I've been having some difficulty making sense of the difference between the following two sentences from "Studies in Modern Irish":-

(a)"Cad chuige adubhairt sí ná raibh aon mhaith innti?"
Meaning: "What did she say she was no good at?"
(b)"Cad chuige go ndubhairt sí ná raibh aon mhaith innti?"
Meaning: "Why did she say she was no good?"


I wasn't aware that the direct relative could be used in sentences like these, much less have an entirely different meaning from one with the indirect relative.

Could it be that where the interrogative pronoun (cad) + prepositional pronoun (chuige) have come to form a unit, like "cad-chuige" or "cad-'na-thaobh", the direct relative is necessary where they do not have that meaning (as in (a))?



Also, according to the author (a) is a "double relative question" while (b) is a "single relative question".
I'm not sure why - I can see two relatives in both.

The sentence with go - are you sure it is indirect relative It seems to me to be a subordinating conjunction "go". I am assuming this as "cad 'na thaobh" is followed by a go-clause in Irish.

Sentence 1 - I wonder if, as well as meaning "why?", cad chuige can be reanalysed as chun+cad. Níl aon mhaith inti chun + cad.

I think:

a)

relative 1: a
relative 2: ná (= nach)

b)

1) go subordinating clause ("that")
2) relative ná (= nach)

Seánw, ná is subordinating and not relative in those sentences. The "extra" relatives are embedded in "cad chuige" - in other words "is cad chuige"

Okay, thanks. Sorry for muddying the waters!

I am thinking that the relative in cad chuige is "cad is chuige" rather than "is cad chuige", but I don't know, and it is a moot point as the "is" is dropped anyway.

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The sentence with go - are you sure it is indirect relative It seems to me to be a subordinating conjunction "go". I am assuming this as "cad 'na thaobh" is followed by a go-clause in Irish.

The author makes it clear that it's an indirect relative and gives examples with "cad 'na thaobh" too.

quote:

Sentence 1 - I wonder if, as well as meaning "why?", cad chuige can be reanalysed as chun+cad. Níl aon mhaith inti chun + cad.

Yes and my assumption is that the direct relative instead of the usual indirect is what indicates the meaning "cad chuige" is intended to have.

quote:

I think:

a)

relative 1: a
relative 2: ná (= nach)

b)

1) go subordinating clause ("that")
2) relative ná (= nach)

quote:

Seánw, ná is subordinating and not relative in those sentences. The "extra" relatives are embedded in "cad chuige" - in other words "is cad chuige"

Actually "ná" in both sentences should be a relative particle.
According to this author, a conjunction doesnt follow
a relative (like "adubhairt" and "go ndubhairt"),
e.g.
"Measann tú GO ndéanfainn maitheas duit"
but: "Cad é an maith A mheasann tú A dhéanfainn duit?"


Perhaps I should give Gearóid Ó Nualláin's works a rest for a while :) They're interesting but frequently very hard to follow.

James, I have studies in modern irish. Which volume, which page?

Sentence b) is asserted by Ua Nualláin to be indirect relative, and to contain only a single relative. So the "go" is the relative, and the ná is subordinating.

If you look at this sentence "isé cúis n-a dtugtí "July an chabáiste" ar an mí sin 'ná so", taken from PUL's Mo Sgéal Féin, cúis is followed by an indirect relative: "the reason for which". In fact you could have said: "isé cúis GO dtugtí "July an chabáiste" ar an mí sin 'ná so". Cad chuige is similar in meaning "the reason for which", and so the go-clause was indirect relative. The ná is just subordinating. She said she was no good is just a subordinate clause.

Sentence a), both the "a" of adubhairt and the ná are relatives (sorry about that a Sheáin W). There is a nested double relative here, with "cad chuige" governing both "adubhairt" and "ná raibh". "at what did she say..." and "at what was she no good".

The ná in sentence b) is definitely not relative. James, you are extrapolating from "Cad é an maith A mheasann tú A dhéanfainn duit?" that a relative clause can never be succeeded by a subordinate clause. In actual fact, "Cad é an maith A mheasann tú A dhéanfainn duit?" is a sentence of type a) above. "Cad é" governs both "a mheasann" and "a dhéanfainn" in a nested relationship.

quote:

James, I have studies in modern irish. Which volume, which page?

Part 1, pg. 138-140.

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Sentence b) is asserted by Ua Nualláin to be indirect relative, and to contain only a single relative. So the "go" is the relative, and the ná is subordinating.

Yes you must be right about the "ná" in the second sentence being subordinate. I had assumed it was relative due to that sentence's apparent similarity to others in which the "ná" was definitely relative.


Bloody grammar! :)