I have just noticed that the online version of An Foclóir Beag lists the nominative and genitive singular of the noun báisteach (rain, rainfall) but no plurals. Since this is unusual, I searched the internet for báisteacha and got very few results, 2 of them in the archives of this site.

Should I conclude that the nominative plural is /b{báisteacha} (or something else), or should I conclude that there is no plural in Irish, and they would say something like "we've had many heavy rains this year" in some other way?

I think in some languages rain is uncountable. German Regen at least is a singulare tantum. báisteaċ might be another example..

I don't think I've ever heard a plural for either báisteach or fearthainn.

Ó Donaill lists no plural either. Rain is a continuum!

Sa chás san, a Aonghuis, conas a chuirfeá Gaeilge ar "we've had many heavy rains this year"? "a lán tamall de bháisteach trom"?

Bhí báisteach trom ann go minic i mbliana.
Bhí ceathanna troma fairsing i mbliana.

...

Maosadh le báisteach sinn i mbliana.

It would be interesting to see if this goes across to other words in the weather catagory. Mar shampla:

- winds
- thunders
- waters
- showers
- fires

Very old usage in English, but every language has different ideas about things. Isn't that what makes Irish and English different, the psychological viewpoint that is built into the languages?

My correction for one of the above before: showers. I see Aonghus has ceathanna.

"Fire" is in the weather category for you? Mate, am I ever glad I don't live where you do!

In any case, I know for a fact that it has a plural since one of the first Irish idioms I ever learned was idir dhá thine Bealtaine. Evidently so does "water" (e.g. uiscí uachtair "headwaters"), "wind" (gaotha móra "high winds"), and "thunder" (toirneacha ag carnadh "thunderclaps piling up").

hmm, shouldn't it be "Idir dhá thine Bhealtaine" ?

Tá an ceart agat ar ndóigh, a Fhirín. Duart gur fhoglaimíos é, ní duart gur fhoglaimíos gan locht é!

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"Fire" is in the weather category for you? Mate, am I ever glad I don't live where you do!

Indirectly, yes. Lightning causing them, or dry heat, and then fires. That happens all the time out here in California.

Some people think "California" comes from Spanish "hot oven". Sometimes it feels like that!

As a fun aside, I found it absolutely hilarious (in a nice way) when I visited Galway and saw people diving off the diving board near Bóthar na Trá. It was pouring rain, quite chilly, and everyone was out like it was the sunniest day in Ireland. Lots of ceathanna that day. Good memory!

Hey, another Californian...

Indirectly, yes. Lightning causing them, or dry heat, and then fires. That happens all the time out here in California.

And the fires can generate their own "weather" of sorts:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=44583780&l=cdea20e4ff&id=3221676

Agus aer glan!!!

Táim ag léamh An Béal Bocht faoi láthair. Is cineál thesaurus é maidir le cursaí drochaimsire!

Thanks for your many comments. I shall now endeavour never to think of an individual period of rain as 'a rain' and multiple separate periods of rain as 'rains', at least not while touring Ireland or Germany.

Interesting that when Fear_na_mbróg used báisteach in the plural on this forum back in 2005, in the context of weak plurals, no one remarked on it:

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Here's a feminine one:

NS: báisteach
NP: báisteacha
GS: báistí
GP: báisteach

Perhaps it's one of those errors one wouldn't make oneself, but doesn't point out when made by another. After all, it's clear how it was made and what is meant by it.

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Bhí báisteach trom ann go minic i mbliana.
Bhí ceathanna troma fairsing i mbliana.

A Aonghuis, as I think you know, I'm still very weak (understatement) on Irish verbs, but it looks to me as if both of these sentences rely on nouns – báisteach (rain) and ceathanna (showers) – rather than their corresponding verbs. If that's right, I'm a bit surprised; I figured that if báisteacha did not exist, "we've had many heavy rains this year" would probably be turned into something like "it rained heavily many times this year". Would you say that Irish tends towards noun structures to describe weather phenomena, or are verbal structures just as common?

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Maosadh le báisteach sinn i mbliana.

Sorry, need help translating this sentence. Stymied by maosadh. Is it related to the noun maos? I see that it means "saturated" and I would just love it if this meant "We are saturated with rain this year," but maos appears to require ar.

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Would you say that Irish tends towards noun structures to describe weather phenomena

Yes. Ó Siadhail gives in lesson 10:

Tá ceo, gaoṫ, báisteaċ, solas ... ann

The ... mean, you can use any weather phenomenon there.

Irish as a whole is a very nominal language, not only when weather is concerned.

A Linda, maosadh in this case is a past impersonal form, so "We were saturated" is a more faithful translation. (The present tense equivalent would be maostar.) My dictionary doesn't have an entry for maos as a verb, but does list the past participle form maosta. So whether it represents dialectalism which never made it into CO or an innovative back-formation, maosadh is perfectly understandable in context.

Speaking of rain, although there is a corresponding verb báistigh, I don't think I've ever seen it used. The expression is always cur báistí or cur fearthainne.

I can't think of a case where the verb báistigh would be used.

There are many, many words for different types of rain however.

Tá brádán [drizzle] ann inniu, ach bhí sé ag clagarnach [pelting] aréir.

Tá díle báistí air. Beir leat an scáth fearthainne!

Ta for the explanation of maosadh. Things are much clearer now.

An Foclóir Beag has no listing for maos at all, just maoth, the adjective. Foclóir Póca has the same adjective, but strangely enough, 'saturated' is not among its many meanings, the others being 'soft, tender; weak; moist; sentimental'.

FP does have maos as an m1 noun, with ar maos meaning 'steeping, steeped; saturated', but no verb maos or past participle maosta. However, it does have the transitive/intransitive verb maothaigh, meaning 'soften; moisten; steep, saturate'.

So I've tried to substitute maothaigh for the verb maos in this sentence, but I barely know my autonomous from my euonymous. Is this right?

Maothaíodh le báisteach sinn i mbliana.

Tá an ghramadach ceart, ach nílim ar an eolas faoin úsáid.

Tá an ghramadach ceart, ceart go leor. Ach tá amhras orm faoin ngramadach.

There is a reason why An Foclóir Beag is called Beag!

Foclóir Uí Dhónaill is about 10 times the bulk.

Báite, as in "drowned", is commonly used to convey the effects of heavy rain. This can be on the individual, the country, the land (agricultural) or pretty much anything else. In conversation, something like "tá an tír báite aríst i mbliana" might be heard. If you wanted to mimic the much satirised rain sodden peasant, you could respond with "caillfí éinne gan snámh maith"!

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Tá an ghramadach ceart, ach nílim ar an eolas faoin úsáid.

The grammar is correct, but I don't know about the usage.

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Tá an ghramadach ceart, ceart go leor. Ach tá amhras orm faoin ngramadach.

The grammar is correct, all right. But I have doubt[s] about the grammar.


Did I translate these correctly? (I love the fact that you both answer me in Irish; the downside for you is that you're then called upon to provide answers about your answers!)

Oops. I meant úsáid rather than gramadach. Your translation is correct.

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Your translation is correct.

Yeah!!!

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There is a reason why An Foclóir Beag is called Beag!

Indeed there is! And I come up against it at least once a day. But it often helps me find things I can't track down anywhere else. And the occasional online search makes a welcome relief from thumbing through the pages of dictionaries all the time.


So, to sum up, it's generally agreed that the word maos, which is a noun and a verb, is commonly used in connection with the weather, and there's also a verb maothaigh, which is not.

One more thing before I allow this particular part of the conversation to die a natural death. Would you say that maothaigh is common enough in other contexts, such as, say, moistening a postage stamp or saturating a sponge, or is it just a dictionary entry which rarely, if ever, sees the light of day?

Pass. It is not familiar to me.

Having started the "maos" discussion I have to admit that I only heard the form "maosta" and took it to mean "soaked" from the context. I am confident that "maosadh muid" is OK for "fliuchadh go craiceann sinn" but it would not work as a transitive verb . I heard it used among Inis Cé islanders and their descendants. Incidentally they also use "sinn" a lot i.e. bhíot sinn = bhíodh sinn = bhímis = bhíodh muid...

I have never heard "maothaigh" used.

Well now, that one took an interesting turn at the end. Thanks for putting up with me. I learned a lot.

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There are many, many words for different types of rain however.

Yes, I rather thought there might be! Which led me to thinking of all our ways to say it's raining, in addition to the aforesaid pelting and drizzling, in my particular part of Canada:

• it's spitting (ie, occasional small drops)
• it's sprinkling (ie, more than spitting, less than falling)
• falling rain (steady rate, normal drops)
• pouring rain
• pounding rain
• drenching rain, we were/got drenched [by the rain]
• soaking rain, we were/got soaked [by the rain]
• lashing rain, we were/got lashed [by the rain]
• raining bucketsful, rain is coming down in bucketsful
• raining cats and dogs
• sheets of rain, the rain is coming down in sheets
• streaks of rain, the rain is streaking down
• curtains of rain, but NOT the rain is coming down in curtains
• the rain is drumming on the roof / against the window
• thundering rain (refers to the sound of the rain, NOT the thunder and lightning, which may not be present)
• a deluge
• a downpour
• a torrential downpour

Would anybody care to throw in an Irish equivalent here or there?

There was a nice article in Lá acouple of years ago which I cut out. If I can find it, it might post it.

spitting - ceobhrán, brádán, lá bog [a drizzly day]
pouring - ag stealladh báistí

More later má bhíonn foighne a dhóthain agam!

Pé cineál fearthainne é, titíonn sé go léír arnár gcloiginn Gaelaigh.

(That's the end of the references to An Béal Bocht, I promise!)

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That's the end of the references to An Béal Bocht, I promise

Sin geal[l]tanas nach gcomhlíonfar!

I always thought lá bog referred to a day that was drizzly but still bright and mild enough to spend outside. My better half calls such a condition "Oregon rain"; yes, the weather is wet, but not so much that you can't do gardening or go swimming.

If we stayed inside every time it drizzled we'd never get out.

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There was a nice article in Lá acouple of years ago which I cut out. If I can find it, it might post it.

spitting - ceobhrán, brádán, lá bog [a drizzly day]
pouring - ag stealladh báistí

That would be great. In the meantime, bog (drizzly) - that's the adjective whose usual meaning is 'soft'?

Yes. But it is only when you say "lá bog" that it means drizzly. You will hear it in English too in Ireland - a soft day.

http://www.recmusic.org/lieder/get_text.html?TextId=10178

Here's another phrase:

Cith is dealán - sunshine and showers

A Aonghuis, an bhfuil leagan cainte a fhreagraíonn do "sunshower" (i.e. báisteach agus an ghrian ag dealrú)? "Cith gealáin", arbh fhéidir?

Múr is aiteall?

N'fheadar. Níl fhios agam. Tá an alt úd aimsithe agam, agus á scanáil agam anois

Luaitear Cith gealáin ann.

(Message edited by aonghus on August 25, 2009)

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dealán

A Aonghuis, me darlin', y' do present a challenge, don't ye? I can't find this word in the dictionary. Not even sure of its root. There's a verb dealraigh and a noun dealramh, both of which are connected to 'shine', but they wouldn't account for the fada or the missing 'r'. There was a suggestion elsewhere that it came from dea- and lán (full, curve, bend). Beyond that, nada. Help!

Seo é:
http://www.box.net/shared/z0gtft4kjn

Ó Dónaill has Dealán as a variant of Gealán.
"Cith is Dealán" is the name of a famous volume of Short Stories by Séamas Ó Grianna (Máire)

http://www.amazon.com/Cith-Dealan-Seamus-O-Grianna/dp/0853424489

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Dealán as a variant of Gealán

And gealán, for all my fellow rank beginners, literally means 'bright spot', making cith is gealán a thoroughly delightful phrase. Needless to say, I'd not heard of Séamas Ó Grianna's volume of short stories. Thank you for telling me about it, a Aonghuis. I'll sock the information away in my ever-expanding "Things I Learned from Aonghus" file for the day when I know enough Irish to be able to read them.

In the meantime, I've downloaded Seán de Fréine's article on the many Irish words for 'rain'. Since it's all in Irish, I hereby serve notice upon all of you -- brace yourselves for many more questions to come. Up until now, my consumption of Irish-language literature has been restricted to Na Dódaí from BBC Northern Ireland, and they give English cheat sheets!

Ah, well. Humble beginnings. Very humble.

You might want to start some new threads....

Maidir leis an mbriathar "báistigh", tá sé ann i gcónaí ina ainm briathartha.

"Tá an lá ag báisteach" a deirtear - nó "ag báistigh" fiú amháin (seanfhoirm shioctha an tabharthaigh, cf. "ag brionglóidigh", "ag géimnigh")

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You might want to start some new threads....

Yes, that's what I thought too.

That was a fantastic article. I know I won't be the only one that's grateful you went to the trouble of scanning and uploading.
I do have something I didn't understand to ask you.
It says you have the choice of 'tuile neamhdhaite' 'tuile rua' nó 'tuile liath'.
Can I ask if anyone knows what the difference is between these??

I don't think there is any difference. He is just saying that the expressions 'tuile rua' and 'tuile liath' are both in use. There is no such expression as 'tuile neamhdhaite' - he just means that you can say 'tuile' on its own.

Aontaíom leat.

The piece is written in a converstaional style.

The sentence in question is under the heading "Rabharta téarmaí" (a flood of terms)
"Tá tuile ann chomh maith, agus rogha agat anseo: é a bheith ina tuile simplí neamhdhaite, nó e bheith ina tuile rua nó tuile liath".

I'd guess that the difference between liath and rua would depend on what the tuile was sweeping with it.

Taoille rua = an-taoille, taoille an-láidir

Níl mé ar an eolas faoin taoille liath.



Oops: for "taoille" (which is a Connemara variant) read "tuile".

(Message edited by Abigail on August 27, 2009)