I just want to clear this up because I'm often frustrated by whether or not a séimhiú should be present in a particular place. In particular, I want to deal with how and why séimhiú's are supressed at times.

The most notorious séimhiú supressor is the "cadad", which is the "dots after dentals" rule. There are times though when the cadad doesn't apply. Could someone please clarify when and where the cadad doesn't apply? Are the following correct?

Scéal Seáin
Institiúid Teicneolaíochta
bean deas (or is it "bean dheas"?)
na focail deasa

One thing that's been irritating me lately is the poem by Séamas Ó Neill: Subh Milis. Why is it that there's no séimhiú on milis? Is there some rule stating that you can't run a bh into an mh? Is it lámh bheag or lámh beag?

Other supressors I can think of off the top of my head are:
(1) Not on an f after "gan": gan fear
(2) Not on a b after "um": um bosca

Help me make an exhaustive list!

quote:

Help me make an exhaustive list!

Beidh tú anseo go dtí lá Seoin Dic....

I mo thuairimse
Scéal Sheáin
Institiúid Theicneolaíochta
ach
Institiúid Teicneolaíochta Bhaile Átha Cliath

Níl mé cinnte, ach deir google tapaidh liom gur cirte "bean dheas"

Kudos to Dennis for spotting the exact term!

The supression after m on b might be (once) a general rule regarding broad bilabials, as 'um bhosca' might sound like very vague in fast speech

I have wondered that very issue with /w/ and /w'/ myself. While the books are poor on this issue, De Bhaldraithe (Cois Fhairrige) p52 (no.269), gives "A labial fricative is replaced by a bilabial plosive under the influence of a following bilabial plosive":

[r@'sa:w] rosámh, [r@'sa:b b'og] rosámh beag
[d'el'iw'] deilbh, [@ d'el'ib' p'i:s@] ag deilbh píosa

So make of that what you will. IN the examples above, they have stayed bi-labial, but done the opposite of lenition, more like 'fortrition', as it were. They also keep their original quality, be it broad or slender. ONe would expect there would not be enought time in fast speech for both broad b, and then a slender b, so it is perhaps a little over idealised above.

Abstracting the rules and taking a pot shot: láibeag or láiveag. However, for lenition to be allowed, a) grammar must override the mechanical movement of the mouth, b) we need examples of v happening after w ('láw veg' -->'láv veg'). Page 47 has other examples but not what is wanted here. There is no reason to say it could not happen: http://borel.slu.edu/gramadoir/foirm.html for what it is worth, expects it.


There might be various reasons fro supression:

machanical (cadad: homorganic coronals (made with tip of tongue); one bilabial to another bilabial)

clarity/perceptual (um before b, p)

change of usage (less lenition after gan than once was the case)

psychological (have no example of it, but it is felt that one word is better non-lenited that was formerly lenited)

generalisation (over generalised from another example or paradigm)

historical overshadow (today's tongue positions might be more numerous or sandhi less pervasive, so that cadad might not be so mechanical today, rather just done as it is learned at the mother's knee)

I'm not going to even begin trying for a complete list, but I can safely say that, as far as I know, the notorious "dentals" rule does not apply in any of the examples you are quoting. Generally, the "dentals" rule does not suppress lenition in a "noun + adjective" or "noun + noun" situation.

> Scéal Sheáin

"Seán" should always be lenited here because it is a proper noun, and proper nouns are always lenited in the genitive. Correct me somebody if you know of exceptions to this, but I'm pretty sure that dentals are of no relevance here.

> bean dheas

It should definitely be "bean dheas". I've been told (don't remember when or where) that dentals used to apply to situations like this (feminine noun + adjective) at some stage in the past, but they don't any more. Maybe they still linger in some dialects, if somebody knows more about this, please tell us. But in standard grammar - as much as I understand - an adjective is always lenited after a feminine noun (in the nominative), no exceptions.

> Institiúid T(h)eicneolaíochta

Whether "teicneolaíochta" should be lenited here or not is a matter of contention even among the best-informed grammarians. There is some unclarity in Irish as to whether genitive nouns that follow feminine nouns should be lenited or not - unlike adjectives, where the rules are pretty clear. We're not going to settle that here. Either way, dentals have no say in it.

> na focail dheasa

Again, dentals do not apply here because this is an adjective following a noun (albeit a plural one), therefore the adjective must be lenited on account of the plural noun ending in a soft consonant.

If somebody has a different understanding of these things, please let me know! My view of all these "rules" concerning mutations is that even though they do exist, they come with an "optional" label and can be relaxed for pragmatic reasons, such as when you're saying something unsual and want to make double sure your audience catches every word. So if I hear somebody say "na focail deasa", I wouldn't write it off as a straigh-forward error.

quote:

It should definitely be "bean dheas". I've been told (don't remember when or where) that dentals used to apply to situations like this (feminine noun + adjective) at some stage in the past, but they don't any more. Maybe they still linger in some dialects, if somebody knows more about this, please tell us. But in standard grammar - as much as I understand - an adjective is always lenited after a feminine noun (in the nominative), no exceptions.

Is dóigh liom go bhfuil an ceart agat. Buailim leis "an mbean dubh" agus a leithéid i sean-amhráin den chuid is mó. :-)

quote:

My view of all these "rules" concerning mutations is that even though they do exist, they come with an "optional" label and can be relaxed for pragmatic reasons, such as when you're saying something unsual and want to make double sure your audience catches every word. So if I hear somebody say "na focail deasa", I wouldn't write it off as a straigh-forward error.

Ceart arís, dar liomsa. Am ar bith a gcuirim focail idir chomharthaí athfhriotail (“  ”), le mo ghuth nó leis an méarchlár, ní bhacaim le séimhíu nó urú.