hello all,
I'm still working through those cases.

trí fhuinneoig - is that Dative?
through the window

tríd an oíche - Accusative?
through the night

‘during the night’

If above mentioned is correct, then could it be generalized that the preposition trí combines with Dative when used spatially and with Accusative when used for expressing time?

Or is it not that exclusive? I couldn't find any other examples (to prove me otherwise)...

cheers, B.

quote:

trí fhuinneoig - is that Dative?

Yes, it is.

quote:

tríd an oíche - Accusative?

No, it is not. It is dative again. Almost all underived prepositions demand dative (chun, idir, gan being exceptions).

The word "oíche" like 99% of words ending in vowel simple has homonymous forms of cases in the singular:

an oíche - nominative
na hoíche - genitive
don oíche - dative
a oíhe - vocative.

Both are dative. There's no overt dative marker in oíche.
Each preposition (e.g. trí) is always used with the same case, and 99% of them require dative (which is overtly marked only in a handful of nouns).

There aren't prepositions that can be used with more cases like in Latin or Slavic languages. The difference between movement and position is denoted by adverbs, or using different prepositions
Daithí

quote:

There aren't prepositions that can be used with more cases like in Latin or Slavic languages.

I think "idir" is problematic. You can state that it governs two cases - accusative and dative.

idir fhir agus mná vs idir fir agus mná.

What do you think?

Is there any difference in meaning? (I think one of them means 'between men and women' and the other 'both men and women'. Only I'm not sure which is which.)

This might be as you say but check the dialects with ibh-dative: wouldn't it be 'idir fhearaibh agus mnaoibh' (or so) then?

In any case, this is not what Brina has been looking for. As I understood, she'd like to know if there's a difference between motion/position in Irish, expressed by means of different cases with the same preposition (cf. Russian: v dom (Acc, direction) vs. v domu (Loc, position))...

Daithí

Yes, Daithí, that is what I had been looking for.

But now I'm just puzzled because I can't figure out what is the difference in the meaning between

faoin mballa & leis an mballa...

they both mean something like "against the wall"? Or at least that's what I found. It's probably not the whole story...

And we were also discussing "san oíche" earlier - could you just give a sentence in which you would use it? thanks !

And also, can anyone please check this sentence in Irish for me> Tá sé agéirigh leis an mballa/ He is climbing the wall. just tell me whether it's correct.

i appreciate it greatly.
Brina

"Tá sé agéirigh leis an mballa"

Where's Mac Léinn?...

Tá sé ag dreapadh suas an balla. I dont think there is a mutation on balla after the adverb, but there might be.

There is greim/grip/grimper in different languages, but I dont think it is used for climbing

"Tá sé ag dreapadh suas an balla" is what I would say. "Dreapadóireacht" instead of "dreapadh" is also acceptable. "Faoin mballa" is used in expressions such as "Bhuail sé an pláta faoin mballa." He hit the plate against the wall. "Leis an mballa" is used in sentences like "Leag sé an rothar leis an mballa." He leaned the bicycle against the wall. So "faoin mballa" suggests that something was hurled against the wall.
Bíonn na réalta amuigh san oíche. The stars are out at night.