Irish
orthography
An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation.
Most transnational languages in the modern period have a writing system, and ...
is very
etymological which allows the same written form to represent all
dialect
The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of linguistic phenomena:
One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a ...
s of
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
and remain regular. For example, ("head") may be read in Mayo and
Ulster
Ulster (; ga, Ulaidh or ''Cúige Uladh'' ; sco, label= Ulster Scots, Ulstèr or ''Ulster'') is one of the four traditional Irish provinces. It is made up of nine counties: six of these constitute Northern Ireland (a part of the United Kin ...
, in Galway, or in
Munster.
A
spelling reform
A spelling reform is a deliberate, often authoritatively sanctioned or mandated change to spelling rules. Proposals for such reform are fairly common, and over the years, many languages have undergone such reforms. Recent high-profile examples a ...
in the mid-20th century eliminated inter-dialectal
silent letter
In an alphabetic writing system, a silent letter is a letter that, in a particular word, does not correspond to any sound in the word's pronunciation. In linguistics, a silent letter is often symbolised with a null sign . Null is an unprono ...
s and lead to , the modern
standard Standard may refer to:
Symbols
* Colours, standards and guidons, kinds of military signs
* Standard (emblem), a type of a large symbol or emblem used for identification
Norms, conventions or requirements
* Standard (metrology), an object th ...
written form used by the
Government of Ireland, which regulates both
spelling and
grammar
In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraints, a field that includes domain ...
.
Some words may have dialectal pronunciations not reflected by their standard spelling, some may have dialectal spellings to reflect this. The IPA transcriptions of examples on this page are in
Connacht Irish
Connacht Irish () is the dialect of the Irish language spoken in the province of Connacht. Gaeltacht regions in Connacht are found in Counties Mayo (notably Tourmakeady, Achill Island and Erris) and Galway (notably in parts of Connemara and o ...
. Grapheme to Phoneme correspondance tables on this page follow the layout shown below, on this layout stands for Mayo and Ulster Irish, for southern Connacht Irish and for Munster Irish.
Alphabet
Latin script
The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern I ...
has been the
writing system
A writing system is a method of visually representing verbal communication, based on a script and a set of rules regulating its use. While both writing and speech are useful in conveying messages, writing differs in also being a reliable fo ...
used to write Irish since the 8th century, when it replaced
Ogham
Ogham ( Modern Irish: ; mga, ogum, ogom, later mga, ogam, label=none ) is an Early Medieval alphabet used primarily to write the early Irish language (in the "orthodox" inscriptions, 4th to 6th centuries AD), and later the Old Irish langu ...
which was used to write
Primitive Irish
Primitive Irish or Archaic Irish ( ga, Gaeilge Ársa), also called Proto-Goidelic, is the oldest known form of the Goidelic languages. It is known only from fragments, mostly personal names, inscribed on stone in the ogham alphabet in Ireland ...
and
Old Irish
Old Irish, also called Old Gaelic ( sga, Goídelc, Ogham script: ᚌᚑᚔᚇᚓᚂᚉ; ga, Sean-Ghaeilge; gd, Seann-Ghàidhlig; gv, Shenn Yernish or ), is the oldest form of the Goidelic/Gaelic language for which there are extensive writt ...
.
Gaelic type
Gaelic type (sometimes called Irish character, Irish type, or Gaelic script) is a family of Insular script typefaces devised for printing Classical Gaelic. It was widely used from the 16th until the mid-18th century (Scotland) or the mid-20th ...
() was the main
typeface
A typeface (or font family) is the design of lettering that can include variations in size, weight (e.g. bold), slope (e.g. italic), width (e.g. condensed), and so on. Each of these variations of the typeface is a font.
There are thousands o ...
used to write Irish until it was replaced by
Roman type () in the mid-20th century. The use of Ogham and Gaelic type today is restricted to decorative or self-consciously traditional contexts. The
dot above a
lenited letter in Gaelic type is usually replaced by a following in Roman type (e.g. → ).
Letters and letter names
The traditional Irish
alphabet
An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written graphemes (called letters) that represent the phonemes of certain spoken languages. Not all writing systems represent language in this way; in a syllabary, each character represents a syllab ...
(
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
: , formerly from the first three
letters
Letter, letters, or literature may refer to:
Characters typeface
* Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet.
* Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alphabe ...
of the
Ogham alphabet) consists of 18 letters: . It does not contain , although they are used in scientific terminology and modern
loanwords/words of foreign origin. occurs in a small number of native (mainly
onomatopoeic words (e.g. "to quack" and "caw") and in a number of
colloquial forms (e.g. for "chirp" and for "screw"). , when not
prefixed to an word initial vowel to show
aspiration or after a consonant to show
lenition
In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them more sonorous. The word ''lenition'' itself means "softening" or "weakening" (from Latin 'weak'). Lenition can happen both synchronically (within a language at a pa ...
, primarily occurs word initially in loanwords, e.g. "hat". is the only letter not listed by
Ó Dónaill.
Vowels may be
accented
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacriti ...
with an
acute accent (; see
below). Accented letters are considered variants of their unaccented equivalent so they are ignored for purposes of alphabetisation, they follow their unaccented equivalents in dictionaries (i.e. , , , ...).
Tree names were historically used to name the letters. Tradition taught that they all derived from the
names of Ogham letters, though it is now known that only some of the earliest were named after trees. The modern letter names follow a similar pattern (based on the original
Latin names) to other languages that use a
Latin script alphabet.
English letter names are generally used in colloquial and formal speech.
Consonants
The consonant letters generally correspond to the
consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are and pronounced with the lips; and pronounced with the front of the tongue; and pronounced wi ...
phonemes as shown in this table. See
Irish phonology
Irish phonology varies from dialect to dialect; there is no standard pronunciation of Irish. Therefore, this article focuses on phenomena shared by most or all dialects, and on the major differences among the dialects. Detailed discussion o ...
for an explanation of the symbols used and
Irish initial mutations for an explanation of eclipsis. In most cases, consonants are "broad" (
velarised) when beside and "slender" (
palatalised) when beside .
Vowels
Sequences of vowels are common in Irish spelling due to the "" ("slender with slender and broad with broad") rule. This rule states that the vowels on either side of any consonant must be both slender () or both broad (), to unambiguously determine if the consonant(s) are broad or slender.
An apparent exception is , which is followed by a broad consonant despite the .
Pronunciation of vowels in Irish is mostly predictable from a few simple rules:
*
Accented
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacriti ...
vowels () are always
long vowels
In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, ...
and in
digraphs and
trigraphs containing them, surrounding unaccented vowels tend to be silent, but there are several exceptions, e.g. when preceded by two unaccented vowels.
* Accented vowels in succession are both pronounced, e.g. "sixth", "royal, kingly, majestic", "sympathy", etc.
* is silent before and after a broad vowel (except sometimes in ).
* is silent before a broad vowel.
* have multiple pronunciations that depend on adjacent consonants.
* A following lengthens some vowels and in Munster and Connacht a following syllable-final or word-final may lengthen or diphthongise some vowels depending on dialect.
Followed by
When followed by , a stressed vowel usually forms a
diphthong or lengthens.
For , see also
Special pronunciations in verb forms.
Epenthesis
In the sequence of
short vowel + +
labial,
palatal
The palate () is the roof of the mouth in humans and other mammals. It separates the oral cavity from the nasal cavity.
A similar structure is found in crocodilians, but in most other tetrapods, the oral and nasal cavities are not truly separ ...
, or
velar consonant
Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue (the dorsum) against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth (known also as the velum).
Since the velar region of the roof of the mouth is relatively extensive an ...
(except for
voiceless stops) within the same
morpheme
A morpheme is the smallest meaningful constituent of a linguistic expression. The field of linguistic study dedicated to morphemes is called morphology.
In English, morphemes are often but not necessarily words. Morphemes that stand alone are ...
, an unwritten gets inserted between the and the following consonant:
* "blue"
* "red"
* "dark"
* "name"
* "prickly, thorny"
* "child"
* "silver, money"
But:
* "body"
* "bad"
There is additionally no epenthesis after
long vowels
In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, ...
and
diphthongs:
* "term"
* "duty"
The rules of epenthesis do not apply across
morpheme
A morpheme is the smallest meaningful constituent of a linguistic expression. The field of linguistic study dedicated to morphemes is called morphology.
In English, morphemes are often but not necessarily words. Morphemes that stand alone are ...
boundaries (e.g. after prefixes and in compound words):
* "grandson" (from ("close, near") + ("son"))
* "very quiet" (from ("very") + ("quiet"))
* "carriageway, roadway" (from ("car") + ("way, road"))
Special pronunciations in verb forms
In
verb
A verb () is a word ( part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descr ...
endings, some letters and letter combinations are pronounced differently from elsewhere.
Diacritics
currently uses one
diacritic
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacriti ...
, the acute accent, though traditionally a second was used, the overdot. If diacritics are unavailable, e.g. on a computer using
ASCII
ASCII ( ), abbreviated from American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for electronic communication. ASCII codes represent text in computers, telecommunications equipment, and other devices. Because ...
, the overdot is replaced by a following , e.g. → "He/It was" and there is no standard for replacing an acute accent. Though, in
anglicised names an acute accent is generally substituted by an apostrophe, e.g.
Dara Ó Briain
Dara Ó Briain ( , ; born 4 February 1972) is an Irish comedian and television presenter based in the United Kingdom. He is noted for performing stand-up comedy shows all over the world and for hosting topical panel shows such as ''Mock the W ...
→ Dara O'Briain.
The
acute accent (;
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
: or "long (sign)") is used to indicate a long vowel, as in "boat". However, there are other conventions to indicate a long vowel, such as:
*A following , e.g. "high", "destruction", "fist", and, in Connacht, a word-final , e.g. g. "time".
*The digraphs , e.g. "gay", "bare", "music".
*The tri/tetragraphs , e.g. "neighbour", "Munster".
* and before or , e.g. "wild", "twine".
The
overdot (; ga, ponc séimhithe "dot of lenition", "struck", or "lenition") was traditionally used to indicate
lenition
In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them more sonorous. The word ''lenition'' itself means "softening" or "weakening" (from Latin 'weak'). Lenition can happen both synchronically (within a language at a pa ...
, though uses a following for this purpose. Thus are equivalent to . In
Old Irish
Old Irish, also called Old Gaelic ( sga, Goídelc, Ogham script: ᚌᚑᚔᚇᚓᚂᚉ; ga, Sean-Ghaeilge; gd, Seann-Ghàidhlig; gv, Shenn Yernish or ), is the oldest form of the Goidelic/Gaelic language for which there are extensive writt ...
, it was only used for , while the following was used for and the lenition of other letters was not indicated. Later the two methods were used in parallel to represent the lenition of any consonant and competed with each other until the standard practice became to use the overdot in Gaelic type and the following in Roman type.
Lowercase
Letter case is the distinction between the letters that are in larger uppercase or capitals (or more formally ''majuscule'') and smaller lowercase (or more formally ''minuscule'') in the written representation of certain languages. The writing ...
has no
tittle in Gaelic type, and
road signs in the Republic of Ireland. However, as printed and electronic material like books, newspapers and web pages use Roman type almost invariably, the tittle is generally shown. Irish does not
graphemically distinguish
dotted i and
dotless ı, i.e. they are not different letters as they are in, e.g.
Turkish and
Azeri.
Punctuation
Generally, the use of
punctuation marks is similar to English. An apparent exception is the
Tironian ''et'' (;
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
: ) which generally abbreviates the word "and", like the
ampersand () abbreviates "and" in English.
A
hyphen
The hyphen is a punctuation mark used to join words and to separate syllables of a single word. The use of hyphens is called hyphenation. ''Son-in-law'' is an example of a hyphenated word. The hyphen is sometimes confused with dashes ( figure ...
( ga, fleiscín) is used in Irish after when prefixed to a masculine vowel-initial word as an
initial mutation, e.g. "the bread", "their daughter". However, it is omitted when the vowel is capitalised, e.g. "the Scotsman", "Our Father". No hyphen is used when is prefixed to a vowel-initial word: "her daughter".
The hyphen is also used in
compound words under certain circumstances:
*between two vowels, e.g. "misfortune"
*between two similar consonants, e.g. "bad language", "prompt payment"
*in a three-part compound, e.g. "permanent joint committee"
*after the prefixes , , before a word beginning with , e.g. "bad tasting", "subsume", "mortality"
*in capitalised titles, e.g. "the Chief Justice"
*after "very" and "good", e.g. "very big", "goodwill"
The
apostrophe ( ga, uaschama) is used to indicate an omitted vowel in the following cases:
*the prepositions "from" and "to" both become before a vowel or + vowel, as in "She fell from a horse" and "Give it to the landlord"
*the possessive pronouns "my" and "your (singular)" become and before a vowel or + vowel, as in "my youth", "your tooth"
*the preverbal
particle
In the physical sciences, a particle (or corpuscule in older texts) is a small localized object which can be described by several physical or chemical properties, such as volume, density, or mass.
They vary greatly in size or quantity, from ...
becomes before a vowel or + vowel, as in "I raised", "he would wait"
*the copular particle becomes before a vowel or + vowel, as in "I found that odd" and "maybe". However, is used before the pronouns , , , as in "It was the generals who kept the power"
Capitalisation
Capitalisation
Capitalization (American English) or capitalisation (British English) is writing a word with its first letter as a capital letter (uppercase letter) and the remaining letters in lower case, in writing systems with a case distinction. The term ...
rules are similar to English. However, a prefixed letter remains in lowercase when the base initial is capitalised ( "China"). For text written in
all caps
In typography, all caps (short for "all capitals") refers to text or a font in which all letters are capital letters, for example: "THIS TEXT IS IN ALL CAPS". All caps may be used for emphasis (for a word or phrase). They are commonly seen in l ...
, the prefixed letter is kept in lowercase, or
small caps ( "THE HISTORY OF IRELAND").
An initial capital is used for:
*Start of sentence
*Names of people, places (except the words , , ), languages ,and adjectives of people and places ( "Michael Murphy"; "Mary McEntee"; "Burke"; "
Slievenamon"; "French"; "Italian food")
*Names of months, weeks and feast-days ( "September"; "Monday"; "Christmas Eve")
* "day" ( "on Monday")
*Definite
title
A title is one or more words used before or after a person's name, in certain contexts. It may signify either generation, an official position, or a professional or academic qualification. In some languages, titles may be inserted between the f ...
s
Abbreviations
Most Irish
abbreviations
An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...
in are straightforward, e.g. → ("page → p.") and → (" (for example) → e.g."), but two that require explanation are: → ("that is → i.e.") and → ("
et cetera
''Et Cetera'' ( or (proscribed) , ), abbreviated to ''etc.'', ''etc'', ''et cet.'', ''&c.'' or ''&c'' is a Latin expression that is used in English to mean "and other similar things", or "and so forth". Translated literally from Latin, means 'an ...
(and so forth) → &c./etc.").
Spelling reform
The literary
Classical Irish which survived till the 17th century was already archaic and its spelling reflected that;
Theobald Stapleton's 1639
catechism was a first attempt at simplification.
The classical spelling represented a
dialect continuum
A dialect continuum or dialect chain is a series of language varieties spoken across some geographical area such that neighboring varieties are mutually intelligible, but the differences accumulate over distance so that widely separated varie ...
including
distinctions lost in all surviving dialects by the
Gaelic revival of the late 19th century. The issue of
simplifying spelling, linked to the use of
Roman or
Gaelic type
Gaelic type (sometimes called Irish character, Irish type, or Gaelic script) is a family of Insular script typefaces devised for printing Classical Gaelic. It was widely used from the 16th until the mid-18th century (Scotland) or the mid-20th ...
, was controversial in the early decades of the 20th century.
The
Irish Texts Society
The Irish Texts Society ( ga, Cumann na Scríbheann nGaedhilge) was founded in 1898 to promote the study of Irish literature. It is a text publication society, issuing annotated editions of texts in Irish with English translations and related co ...
's 1904 Irish–English
bilingual dictionary
A bilingual dictionary or translation dictionary is a specialized dictionary used to translate words or phrases from one language to another. Bilingual dictionaries can be ''unidirectional'', meaning that they list the meanings of words of one lan ...
by
Patrick S. Dinneen used traditional spellings.
After the creation of the
Irish Free State
The Irish Free State ( ga, Saorstát Éireann, , ; 6 December 192229 December 1937) was a state established in December 1922 under the Anglo-Irish Treaty of December 1921. The treaty ended the three-year Irish War of Independence between ...
in 1922, all Acts of the
Oireachtas were translated into Irish, initially using Dinneen's spellings, with a list of simplifications accruing over the years.
When
Éamon de Valera
Éamon de Valera (, ; first registered as George de Valero; changed some time before 1901 to Edward de Valera; 14 October 1882 – 29 August 1975) was a prominent Irish statesman and political leader. He served several terms as head of govern ...
became
President of the Executive Council after the
1932 election, policy reverted to older spellings, which were used in the enrolled text of the
1937 Constitution.
In 1941, de Valera decided to publish a "popular edition" of the Constitution with simplified spelling and established a committee of experts, which failed to agree on recommendations.
[Dáil debates Vol.99 No.17 p.3](_blank)
7 March 1946 Instead, the Oireachtas' own translation service prepared a booklet, ''Litriú na Gaeilge: Lámhleabhar an Chaighdeáin Oifigiúil'', published in 1945.
The following are some old spellings criticised by
T. F. O'Rahilly and their simplifications:
The booklet was expanded in 1947, and republished as ''
An Caighdeán Oifigiúil'' ("The Official
Standard Standard may refer to:
Symbols
* Colours, standards and guidons, kinds of military signs
* Standard (emblem), a type of a large symbol or emblem used for identification
Norms, conventions or requirements
* Standard (metrology), an object th ...
") in 1958, combined with the standard grammar of 1953.
It attracted initial criticism as unhistorical and artificial; some spellings fail to represent the pronunciation of some dialects, while others preserve
letters unpronounced in any dialect.
Its status was reinforced by use in the
civil service and as a guide for
Tomás de Bhaldraithe's 1959 English–Irish dictionary and
Niall Ó Dónaill's 1977 Irish–English dictionary.
A review of the written standard, including spelling, was announced in 2010, aiming to improve "simplicity, internal consistency, and logic". The result was the 2017 update of ''An Caighdeán Oifigiúil''.
See also
*
Irish Braille
*
Irish manual alphabet
*
Gaelic type
Gaelic type (sometimes called Irish character, Irish type, or Gaelic script) is a family of Insular script typefaces devised for printing Classical Gaelic. It was widely used from the 16th until the mid-18th century (Scotland) or the mid-20th ...
*
Roman type
*
Scottish Gaelic orthography
Notes
* Vowels with an acute accent are read as
�/é/í/ó/ú "long
�/é/í/ó/ú.
* -- is after ( are deleted before it is added). It is after which are deleted before it is added.
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Irish Orthography
Orthography
An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation.
Most transnational languages in the modern period have a writing system, and ...
Indo-European Latin-script orthographies