Wow!  I just found out about the conference.  If only I had know sooner.  :)

Well, anyway, I'm quite interested in Gaelic languages; I've been slowly
aquiring the taste over the past year or two.  Unfortunately, I don't know
any Gaelic of any sort, so I can't participate in the Irish Item.

This item is for the discussion of any of the Gaelic languages, from Manx,
to Welsh, to Cornish, where we can talk about, oh, anything from origen, to
pronunciation!  Have fun!

69 responses total.

I think we started an Irish item a while back, although it didn't go very
far.  Why not kill that one and fold it in here.  Thanks for starting it.

So- what's your interest in Celtic languages?  Are you familiar with any
of the literature, poetry, culture, etc.?

Well, my interest in Celtic language stems from my great interest in Celtic
mythology.  I read lots of fantasy, and the authors I enjoy often incorperate
aspects of Celtic mythology into their writing.  When I find something like
this, I often get curious, and look it up in the big Celtic mythology
dictionary (I can get the title if you're interested), and learn more about
it.  The more I read about it, the more I learn, and get interested.  I love
the way the language sounds, and looks when written out, and so learning
pronunciation is something I'm in the process of doing.  Unfortunately, I
don't know a tad of any Celtic language, and I don't know where to start.
        I'm not really familiar with any literature or peotry, but the myths
and stories, especially involving the Fae or Sidhe, are what I'm the most
familiar with.  I'm not really sure about whether I'd like the literature and
poetry or not because it again relates back to the fact that I don't know any
Gaelic.  <sigh>.  One of these days...

Which mythology dictionary are you using?
Are you getting your pronounciation from guides in books or where?  That's
one aspect of language which is hard to teach over the computer.  Of course,
even when you use language tapes or books, you've got the problem of whether
it's Scots or Irish Gaelic, and within each strain, what dialect. Complicated.
Do you *want* to learn a Celtic language, or is it easier to just play with
names?  They are difficult, but neat.
        The literature I was refering to was the mythology, I don't know much
modern stuff.  Poetry, too, shows up in translations of the myths.  The thing
about the Sidhe folk is that they *might* be a Christian invention- a
diminution of the older people and their gods into something small, tricksy
and insignificant instead of large and powerful.  Dunno, some of the wee
folk might be another entity than the Tuatha de Dannan and Formorians,
entirely.

Let's see... the name of the book is An Encyclopedia of Fairies by Katharine
Briggs.  I think we might have a few more, but this is the one I mainly use.
I do get my pronunciation from books, but a nice thing of this encyclopedia,
is it has phonetics <sp> along with the original...  Yes, learning a Gaelic
language is a goal of mine for some point in the future.
        Hmmm... that's interesting about the Sidhe possibly being a Christian
creation.  I hadn't heard that before.  I guess you learn something new every
day!  But actually, when you look at some of the descriptions in the
encyclopedia, many of them say "It was a reference to the Devil".  I can't
believe I didn't notice that before.

That particular "Encyclopedia" is mostly a creative exercize.  Have a look
at Rutherford or Ellis, or Rees and Rees's _Celtic Heritage_ for better
resources on the mythology and culture of the Celtic people.  Also just
about anything by Miranda Green.  As to language, have a look at _Teach
Yourself Irish_ (hah!) co-written by Myles Dillon, who is also one of
my favorite mythology scholars.  The class I've been in uses Micheal O'Siadhael
's _Learning Irish_, which has a tape series to help with pronounciation. It's
not an ideal book for beginning language learners because it was organized
for linguists, but it's not horrible.  I never got anywhere with the 
pronounciation guides in books because I just couldn't translate the
phonetic transcription and examples into a real sound.  Tapes help that way.

Wow!  I got more info in that one response than in the last three months! 
Thanks!  I'll let you know what I get in to.

About the only thing I know about Gaelic is that it is the clue for
"Erse" in a lot of crossword puzzles.  Given that, I suspect that is
only partially true (crossword clues usually take a fair bit of
liberty with such classifications).  So...can anyone give a taxonomy
and/or history of Gaelic languages?

Well, they're all derived from Indo-European!  ;)

aaaargh!!!!  Could take hours (I'm terrible at ascii art).  Well; there's
two sets of Celtic languages-P Celtic and Q-Celtic.  That refers to a consonant
shift.  I believe that Welsh and Manx are P Celtic, Irish (Erse) and Scots
are Q-Celtic, and Breton *may* be (I'm too lazy to go get the dictionary)
a cross between Q-Celtic and French.  Not sure about Cornish, or whether I"ve
missed any (What do they speak in the Farro islands- Scots Gaelic?  What about
the Shetlands? The Hebredies?) or whether Gallega (spoken in Galecia, Spain)
is a Celtic language.  Yes, they were Indo-European, but I just don't remember
how they got from there to here.

Well, that was helpful to me, kami.  Thanks.

Crosswords to the contrary, I'm told that the Irish definitely say "Irish"
not "Erse".  But this is definitely secondhand info.

The Irish used to use "Erse" - about 1000 years ago, I think?  I'll
have to check on that.

That sounds about right, Rob.  Coulda been longer.

This item has been linked from Language 81 to Intro 103.
Type "join lang" at the Ok: prompt for discussion of languages,
both domestic and foreign.

Huh?

Every time someone gets a really good item going, Rob has a tendency to link
it to intro so that the new conferencers will find out about the other great
conferences on Grex. That was what just happened. It's OK.

No, that's not OK, that's a Good Thing (tm).
Thanks.

So- what do we want to discuss about or in Gaelic/Irish?

possible books of interest: *Celtic Heritage: anicient radition in
Ireland  and Wales* by Alwyn & Brinleames & hudson.
  If you're interested in learning language, Border's has (or used to have)
a *Teach Yourself Gaelic* book, which is ?Scots Gaelic.
Even w/ the pronunciation guide, I don't recommend using it unless
you have a good feel for how the language sounds (like you've heard
it from a native speaker and are familiar w/ the conventions.)
it is useful as a vocabulary builder & for getting a general
idea off how the language works.

When I first ran across _Celtic Heritage_ in '81 or '82, it was considered
very controvercial.  Now it's the standard in the field.  Go figure.  Still
my favorite.  
I'm not real impressed with "Teach yourself Gaelic", but that might just be
because it's Scots and I'm studying (desultorily, just now) Irish, but one
of the two authors of the "Teach yourself Irish" book is Myles Dillon, one
of my favorite mythology scholars, so I'm more than a bit biased in its 
favor.  Objectively, it's a *bit* friendlier than Michal O'Siadhal's _Learning
Irish_, but possibly not as well organized (hard at that may be to believe).
I believe the former has tapes, I know the latter does.  There are a couple
other books with tapes, but they are more phrase books than language texts.

 Hi Kami how are you ? I spotted the new Gaelic Item and *had* to add my two
cents ;) You are right on the money with your explanation of the various
Celtic languages!  FYI Breton is a purely P Celtic language with only a few
French words. The original speakers migrated *to* France from Britain during
the Anglo-Saxon invasion. In the Shetlands they speak Scots Gaelic, which is
Q-Celtic. But did you mention the Faeroes? I think they speak one of the Norse
languages there.

I learned from 'Teach Yourself Irish' by Myles Dillon too. Not bad if you can
get the L.P. Then I got a set called Buntu/s Cainte. Very idiomatic, and comes
with tapes Tapes are a *must* when learning Celtic languages. The bizarre
spelling you know.      

Hello stranger!  Cormac, you disappeared, and now I hear there's two of you?
Congrats! THanks for the elaboration on Breton.  I mentioned the Faeroe
islands thinking of the song _The Great Selkie of Sule Skerry_, which sure
sounds Celtic in theme, but I also sort of remember them being Norse in 
culture.

I've run across Butu/s Cainte, seemed to be more of a "phrase book" style,
like I said.  I think that's what you mean by "idiomatic"?  Tapes are a
good thing, conversation group would be better. 

Well... cell division is greatly over-rated. Cloning might have been more
comfortable!  ;) In all honesty I'm not sure what you mean when you say
there's two of me.  :)  I'm kinda like a butterfly in my attention span. I
flit from one thing to another. I've been all over the net looking at this
and that. The people on grex are by far the friendliest!

Yeah, as far as Buntu/s Cainte it *is* basicly a phrase book, a good
foundation in the grammar is needed to make the book any value. The reason
I found it so usefull is because It translates alot of the Idioms that don't
make sence when you try to translate them directly to English. And I mean some
*really* useful ones. such as:

Mar sin....So, or therefore. (this one always threw me)
Cinnte.....Certainly  (Real useful)
Ceart go leor... Right enough  (Easy to translate but I wouldn't have thought
it up myself)
Maise!....Indeed! (Another useful interjection that I've heard before but
didn't realize was *actually* Irish. I heard pronounced like moosha)
Seo!...used in the way we might interject here! ex. Here! the dog has gotten
out! 'Seo! Ta' an gadhar amach againn!
But also: Seo an t-ara/n ....Here's the bread. (Is this the copula? I'm not
real good with that.)
seo duit...Here you are (as when giving some one something)
Ach oiread....Either (this one always eluded me too.)
And on and on and on it goes with a whole collection of imposible litle
phrases like this that, they hand to you all nice and solved begining right
from the ffirst lesson

Well I'm going to bop over to that other conf the name of which eludes me now.
see you there

Now you're being coy, Cormac <g>

The phrases are indeed useful, as are the practical definitions.  Me, I want
the literal meanings, too- I want to know *why* the word means what it does,
where it comes from.  I like derivations.
"Maise"- I've got it as "Muise", and it is indeed pronounced "musha"

And you've got gadhar for dog, I've got madra. Wonder what's the difference.

Don't *think* that you described the copula, but I'd have to look it up.
THis could be a fun topic of discussion- why things mean what they do.

Yep Its very interesting to see how Irish speakers think via the syntax.
Sometimes, Irish words don't corespond exactly to their supposed English
translation. They really describe totally different concepts.
Dearg for instance translates popularly, into Red. but it also can mean
golden, bloody, intence bloody,inveterate, red-hot, real and lighted. as in
a fire.....cont.

Also "redden"=cook.  Didn't know about "inveterate"-- sort of like the Brit.
slang "bloody" I wonder?

 <cormac breaks out his wonderfull dictionary>  O.K... As regards #23. My
dictionary says gadhar means; a hound, hunting dog; beagle, dog, mastiff. and
it gives madra as a dog or mastiff but says use madra when describing wild
or stray or savage type dogs.  I always thought gadhar was just the word they
preferred in Munster. Perhaps gadhar specificly refers to domesticated dogs?

I first started learning Irish when I found a very old book of my Aunts in
my attic. It wasn't written in the roman alphabet, that's how old it is.
This book gave me the word cu/ for dog. Teach yourself Irish said this word
means greyhound. Lets see what this dictionary says.......... O.K. Cu/= a dog
a hound , a greyhound, a hunting dog.  But get this! it also means a hero or
a champion.gee.... I wonder where that came from ;)

Last night before I got cut off I was going to raise a point. It seems that
these words don't have the meaning we think they do. They pack all those
different meanings into the one word. But perhaps the dictionary writers give
us all those different deffinitions to point us in the direction of the
meaning as the Irish speakers understand it. Perhaps their concept of a
greyhound carries with it a sence of superiority to other dogs because of its
champion shadings. And a champion would ( in their minds) have stunning speed
and singleminded purpose that the greyhound has.

My guess is that Cu/ picked up the meaning of champion *because* of the
story of Cu/Chullain.  Either that, or it did imply "guard dog", since that's
what he did.  Or it could well be as you say.  Oh- Madra Ruadh, "red dog",
means fox.  What'
s the word for otter?  I know it translates as "water dog".

Re 26 "...these words don't have the meaning we think they do...":
In all (natural) languages, single words are used in a fairly wide variety
of ways, often related but often not *simply* related.  Those uses
determine the meaning.  Even in quite closely related languages, the range
of uses (meanings) is usually not exactly the same.  The real problem is when,
in looking at another language, you try to gloss a word with a single word
in your own language.  (Or vice versa, of course.)

But of course you're right that the way we think about a word in one context
is often influenced by other uses of that word.  It's easy to go overboard
on that kind of thing, but important to recognize that it does happen.

Hi Dave,  You're saying that I'm talking about homonyms. Words that sound the
same, and may be spelled the same but have different meanings. This is a very
*large* possibility. In investigating this theory of mine I have discovered
words whose definitions do not fit into the *new* gloss I am trying to create.
In such a case I can only assume the word actually is a homonym. In other
cases I can readily see relationships in the varying definitions given a
single Irish word. I suppose this could be done with any language and so I
suppose we are in danger of drifting off topic. In any event its an interestin
mental exercise.

Kami, I bet the word cu/ got its champion meaning from cu/ chullainn too. of
course theres no way to find out the truth short of a time machine. But ,
based on the story it looks like a safe bet. For those of you who don't know
the story, A young boy by the name of Setanta was arriving at a feast late.
As he aproached the house where the feast was being held, his hosts dog (A
type of dog called cu/ in Irish) attacked him. Setanta killed the dog to the
amazement of all. (Setanta being only a small boy and the dog being a giant
drooling ferocious monster which had killed grown men). However the owner of
the dog, aman named Cullainn, wanted recompence. And so Setanta was made to
take the place of the dog for a period of time. So Setanta got a new name,
Cu/ chullainn, The hound of Cullainn.

Uh-oh! I'm about to get kicked off. See you all!  :)

Oh by the way Kami, The Irish for otter is Madra uisce, as you may have
surmised.

I figured it was something like that, but I was too lazy to go look. Thanks.

In case any body reads this... re #9: Gallego, of northwestern Spain, is a
Romance dialect, close to Portuguese. Breton, Cornish and Welsh are very
closely related, and are called the Brittonic or Brythonic languages, from
Welsh Brython "Briton, Welshman" or its ancient equivalent. Nobody has spoken
Cornish natively in centuries; there is some medieval literature. Breton and
Welsh are going strong. Irish, Manx and Scottish Gaelic are descendants of
Old Irish and very close, but not so close to Brythonic. Irish and Scottish
Gaelic use variants of the same, quite old spelling system; Manx of the Isle
of Man, now extinct, used a crazy one. The oldest, coolest literature is in
Old Irish; the Britons were Christian from Roman times and wrote a lot of
Latin, but there is plenty of Old Welsh poetry. The Arthur legends, and other
medieval romances com from Brittany, but they may have been written down in
French. I only know a little Welsh, unfortunately.

I thought that Galecia had a Celtic or closely related language and culture.
Sure you're not thinking of the Basques?
Weren't the last Cornish speakers found in the last century? It was thought
that they'd found some in this century, I guess, but there were Breton. Odd.
Or do I have my times wrong?
HOw was Manx spelling crazy?
I love Irish lit. and mythology.  I wish I could read it in the original.

Where does Provencal fit in, in these language families?

Dunno.  Clearly, it is partly French, but I don't know the other part. Sorry.

And I didn't mean Provencal anyway <gracel slaps herself on the head, to
readjust memory cells> I meant Catalan, I think.  

I don't know, I think Catalan is much closer to Castillian, although it
might have some Celtic remnants.  What's on the other side of the mountains
there?

>Here's something really cool on the evolution of Gaelic, esp. Irish, from
>Alexei Kondratiev, one of my favorite Celtic scholars:

[I'm re-posting this message because I think most people didn't receive it]:
 
M/aire wrote:
>>>WE translate Tuatha De/ Danna/n into
"people of the goddess Danu" but it may have simply meant "people of Danu"
and the term goddess didn't exist.<<<
 
Actually, we can be pretty sure that 'Tuatha D/e Danann' means "Peoples of
the Goddess Danu". In the oldest forms of the name the second word appears as
'D/ee', with a second /e/. This is because it contains the remnant of a
feminine genitive ending. We have plenty of evidence that in Old Celtic the
word for "god" was 'd/euos' and the word for "goddess" was 'd/eu/a'. The
genitives of these words were 'd/eui' ("of-god") and 'd/eu/as' or
(proto-Goidelic) 'd/eui/as' ("of-goddess"). So the whole name in Old Celtic
would have been 'Tout/as D/eui/as Dan/onos'. As Old Celtic evolved into
Irish, some final syllables were regularly lost. If we had had "D/eui=of the
God", the final syllable would have dropped off altogether. But because the
feminine ending was long, the vowel was preserved. However, Old Celtic /u/
disappeared between vowels in Irish; and since adjacent vowels in Irish
always merge, you eventually got the single form 'd/e' to mean both "of the
god" and "of the goddess". Later Irish got around this by adding the feminine
prefix 'ban-' to mean "goddess". But there's no ambiguity about the original
form 'D/ee'.
Le gach deagh-dh\urachd,
Alexei

I found it humourous that the Irish word for "saint" is pronounced "nave",
as is the word "knave".  ;-)

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