LESSONS IN IRISH.
Irish Letters—Their Sounds.
There are seventeen letters in the Irish Alphabet, of which five are vowels, the remaining twelve being consonants. Their correspondents in English are a, b, c, d, e, f, g, i, l, m, n, o, p, r, s, t, and u.
The designation of the letters by their Irish names, Ailm, Beith, etc., which is only a convenient contrivance for distinguishing them from those of other languages, has been purposely omitted, partly because they are, at present, seldom or never called by their appellations, and partly because there is often danger in mistaking the names for the sounds of the letters.
Regarding the pronunciation of Irish letters, and of the Gaelic language generally, the fullest and most open enunciation is required. The vowels must be sounded as in Italian or French; the consonants, as in German or Spanish. This open, full sounding of the letters enables foreigners to learn to speak Irish more correctly and more readily than English-speaking people; for, of all spoken languages, the pronunciation of the English is the most opposite to that of Irish.
Sounds of the Consonants.
The letters b, f, m, n, p, and r, except when aspirated, are sounded like their English analogues. C is never at all pronounced like s or ch soft, but always hard like k; d, like dh; g hard, as in get; and l, generally, like the first l in William.
More variable, however, is s. Before or after the vowels e or i, it is most generally sounded like sh, there being but a single exception to the rule, and this occurs in the word is—the third person singular present indicative of the assertive form of the verb to be, which is pronounced is, and not ish. Before or after a, o, u, it takes simply the sound of s in soon, the demonstrative pronoun so, this, being in Connaught, where it is pronounced sho, the only exception.
Sounds of the Vowels.
A long, as in wâll, has the broad sound as in English; a short, that of a in băt. There is a third sound, very common in the South and West of Ireland, corresponding to the sound of a in whät.
E long is sounded as in whêre, e short, as in whĕn; i long, as ee in pîque, i short, as in pĭck; o long, as in tōld, o short as in gŏt; u long, as in rūle, u short, as in fûll.
Vowels are divided into broad and slender. The broad are a, o, u; the slender are e, i.
Union of Vowels, and their Sounds.
Two vowels coming together constitute a diphthong; three, a triphthong. In Irish there are thirteen diphthongs and five triphthongs. Of the former, six are always long, or naturally so, and the remainder naturally short, but becoming long when accented. The long diphthongs, as they are invariably long, require no accent. The seven short need the presence of this character to show that their sound is, in the case so designated, to be pronounced long.
The long diphthongs are:—ae, ao, eo, eu, ia, and ua.
Sounds of the Six Long Diphthongs.
Ae is sounded like ae in the Latin word Musæ; ao, usually like ee in queer, except in Munster where it has the sound of the first e in there; eo, like eo in the proper noun Keon; eu, long, like ai in wail; ia, like ee in teem; ua, like ooe in wooer.
Sounds of the Seven Short Diphthongs.
Ai, accented, is equivalent to the sound of awi in the English word sawing, being nothing more than the combined sounds â and ĭ; ai, not accented, has the sound of ai in the French taille, cut, and is hard to be learned by an English-speaking student; ea, accented, is sounded like ea in swear, unaccented, like the same letters in heart; ei, accented, like ei in deign, unaccented, like e in den; io, accented, like ee in green, unaccented, like i in grin; iu, accented, like iew in review, unaccented, like oo in blood; oi, accented, like oi in boil, unaccented, like u in shut; ui, like ui in fruit, unaccented, like ui in quiet.
Triphthongs, and their Sounds.
All the triphthongs—aoi, eoi, iai, iui, uai—are pronounced long, and differ but little in their sounds from those of the long diphthongs from which they are formed. They differ mainly in two particulars—first, in a slight prolongation of the diphthongal sound; secondly, in imparting to the immediately succeeding consonant, on account of its nearness to the slender vowel i, a liquid, slender sound, which it would not otherwise receive. Aoi is sounded like uee in Queen; iai, like the diphthong ia (ee), except that the final i gives to the consonant that follows a slender or liquid sound; iui, like eeyu, sounds that cannot be represented in English, as heard in the Irish word ciuin, pronounced keeyuin, in one syllable.
Aspirated Consonants.
We come now to consider the twelve Irish consonants. Of these consonants—l, n, r—never alter their primitive or radical sounds. The remaining nine do change their radical sounds to those of cognate nature.
This change, arising from a rough breathing after the vowel sound, is properly called aspiration, as it merely modifies, rather than destroys, as is sometimes erroneously supposed, the sound of the consonant. The notation for the aspirate is indicated by an accent (´) or h.
Ṕ (asp.) is equivalent to ph or f. B́, before or after e or i, to v; but before or after a, o, u, to w.
Ḿ, before or after e or i, to v; before or after a, o, u, to w, with a slightly nasal sound.
F́ is usually silent; in some words, however, it has the sound of h.
Ć, like ch in och, or the Greek letter chee. Before a, o, or u it has the former sound, which is that of the German ch; but before e or i, it invariably takes the latter sound.
Ǵ, in the beginning of a word, if before the vowels a, o, u, has the guttural sound gh; but before e or i, it is sounded like y. At the end, or in the middle of words, it has no other power than that of prolonging the sound of the preceding vowel.
D́ has a thick, guttural sound, very analogous to g. In the beginning of a word, before e or i, it has exactly the sound of y; but in the middle, or at the end, it has the force of g, that is, it merely lengthens the sound of the preceding vowel or diphthong.
T́ loses its power as a consonant, and has the force of h.
Ś has the sound of k; s, final, is never aspirated.
Derivative Nouns.
Derivative Nouns in Irish are personal or abstract.
Personal Nouns end in ōir, aire, ai, aid́, and are produced from primitive nouns, or past participles.
The terminations ōir, aire, are supposed to be broken forms of the word fear, pronounced fär, a man. If so, then fear must be considered as the root of the Latin ending or, and of the English suffix er.
Abstract Nouns terminate in as or eas, masculine; in aćt, feminine; or in the genitive case singular feminine of adjectives.
Diminutives are formed from nouns and adjectives, and end in an, masculine; in în, masculine or feminine; in ōg, feminine.
Many words that are not diminutives end in an.
Other words terminating in an, from tan, time, or from tain, possessions, are of this class. Iat́, a region, a territory, is, in its fragmentary form ia, the termination of almost all the Latin names of places that have that ending.
From the active signification of the ending ać, and from the meaning of the term neać, an individual, an agent, of which ać is apparently a mere fragment, adjectives with this suffix become personal nouns, and as such are expressive of office, action, or individuality.
Sounds of Certain Terminations.
In Connaught, final ead́ is pronounced like oo in English; in Munster, like a. As the final syllable of the imperfect tense of verbs, it is pronounced incorrectly in Munster, and in some districts in the southern parts of Connaught, like guttural agh.
Generally, ad́ final, in words of two or more syllables, is pronounced like ead́; in Munster, like unaccented a; and, in Connaught and Ulster, like English oo. But in words of one syllable and their compounds, however, the Munster pronunciation is not only adopted in the South, but also in the West and North of Ireland.
In Kilkenny, Waterford, and Tipperary, the diphthongs ea, io, and sometimes iu, are incorrectly pronounced like ow on coming before l, m, and n.
In the words bean, a woman, bard, a poet, and bord, a table, the initial consonant b, when not preceded by the possessive pronouns singular, is not aspirated. Put, however, these pronouns, excepting the feminine, before the same words, and b immediately assumes the aspirate sound; that is, it is pronounced like v, if e or i follow, and like w, if a, o, or u follow.