Haigh,
I've noticed something while looking at a phrase book:

Tá tinneas fiacaile orm "Stands sickness of teeth on me" 'I have a toothache'

Tá orm an fiaclóir a fhéiceáil "Stands on me the dentist a seeing" 'I have to see a dentist'

It looks like the 'state of' (status) coded by 'ar' (orm here) has been fronted, that is, a personal status or personal/subjective experience has been brought to the fore to show it is important, very important, so modality has been born of 'expression of status' x 'tagging (fronting) mechanism'.


Other examples?:

Tá Gaeilg agam -I have Irish
Tá agam Gaeilg a labhairt -I must Irish a speak

*Tá carr liom
Is liom an carr seo

But is this (tá ... ar ... -> tá ar ... a ...) really English influence?
I'd think it's normal to move long phrases to the end of sentences, especially clause-like verbal noun phrases.

"Tá agam Gaeilge a labhairt" is an anglicism because English "have to" is rendered by "tá ag ... a"

The sentence "Is liom an carr seo" is very different.
"liom" is predicate, "an carr seo" is subject. So it's normal Irish word order.
"*Is (í/é) an carr seo liom" would be ungrammatical.

Lars

(Message edited by Lars on January 17, 2008)

>Tá agam Gaeilg a labhairt -I must Irish a speak

If you wanna say I must, you say "Tá agam LE Gaeilg a labhairt".

>*Tá carr liom

means "I’ve brought a car"

Tá orm Gaeilge a labhairt a bheadh agamsa.

Tá amhras orm faoi "Tá agam"

Ach feicim ó Tobar na Gaedhilge go bhfuil sé ag Máire 7 rl, ach mar a deir Lughaidh "Tá agam le" atá i gceist i gcónaí.

(Message edited by aonghus on January 17, 2008)