour in grammar when the natives are jettisoning 1500+ years worth of gaelic elements? Witb the dublin and galltacht gallygores working at it form thier direction, it seems like everyone is intereted in making it lke English.

Personally, i think it means the gaeltachts will disappear, maybe except for a few isolated spots.

When the Old English cases and plurals in -en etc have been lost, the language has not died, asfar as I know :) .

"Nowadays, in younger speakers's speech in Donegal, I think there 's a tendency to have a strong plural for most nouns, even in the 1st declension "

And ho many young speakers are there in Ireland? 5000? Most dont care about Irish, they just got brought up with it (meaning they have a more health atitude towards it perhaps).

i mean that concurrent with the loss of cases is a lessening of the pool of speakers. Irish is losing these features becasue it is undergoing a 'Manx-effect' of extreme angicisation. One the cases are lost and the phonetics are english, if it continues, I'd say faer plé daoibh for continuing it, but i'd rather a more gaelic irish, so i'm going to set up my own gaeltacht with archic old irish, add 60 cases, and make it so synthetic you can say an english sentance of 20 words with one irish word...

(quote: Robert)
i'm going to set up my own gaeltacht with archic old irish, add 60 cases, and make it so synthetic you can say an english sentance of 20 words with one irish word.

Ya don't mind the odd contradiction do ya? ;)

Hi Robert,

OK, here's an easy Old Irish verbal complex for you take apart:

Nímcharaside.

Hope it turns out better than your English communications.