Gabh mo lesceal,

I haven't quite gotten to the writing of Irish yet as I'm still working through Pimsleur, but I've noticed in this forum that some Irish words are written with capital letters in the middle of them, (or perhaps it's just the second letter of the word). Why is that?

I have not noticed if those words only come at the beginning of a sentence or are always in the middle of a sentence, if there is indeed a difference. Go raigh ma agat.

Irish has a funny grammatical thing called eclipsis. Under certain circumstances a letter is added to the beginning of a word, "eclipsing" the original initial letter. When a word like that is a proper noun or otherwise needs to be capitalized, the true initial letter is capitalized and the eclipsing letter is left lowercase.

An raibh siad ina gcónaí i mBoston? (Were they living in boston?)

in this instance, both cónaí and Boston have been eclipsed with their respective eclipsing letters (each eclipsable letter can only take one possible eclipsing letter...so c will always be eclipsed by g and b by m, etc).

when you see impossible combinations like that at the beginnings of words it's a safe bet you're observing eclipsis at work

Go raibh maith agat.
So what effect does the eclipsing have? does it change the pronunciation? what kinds of circumstances would eclipsing occur?

(Message edited by finbarr on January 18, 2007)

Finbarr,

I'm sure the linguistic experts here will be able to give you chapter and verse on eclipsis and the rules pertaining to it, but I have always understood that it is based on the natural way in which sounds are formed.

For exmaple my surname in Irsih is "ó hUigin" (O-HIGGEEN). Uigin (meaning Viking) is the basis of the name and therefore the "U" is capitalised. But the prefix "O" followed the first vowel in the name proper makes it less easy to pronounce: O-IGEEN. Eclipsis by inserting the "h" facilitates easier pronunciation.

Similarly i mBoston is easier to say than i Boston.

consonant eclipsis means you will pronounce the eclipsing letter, and the original initial letter will go silent

i mBoston = "ih MAWStun"

With vowels you will pronounce both as explained above.

The statement "written with capital letters in the middle of them, (or perhaps it's just the second letter of the word)" is a clue to t-prothesis and h-prothesis, not eclipsis.

There is a massive difference, and should not be confused. Lenition and eclipsis in writing have grammatical function; in speech they have both grammatical function and non grammatical incidence.

p -->b then b -->m are just two examples. There is a rule for their creation that is simple and clear, but I wont bore you with that.



h-prefix:
preceding a vowel: ha, he, etc. capitalised: hA, hE, etc. e.g.: Poblacht na hÉireann = Republic of Ireland

h-prefix is only used preceding words beginning in a vowel. It generally serves to simplify pronunciation, if 2 vowels clash and neither lenition nor eclipsis are necessary.



t-prefix
preceding s: ts capitalised: tS
preceding a vowel: t-a, t-e, etc. capitalised: tA, tE, etc. e.g. an tÉireannach = the Irishman

pronunciation:
The s after t-prefix is not spoken: an tsráid [tra:d']

article an in the direct case with masculine nouns, e.g.: an t-úll = the apple (not in the genitive and dative, e.g.: craiceann an úll = the skin of the apple, ar an úll = on the apple) preceding nouns with s- after the article an (instead of lenition of the s; occurs only if it's followed by a vowel or l, n, r) in the direct case by feminine nouns: an tsráid = the street

In the genitive by masculine nouns: an tsagairt = of the priest




Causes of +t and +h: http://www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/sindos.htm

wow, thanks. I think I'll have to read these responses a few more times to get it.

Dúirt Finbarr:

quote:

I haven't quite gotten to the writing of Irish yet as I'm still working through Pimsleur, but I've noticed in this forum that some Irish words are written with capital letters in the middle of them, (or perhaps it's just the second letter of the word). Why is that?

I'll try to draw a parallel with English here. Imagine you had an essay entitled A Summer Day. Now imagine you changed it to An Autumn Day. Now imagine, instead of putting the n with "An", we put it with "Autumn": A Nautumn Day. Now imagine that we capitalise the A instead of the n: A nAutumn Day. That's basically the idea of it. There are four instances in Irish where you could have an initial letter or letters which go uncapitalised:

(1) Urú [In Galway : I nGailimh] The following are the urú's for each letter:

For all vowels : n [Amhrán na nÉan]
B : m [Cosa na mBord]
C : g [Ainmneacha na gCat]
D : n [Buaiteoir na nDuaiseanna]
F : bh [Díoltas na bhFear]
G : n [Cumann na nGael]
P : b [Údar na bPeann]
T : d [Úinéirí na dTithe]

(2) T prefixed to a vowel

An tÉan
An tAsal

(3) T prefixed to an S

An tSráid
Blas an tSiúcra

(4) H prefixed to a vowel

Go hAlban
Le hÁthas

Dúirt Suaimhneas:

quote:

But the prefix "O" followed the first vowel in the name proper makes it less easy to pronounce: O-IGEEN.

Debateable! I've no problem with: Tháinig sé ó Alban.

Suaimhneas arís:

quote:

Similarly i mBoston is easier to say than i Boston

Debateable! Actually, if I'm not mistaken, it should be in Boston. (Some special rule for dealing with definite names of foreign places, I think).

Dúirt BRN:

quote:

Lenition and eclipsis in writing have grammatical function; in speech they have both grammatical function and non grammatical incidence.

All the initial mutations in Irish are purely for decoration. Letters like L, R, N, never suffer mutation but don't hinder the reader or listener's understanding.

BRN arís:

quote:

e.g.: craiceann an úll = the skin of the apple

Craiceann an Úill.

BRN arís:

quote:

preceding nouns with s- after the article an (instead of lenition of the s; occurs only if it's followed by a vowel or l, n, r) in the direct case by feminine nouns: an tsráid = the street

Entirely incorrect:

An tSaibhseáil
An tSráid
Blas an tSiúcra
Údar an tSlaba
An tSochaí
An tSeirbhís
Titim an tSneachta

One more thing... in cases where you have an adjective which presents itself as a prefix, e.g.:

the high king = an t-ard-rí

, I believe you use a hyphen to separate the prefix from the word (rather than just capitalise the initial letter of the base word):

The High King = An tArd-Rí

Then, of course, there's just the plain odd ones:

The T-shirt = An T-léine

Tell that to Lars -I just wrote the first part, and cut and paste the second without checking!

"All the initial mutations in Irish are purely for decoration" his/hers/theirs difference you did not explain before. As I said, what is left of the cases are hand-me-downs from IndoEuropean, and the extra urú or séimhiu are not the most important part; for possesion there are some cases where they are needed. Tell me how to by pass them in the examples I gave, and I will beleive you. I think I have been ameanable to changing by opinions on this before.

Okey Doke, I probably should have explained this better before but was too lazy to. I'll explain by analogy... here comes some meandering thoughts:

Take Germany. In Germany, your name must indicate your sex. Therefore, a name is a 100% reliable indicator of gender in Germany. When someone fills out a form, you don't even have to have a "Sex" part on it because you can simply tell from the name.

In Ireland, you can pretty much have any name you want. Particularly, you can have a unisex name such as "Jamie". In Ireland, you cannot rely on a person's name to determine gender, and you would be stupid to do so (even if it is obvious most of the time, e.g. James, Mary, Bryan).

In the Irish language, you cannot rely on urú's or séimhiú's to convey any meaninful information 100% of the time. Why? Because there's plenty of places where they're non-existant:

I saw his book = Chonaic mé a leabhar.
I saw her book = Chonaic mé a leabhar.
I saw their book = Chonaic mé a leabhar.

If you're a native speaker of English, you may see this as a flaw. But it's not a flaw at all -- the possessive personal pronouns simply aren't designed to explicitly indicate who they're talking about. Sure, it's obvious a lot of the time, e.g.:

I saw his table = Chonaic mé a bhord.
I saw her table = Chonaic mé a bord.
I saw their table = Chonaic mé a mbord.

And other times, it's semi-obvious:

I saw his bag = Chonaic mé a mhála.
I saw her bag = Chonaic mé a mála.
I saw their bag = Chonaic mé a mála.

But the overall outlook is this: The urú and séimhiú cannot be relied upon. You might think that this is a bad thing, but in reality it doesn't make a difference because you shouldn't be using initial mutations to distinguish between "him" "her" and "them". The Irish langauge has a system of emphasis within it that is very alien to anything you've ever experienced in English.

I can't translate lone sentences without context. Give me a paragraph of English which relies on "him" "her" "them" to distinguish who we're talking about, and I'll translate it to Irish for you.

Initial mutations would be reliable indicators if they were used across the board -- but they're not. There's plenty of places where they're non-existant. This isn't a problem though, because people don't rely on them to convey any information.

If there are a handful of circumstances in which people do rely on urú's or séimhiú's to convey information, you can bet that it's an exploitation (which isn't a bad thing). One such place I can think of is "an chéad lá" Vs. "an céad lá".

End of the story is this: Initial mutations are simply for decoration in Irish, and many people feel that they are perhaps its most beautiful feature.

Give me a page of written Irish, remove all initial mutations, and I'll still tell you exactly what it means (assuming it was written correctly, of course) -- except for the handful of places where séimhiú and urú are exploited (again, "an chéad lá" Vs. "an céad lá".

"Actually, if I'm not mistaken, it should be in Boston. (Some special rule for dealing with definite names of foreign places, I think). "


yes, but Boston is also the name of a very old city in england. My understanding is that ancient foreign placenames get to be subject to rules/spellings of Irish. York is still Eabhrac (Nua-Eabhrac). Philadelphia is also an ancient city name. And Jersey (Geirsí) I contend should also be carried through like York for New Jersey (Nua Gheirsí).

Anyone know why New York is traditionally rendered as Nua Eabhrac and not Eabhrac Nua?

Dia dhuit Fear_na_mbróg ,

Tuigeann anois. Go raigh maigh agat.

The analogy made a lot of sense, they're sortof like contractions. thanks.

(I finally caved and looked at the Pimsler transcript...whoa. This is why I've attempted to write in Irish. There's no way I would have guessed that I'd learned to say and understand (audibly) some of those words! I think I'll leave the reading and writing for much later.)

A Fhionnbarr,
Halló agus fáilte romhat, a chara. I will try to add to the discussion.



"But the overall outlook is this: The urú and séimhiú cannot be relied upon"; "Initial mutations would be reliable indicators if they were used across the board -- but they're not. There's plenty of places where they're non-existant"

Nothing in your analysis contradicts my position; the 'weight' between syntax and inflection (if you get my drift) in Irish rests on the syntax side, thus word position tells you much of what is convayed. Gesture and context, in speech, provide more information


I cut and paste and never read the thing apart from switch nominative to 'direct'. You list is confusing to a novice though, don't you think? These examples don't contradict the intent behind the above:

the apple (M): an t-úll (direct); of the apple: craiceann an úill (genitive)

the stream (M): an sruth (direct); of the stream: uisce an tsrutha (genitive)

the street: (F):an tsráid (direct); of the streat: taobh na sráide (genitive)

the street: (F):an tsnaidhm (direct); of the streat: taobh na snaidhme (genitive)

Normally, there is not initial mutation on the first consonant in a cluster (2+ consonants) in word-initial position. The reason it can happen for sr, sn, sl is to do with the fact that on a hierarchy of sonorancy, such sounds are nearer to vowels than t, or g, so are good to go



"Letters like L, R, N, never suffer mutation but don't hinder the reader or listener's understanding."

Grammatically, L and N they are on record as been used in long/fortis & short/lenis distinction as a sort of generalisation from the stops. Just thought I'd add it in. It was not lenition, more generalisation from stops so that it became 'grammatical lenition' as opposed to 'phonological lenition' as seen in regular b -->bh etc


"Debateable! I've no problem with: Tháinig sé ó Alban." This should be seen within the context of language change. From a statistical perspective, there are little changes every generation. At some point, it seems, lacking a glottal stop (the click of the throat seen as very urban southern speech in England, but coming into Estuary English increasingly), vowel clashing was an issue, and h (which is really turning off the voice box between vowels, in this context) got added. NAtives did not do 'vowel clashing' for whatever reason, so something was added. Of course, we have no problem with, but there you go.


Nua Earbhrac might be via imitation

"I think I'll leave the reading and writing for much later.)"


there's nothing wrong with that...when you learned english you learned to speak it first, and then read it years later...