Fun Facts about Scottish Gaelic

[HolyHandGrenade!]

I will be posting fun facts about Scottish Gaelic, because I’ve been learning it and I think it’s a very interesting language. Hopefully people will be interested but it will be fun even if I am just screaming into the void.

[HolyHandGrenade!]

Gaelic has a very fun phonology. Every consonant in Gaelic has 4 forms: broad (basic or velarized), slender (palatized), broad lenited, & slender lenited. Lenition is shown by adding ⟨h⟩. Gaelic distinguishes between aspirated & unaspirated stops instead of voiced & unvoiced.
p: [pʰ] [pʰj] ph: [f] [fj]
b: [p] [pj] bh: [v] [vj]
t: [t̪ʰ] [tʲʰ] th: [h] [hj]
d: [t̪] [tʲ] dh: [ɣ] [ʝ]
c: [kʰ] [kʲʰ] ch: [x] [ç]
g: [k] [kʲ] gh: [ɣ] [ʝ]
f: [f] [fj] fh: silent
s: [s] [ʃ] sh: [h] [hj]
m: [m] [mj] mh: [v] [vj]
Lenition is unmarked for:
n: [n̪ˠ] [ɲ] [n]
r: [rˠ] [ɾ] [ɾʲ]
l: [l̪ˠ] [ʎ] [l̪ˠ] [l]

These rules are not always consistent with spelling. For example, ⟨mh⟩ and ⟨dh⟩ are sometimes silent.

[Arayaz]

Fun. That looks pretty similar to Irish, though the aspiration contrast is different.

[WeepingElf]

Fun. That looks pretty similar to Irish, though the aspiration contrast is different.

Yes - Irish and Scottish Gaelic are very closely related, hardly more than two dialects of the same language.

[HolyHandGrenade!]

Last time I told you about broad & slender consonants, but not how they are indicated in the orthography. Basically how it works is broad consonants are surrounded by broad vowel: a, o, u; slender consonants are surrounded by slender vowels: i, e.
For example in the word “gearmailtis”, ⟨ɡ⟩, ⟨lt⟩, & ⟨s⟩ are slender, while ⟨rm⟩ is broad. A side effect of this is that sometimes you can’t tell if a vowel actually produces a sound or if it’s just there to indicate broad or slender. In the first syllable of “gearmailtis” the ⟨a⟩ is silent, while in the second syllable it isn’t and instead the ⟨i⟩ is silent.
This rule, combined with lenition, tends to make words longer than they should be. For example: “fhidheall” /i.əl/ (as best as I can hear it).

[Kijetesantakalu042]

Scottish Gaelic is kinda cool

[HolyHandGrenade!]

Scottish Gaelic is kinda cool

Wait till I get to grammar

[HolyHandGrenade!]

In Gaelic, the possessive is indicated by the preposition “aig” meaning “at”. So “Mary has a dog” = “tha cù aig màiri” = “a dog is at Mary”. And also “Mary’s dog” = “an cù aig màiri” = “the dog at Mary”.
But if you wanted to talk about something attached to your body, like body parts or clothes, you would use “air” meaning “on”. “Tha bròg aig màiri” = “Mary has a shoe”, while “tha bròg air màiri” = “Mary has a shoe on”. And with body parts: “Tha ceann air màiri” = “Mary has a head”. If you said “Tha ceann aig màiri”, that might mean she is holding someone else’s head, or a severed head, or any type of head not directly attached to her body.

Now here’s where Gaelic gets really interesting. You might think “my dog” = “an cù aig mi”, but Gaelic has inflected prepositions. That means that prepositions inflect for person. Note this is not agreement because the inflected form can no longer modify a noun and the form for 3rd person inflection is not the same as the form used for nouns.
“Aig” meaning “at”:
(This chart will also introduce you to Gaelic pronouns)
Aig+mi=agam “at me”
Aig+sinn=againn “at us”
Aig+thu=agad “at you”
Aig+sibh=agaibh “at you (formal/plural)”
Aig+e=aige “at him”
Aig+i=aice “at her”
Aig+iad=aca “at them”
“My dog” = “an cù agam”

There are, however, more Englishy possessive pronouns, including “mo” meaning “my”, and “do” meaning “your”, but these are only used for inalienable possession, such as family members and body parts. “My mother” = “mo mhàthair”.
Something amusing to cap off the post: “my wife” is “mo bhean”, while “my husband” is “an duine agam” literally meaning “my person”.

[Kijetesantakalu042]

In Gaelic, the possessive is indicated by the preposition “aig” meaning “at”. So “Mary has a dog” = “tha cù aig màiri” = “a dog is at Mary”. And also “Mary’s dog” = “an cù aig màiri” = “the dog at Mary”.
But if you wanted to talk about something attached to your body, like body parts or clothes, you would use “air” meaning “on”. “Tha bròg aig màiri” = “Mary has a shoe”, while “tha bròg air màiri” = “Mary has a shoe on”. And with body parts: “Tha ceann air màiri” = “Mary has a head”. If you said “Tha ceann aig màiri”, that might mean she is holding someone else’s head, or a severed head, or any type of head not directly attached to her body.

Now here’s where Gaelic gets really interesting. You might think “my dog” = “an cù aig mi”, but Gaelic has inflected prepositions. That means that prepositions inflect for person. Note this is not agreement because the inflected form can no longer modify a noun and the form for 3rd person inflection is not the same as the form used for nouns.
“Aig” meaning “at”:
(This chart will also introduce you to Gaelic pronouns)
Aig+mi=agam “at me”
Aig+sinn=againn “at us”
Aig+thu=agad “at you”
Aig+sibh=agaibh “at you (formal/plural)”
Aig+e=aige “at him”
Aig+i=aice “at her”
Aig+iad=aca “at them”
“My dog” = “an cù agam”

There are, however, more Englishy possessive pronouns, including “mo” meaning “my”, and “do” meaning “your”, but these are only used for inalienable possession, such as family members and body parts. “My mother” = “mo mhàthair”.
Something amusing to cap off the post: “my wife” is “mo bhean”, while “my husband” is “an duine agam” literally meaning “my person”.

This is giving me ideas for my conlang grammar. Please continue at some point.

[HolyHandGrenade!]

Some quick notes about phonology. Stress is on the first syllable, except for a few exceptions, and stressed vowels may have vowel length, which is indicated by a grave diacritic. Lenition is only productive on the initial consonant, and slenderization is only productive on the final consonant. Consonant clusters /sm sp st sk/ block lenition. Epenthesis is common (ex: “Alba” [al̪ˠapə] meaning “Scotland”).

[HolyHandGrenade!]

Gaelic doesn’t have an indefinite article, but it does have a definite, “an”, which is unnecessarily complicated because Gaelic. “An” lenites feminine words beginning with ⟨p b m f c g⟩ and becomes “a’” (except before ⟨f⟩, because lenited f, or ⟨fh⟩, is silent). It becomes “am” for masculine words beginning with ⟨p b m f⟩ and “an t-” before any noun starting with a vowel and feminine nouns starting with ⟨s sl sn sr⟩. The plural article is “na”, or “na h-” before nouns starting with a vowel.

[HolyHandGrenade!]

Gaelic has three ways of making plurals: the suffix -an (or
-ean if the previous consonant is slender), the suffix
-aichean, and by slenderizing the last consonant (shown by adding an i or e before it). You really just have to memorize what gets what plural.

Uinnean “onion” > uinneanan “onions”
Bata “boat” > bataichean “boats”
Mathan “bear” > mathain “bears”

[HolyHandGrenade!]

Verbs part 1 (the games begin!):
Scottish Gaelic is a VSO language:

“Tha mi toilichte”
COP 1 happy
/ha mi ˈtʰɔlɪçtʲə/
I am happy

“Goid mi an drathais”
steal 1 DEF underpants
/kɤtʲ mi an̪ˠ ˈt̪ɾa.ɪʃ/
I steal the underpants

However, with the imperfective construction, which Gaelic uses frequently, the content verb is between the subject and the object and is proceeded by the particle “ag” (or “a’” before consonants):

“Tha mi a’ goid an drathais”
COP 1 NPFV steal DEF underpants
/ha mi ə kɤtʲ an̪ˠ ˈt̪ɾa.ɪʃ/
I am stealing the underpants

Infinitives are preceded by the particle “a”, lenited, and then given the prefix “dh’-” if they start with a vowel.

“a ghoid”
INF steal\INF
/ə ɣɤtʲ/
To steal

“a dh’òl”
INF INF-steal
/ə ɣɔːɫ̪/
To eat