I have been busy updating my Niamh in line with the Muskerry house style - I am now in chapter 33 of the the 35 I had done previously. It is very onerous to keep redoing these things, but I am nearly through! So I want to do more chapters of Niamh next week!

Query: “Dá gcurfá chúm siar go Ceann Cora, a rí,” ar seisean le Maolmórdha, “trí cínn de sna crannaibh is feárr agat chun na hoibre, do chuirfinn trí loingeas dá ndéanamh gan a thuilleadh righnis.”

Is "rud a chur á dhéanamh" "to have something made"?

So if you wanted to say "I had a suit made", could you say "do chuireas culaith éadaigh á déanamh"?

Query eile:

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Chuímhníos air nuair a thugas an tarcaisne dhuit agus nuair a chonac an chuma ’nar chimeádais srian le t’fheirg. ‘Mura mac rí é,’ arsa mise im aigne féin, ‘tá an fholaíocht ann pé ball ’na bhfuair sé í ’ bheith ann.’

If he is a king's son, he's got breeding, wherever he found it to be - does that make any sense? The "wherever he found it to be" doesn't really work. Does it mean "wherever he got it from"?

quote:

Nách mór an cleasaí Niamh! Chuir sí thusa ar theachtaireacht an lá úd. Do chuir más fíor bréag! Ní hea ach cheap sí sinn a chur ó chéile.

I am thinking that "ní hea ach..." can be translated as "actually" - "actually she thought of a way of splitting us up"?

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Is "rud a chur á dhéanamh" "to have something made"

By somebody else, yes. "In Auftrag geben" in German; "to commission" in English, perhaps.

"Mura mac Rí é" If he is not a king's son

however he has the capacity for it wherever in himself he found it

Would be my reading

folaíocht [ainmfhocal baininscneach den tríú díochlaonadh]
mianach, pór maith fola (capall folaíochta).

He is saying that he was not sent on a message, (Más fíor bréag) i. that the message was an excuse and the real purpose was to separate them.

Thanks for all those, Aonghus.

Some of these are things that someone working from English and translating into Irish pretty directly would not come up with. Take "Chuir sí thusa ar theachtaireacht an lá úd. Do chuir más fíor bréag! Ní hea ach cheap sí sinn a chur ó chéile." The idiom just doesn't parallel the English.

Más fíor bréag - this is meant to mean "whether it be true or false", but seems to mean "even though it was a load of rubbish".

Ní hea ach - this is mean to mean "not only that but", but seems to mean "actually what it was was that..."

Of course it's fine to understand things from the context, but to try to thing yourself into a Gaelic mindset, whereby you would be naturally saying these things (and not translating) must be harder!

más fíor bréag - "apparently"?

I read it as "If a lie be true", i. that is is a complete lie.

However, I see Ó Dónaill has "Más fíor (nó) bréag é" whether it be true or false.

I'm not sure. The sense is clear however from the context.

>>>Chómh luath agus ’ bhí am mhairbh na hoíche airís ann d’imigh sé.

I would understand "am marbh", but "am mhairbh" has got me. Does anyone get this? Is it "am (de) mhairbh"?

Google shows several uses of "am mhairbh an hoíche": I thhink the grammar would be explained by considering this as a unit - the dead of night.

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Is "rud a chur á dhéanamh" "to have something made"?

Yes. "chuir sé tigh á dhéanamh" = he had a house built, for example.

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‘Mura mac rí é,’ arsa mise im aigne féin, ‘tá an fholaíocht ann pé ball ’na bhfuair sé í ’ bheith ann.’

He has the breeding wherever he found it to be, i.e. whatever place it is in which he found it

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The "wherever he found it to be" doesn't really work.

It does work if you think of the verbal noun phrase "í 'bheith ann" as being the object of "fuair sé". In other words "in whatever place he found it to exist".

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Nách mór an cleasaí Niamh! Chuir sí thusa ar theachtaireacht an lá úd. Do chuir más fíor bréag! Ní hea ach cheap sí sinn a chur ó chéile.

"Más fíor bréag" normally means "whether it be true or not", in other words the conjunction "nó" is understood to be between "fíor" and "bréag": "Más fíor (nó) bréag é, ní mise a chúm ná a cheap". I think in the particular example you quote, it is in fact "más fíor is bréag é", "if is taken as a truth, it is in fact a lie". "She did forsooth, indeed!"

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"actually she thought of a way of splitting us up"?

Not quite, "not a bit of it/not at all, what she was actually thinking of was to split us up".

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I would understand "am marbh", but "am mhairbh" has got me. Does anyone get this? Is it "am (de) mhairbh"?

It's the plural of "marbh", "na mairbh" being the dead (people) as a plural noun! Remember the old saying "Am codlata dos na beoibh is am spóirt dos na mairbh"!

Carmanach, thanks for all that. But why would mairbh be lentied in "am mhairbh"? I get "am na mairbh", but "am mhairbh"?

I suspect that explanation too; it is "am/uair mhairbh na hoíche" - it seems to me that it is an adjective here.

I see that there is another sample in Séadna:

Nuair a dhúisigh sí as a codladh bhí sé in am mhairbh na hoíche

http://wikisource.org/wiki/S%C3%A9adna/32

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Carmanach, thanks for all that. But why would mairbh be lentied in "am mhairbh"? I get "am na mairbh", but "am mhairbh"?

Well, am + mairbh na hoíche would seem to be the only logical explanation. You would therefore need lenition if "am" is governing "mairbh na hoíche". A colleague suggested "mairbh" might be a dative form but in the expression you quoted "Chómh luath agus ’ bhí am mhairbh na hoíche airís ann d’imigh sé." there is no preposition.

Bear in mind also, the variant expression "i mí mharbh na hoíche". There, though, it is obvious it is mí mharbh + na hoíche and not mí + marbh na hoíche.

I see Dinneen too follows my own line of thinking in treating "mairbh" as a plural noun.

Chonaic mé "uair mhairbh na hoíche" freisin.

The hour of night belonging to the dead, mar sin?

Bheadh ciall leis sin.

Shíl mé go mb'fhéidir go raibh aitreabúid i gceist, i. cén cineál ama/uair a bhí i gceist.

I see - the lenition relates to concatenation of genitives. An odd phrase - or one possibly originally Béarlachas? (in the DEAD of night?)

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I see - the lenition relates to concatenation of genitives. An odd phrase - or one possibly originally Béarlachas? (in the DEAD of night?)

I can't possibly see how it is Béarlachas. Dinneen's and my own explanation make most sense I think. The only other possibility we are looking at is that "am mhairbh na hoíche" has become frozen from being used with a preceding preposition "in am mhairbh na hoíche" (which Dinneen does give in his example) where "mhairbh" is dative. When it is used in absence of the preposition the dative form is nevertheless retained plus the requisite lenition, not at all a rare phenomenon in modern Irish.

Another question though; is this the norm in the dative of adjectives following masculine nouns? I'm not entirely sure myself. The fact that we also have "uair mhairbh na hoíche" might cast cold water on the idea that we're looking at a dative - but Corkirish might be able to tell us more on that.

"i mí mharbh na hoíche" is slightly different in that "mí" is a feminine noun meaning "middle" followed by the adjective "marbh". There's little doubt there that "marbh" is an adjective.

http://www.feasta.ie/2009/meitheamh/alt5.html

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Bhí an chuma ar an scéal gur éirigh leo fosta, mar nár sheas sí suas ag uair mhairbh na hoíche agus d’fhógair i nguth ard scréachach go raibh sí féin ag smaoineamh ar leabhar a scríobh chun a cuid dóláis i ndiaidh a grá ghil a bhí sínte faoi chlár taobh léi a dhíbirt.

Sampla fánach amháin atá ann.

Well, Carmanach, my problem with the idea that mhairbh is dative is that the form would be mharbh not mhairbh. You can have lenition, eclipsis or nothing in the dative of adjectives following masculine nouns in PUL's works. But the slender -rbh requires explanation.

Maybe best to learn as a phrase and come across explanation some other time!

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Well, Carmanach, my problem with the idea that mhairbh is dative is that the form would be mharbh not mhairbh.

Thank you. I suspected that the ending wouldn't change in the dative.

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Maybe best to learn as a phrase and come across explanation some other time!

So, you don't believe that "mairbh" is the plural of the noun "marbh? Or are you thinking that it should be "am marbh na hoíche" on the old pattern where each noun in the chain takes the genitive and so the genitive plural of "marbh" is "marbh"?

No, Carmanach, I did accept your earlier interpretation that mairbh is the plural of marbh. I was thinking the literal meaning is "the time of the deads of the night".

But if it is a dative adjective, it would be analogous to the problem with "dom lom deirg ainneóna", where lom is a masculine noun and deirg appears to be a dative feminine adjective and not masculine. It is possible that a number of these adjectives have got dsm's that mirror dsf's?

(Message edited by corkirish on January 24, 2011)

Remember that "na mairbh" is very commonly used in Irish. "Cuirimíst paidir le hanamacha na marbh".

ní raibh aon chuid de na mairbh á dtaispeáint féin; no part of the dead men was showing, coming up (in water), (FI:45)
má tá aon bhaint ag na mairbh leis an mbeo (AC:18)

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It is possible that a number of these adjectives have got dsm's that mirror dsf's?

Yes, perhaps so.