Dia dhuit!

Could someone tell me how to correctly address a warrant Irish officer or soldier? If I know his/her name and if I'm only aware of his/her rank.

Go raibh maith agaibh roimh ré!

There is a book called Maidir le do Litir by Séamas Daltún and is basically about how to write letters in Irish. He has a long section on how to address various people, clergy, army officers, politicians etc. If you give me the exact rank of the person you are speaking of, I can search it for you.

Carmanach, is there a difference between written and spoken address? If I meet an officer/soldier and need to call him.

I'm mostly interested in:

1) private (Saighdiúr Singil)
2) corporal (Ceannaire)
3) sergeant (Sáirsint)
4) lieutenant (Lefteanant)

Cesarborgia,

Irish uses the Vocative case when addressing someone. Essentially, this adds an "h" after the first letter of the title (called lenition) if that letter can "accept" that "h". The letters that are typically lenited are all consonants except M R H L and N.

So, for example when addressing a Sergeant you would say "A Sháirsint"..pronounced roughly "Ah harsint". If you log onto www.tg4.ie and watch an episode or two of Ros na Run, you'll hear it used when addressing Una, the local Garda Sergeant.

Officer ranks are here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Army_Officer_Rank_Insignia

Enlisted ranks are here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Army_Enlisted_Rank_Insignia

I see no references to Warrant Officers on the Irish Defence Force web-site. However, the Warrant Officer is a staple of most European styled militaries so it would stand to reason that they do exist in Óglaigh na hÉireann.

Le meas,

James

Warrant Officer (Oifigeach Barántais)is the most senior non-commissioned officer rank in the Irish Naval Service. I think it is the naval equivalent of Sergeant Major in the Army

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Navy_Enlisted_Rank_Insignia

So would vocative case would be "A hOifigeach Bharántais" or "A hOifigigh Bharántais"?

James, thank you for the link and the answer!

So there's no need to adding something like an t-uasal to Sáirsint and others except if calling them by name, right?

(Message edited by cesareborgia on April 17, 2009)

BTW, how should I translate into Gaeilge 'Private First Class' (like in US Army)? Saighdiúr Singil na hAicme a hAon seems to be a bruteforce solution...

Saighdiúir Singil, 3 Réalta

is the highest class of private.

Aonghus, yes, that's the Irish rank equal to US Pte I. But I'm mostly interested in literal translation of 'First Class' :-)

Cesarborgia,

I've spent the better part of 22 years working with foreign militaries. You're better off looking at the direct equivalent rank (apples to apples, oranges to oranges, if you will) rather than literal translations. The highest rank of Private in the US Army is PFC (Private First Class, with a pay grade of E-3). You're most direct comparison within Óglaigh na hÉireann would be Saighdiúr Singil, 3 Réalta (Single Soldier, 3 Star).

Normally, I would suggest that you not get too wrapped up with the literal translations. They will most often lead you into a quagmire, especially with Irish. However, in this case the opposite is true. Look at the literal translation of Private First Class in Irish. I personally find this description interesting in that a Private is considered a "Single Soldier"; Saighdiúr Singil. Too often in our (U.S.) military the Private is married with children and the salary associated with the pay grade of E-3 simply is not sufficient to support a Soldier with wife and kids. The literal Irish translation seems to sum up the intent of this rank...Single Soldier. If you look at the insignia of the Saighdiúr Singil, 3 Réalta you will see an triangle enclosing 3 stars....what a descriptive rank; Single Soldier of 3 Stars.

Le meas,

James

James,

I have researched modern military for only five years for my own pleasure only :-), but of course I understand that real Army ranks should only have equivalents, not literal translations; my question about 'First Class' is rather theoretical.

Anyway thank you for your detailed answer! Really interesting information.

Go raibh maith agat :-)

A Chesare, are you familiar with the Foclóir Béarla – Gaeilge de Théarmaí Míleata agus de Théarmaí Gaolmhara? It's available in PDF format here: http://www.military.ie/dfhq/pubrel/publications/focloir.pdf. Under the entry for "Private" are the terms P. grade I, II, III which are equated to "S.S. grád I, II, III". In other contexts, grád is used as an equivalent of "class", e.g. carráiste den chéad ghrád "first-class compartment", lámhachóir den chéad ghrád "first-class shot", etc.

search a site called ''scribd''

there is a downloadable dictionary of irish military terms

Domhnaillín_breac_na_dtruslóg, that is really useful PDF! Thank you so much.

Conchubhar1, thanks! It seems that the document on scribd is the same as one on military.ie. However, i've found a few other interesting docs on scribd :-)

its an amazing site

so handy