Appendix:Classical Gaelic pronunciation
Classical Gaelic covers the time between circa 1200 and 1750 AD, over five hundred years of linguistic change. A form of the language heavily standardized for dán díreach by the end of the 12th century appears to have been used in poetry throughout this period despite significant changes in the spoken language in both Ireland and Scotland. Because of its longevity, that conservative form used in poetry is focus of what is described here. Classical Gaelic entries may also provide later and regional pronunciations of specific entries.
Consonants
[edit]Classical Gaelic has the following consonants – all but /h/ occur in pairs of slender (caol, ie. palatalized) and broad (leathan, ie. plain or velarized) variants.
Bardic tradition divides the consonants into several rhyming groups:
- light consonants (consaine éadtroma) – voiced fricatives and lenis sonorants: bh, dh, gh, mh, l, n, r,
- firm consonants (consaine theanna) – fortis sonorants: m, ll, nn, rr, ng,
- hard consonants (consaine chruaidhe) – voiced stops: b, d, g,
- rough consonants (consaine gharbha) – voiceless fricatives: f or ph, th, ch,
- soft consonants (consaine bhoga) – voiceless stops: p, t, c,
- a barren consonant (consaine aimrid) or queen of the consonants (ríoghan na gconsaineadh): s.
Classical grammars do not recognize /h/ as a separate consonant.
The resulting set of consonants is thus:
| Consonants | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spelling | Broad | Slender | ||
| IPA | Example | IPA | Example | |
| light consonants (consaine éadtroma) | ||||
| bh | β | ubhall /ˈuβəˑl̪ˠ/ | βʲ | do-bheir /d̪əˈβʲeɾʲ/ |
| dh | ð | adharc /ˈaðəɾk/ | ðʲ | buidhe /ˈbuðʲə/ |
| gh | ɣ | ógh /oːɣ/ | ɣʲ | adhaigh /ˈaðəɣʲ/ |
| mh | β̃ | snámh /sn̪ˠaːβ̃/ | β̃ʲ | cnáimh /knaːβ̃ʲ/ |
| l (non-initial) | l | flaitheas /ˈɸlaθʲəs/, colainn /ˈkoləˑn̠ʲ/ a laoch /əˈləːx/ ‘his hero’ |
lʲ (non-initial) | fleasc, /ˈɸʲlʲesk/ baile /ˈbalʲə/ |
| n (non-initial) | n | gonaidh /ˈɡonəðʲ/ | nʲ | fine /ˈɸʲinʲə/ |
| r (non-initial) | ɾ | béarla /ˈbʲeːɾlə/ | ɾʲ | beiridh /ˈbʲeɾʲəðʲ/ do rígh /də ˈɾʲiːɣʲ/ |
| firm consonants (consaine theanna) | ||||
| m | m | mór /moːɾ/ | mʲ | milis /ˈmʲilʲəʃ/ |
| l (initially) ll (non-initial) |
l̪ˠ | labhra /ˈl̪ˠaˑβɾə/ ball /baˑl̪ˠ/ |
l̠ʲ | leabhar /ˈl̠ʲeβəɾ/ céille /kʲeːl̠ʲə/ |
| r (initially) rr (non-initial) |
rˠ | rún /rˠuːn/ fearr /ɸʲeˑrˠ/ |
rʲ | reamhar /ˈrʲeβ̃ər/ fairrge /ˈɸaˑrʲɡʲə/, tairreang /t̪arʲəˑŋ/ |
| n (initially) nn (non-initial) |
n̪ˠ | naomh /n̪ˠəːβ̃/ Éireann /ˈeːɾʲəˑn̪ˠ/ |
n̠ʲ | néal /n̠ʲeːl/ fírinne /ɸʲiːɾʲən̠ʲə/ |
| ng | ŋ | ceanglaidh /ˈkʲeˑŋləðʲ/ | ŋʲ | tarraing /ˈt̪arˠəˑŋʲ/ |
| hard consonants (consaine chruaidhe) | ||||
| b | b | bó /boː/ | bʲ | béal /bʲeːl/ |
| d | d̪ | draoi /d̪rəː/ | d̠ʲ | dearg /d̠ʲeˑɾɡ/ |
| g | ɡ | Gaoidheal /ˈɡəːðʲəl/ | ɡʲ | géar /ɡʲeːɾ/ |
| rough consonants (consaine gharbha) | ||||
| f ph |
ɸ | fuil /ɸulʲ/ phóg /ɸoːɡ/ |
ɸʲ | filidheacht /ˈɸʲilʲəðʲəxt̪/ phearsa /ˈɸʲe(ˑ)ɾsə/ |
| th | θ | tuath /t̪uəθ/ | θʲ | maith /maθʲ/ |
| ch | x | Lochlainn /ˈl̪ˠoxləˑn̠ʲ/ | xʲ | timcheall /ˈt̠ʲiˑmʲxʲəˑl̪ˠ/ |
| soft consonants (consaine bhoga) | ||||
| p | p | póg /poːɡ/ | pʲ | pearsa /ˈpʲe(ˑ)ɾsə/ |
| t | t̪ | tarbh /t̪aˑɾβ/ | t̠ʲ | tír /t̠ʲiːɾʲ/ |
| c | k | cara /kaɾə/ | kʲ | ceist /kʲeʃt̠ʲ/ |
| a barren consonant (consaine aimrid) | ||||
| s | s | sagart /saɡə(ˑ)ɾt/ | ʃ | sean /ʃen/ |
| other (unrecognized as a consonant by bardic schools) | ||||
| sh h- (prefixed) |
h | a shúil /əˈhuːlʲ/ ‘his eye’ a hathair /əˈhaθəɾʲ/ ‘her father’ |
h | a sheómra /əˈhoːmɾə/ ‘his room’ a hiasc /əˈhiəsk/ ‘her fish’ |
The nasal fricative /β̃/ was possibly phonetically identical to /β/ but it affected its neighbouring vowels, nasalizing them. Bh /β/ and mh /β̃/ never fully merged during early modern period as evidenced by consistent distinction in spelling between the two, except for words containing other nasals (in which dissimilation and assimilation processes are responsible for the variation).
All consonants beside h can be either broad or slender. Slender consonants were palatalized, broad consonants could have been velarized.
Firm consonants were likely held longer than light consonants – except in certain situations (eg. after a long vowel) where they could be shortened and rhyme with light consonants (eg. a-tám rhymes with grán).
Delenition
[edit]See https://www.celtic-languages.org/Notes_on_Classical_Gaelic_Grammar#Rules_of_delenition
For purposes of homorganic delenition and alliteration dh and gh are kept apart, as are th and sh, ch.
Non-classical developments
[edit]In pronunciation dh and gh merge as /ɣ/ already before the 13th c. – but for metrical purposes they are kept apart in dán díreach.
By the 14th century /ɣ(ʲ)/ (gh and dh) between vowels and in syllable auslaut gets vocalized into /w/ (broad) and /j/ (slender), eventually resulting in long vowels and diphthongs in dialects, eg. bodhar /ˈboðəɾ/ > /ˈboɣəɾ/ > /ˈbowəɾ/ > modern Munster /bouɾ/, Scottish /ˈbo.əɾ/.
In southern part of Ireland (but not in Scotland) /ɣ/ (dh, gh) in accented syllables undergoes palatalization to /ɣʲ/: Tadhg /t̪aˑðɡ/ > /t̪aˑɣɡ/ > /t̪aɣʲɡ/ > modern Munster /t̪əiɡ/ (Scottish /t̪ɤːɡ/), adharc /ˈaðəɾk/ > /ˈaɣəɾk/ > /ˈaɣʲəɾk/ > modern Munster /əiɾk/ (Scottish /ˈɤː.əɾk/). The same happens in the plural ending -adha developing into -aidhe > -aí in Modern Irish.
Similar vocalization happens to /β, β̃/ (bh, mh) resulting in /w/.
The bardic tracts admit some of those changes in pronunciation but nevertheless give importance to etymological spelling and rhyming. For example IGT i[1] states that chth and ch are pronounced the same but they need to be distinguished in writing:
(…) “as cōir ‘do na lochuibh uisge’ ⁊ ‘do na lochthuibh’ (úaidhe so: ‘luch’) ar énG[h]āoidheilg ⁊ nī hionann ogham dhóibh.
[(…) it is right to pronounce do na lochuibh uisge and do na lochthuibh (from luch) the same and they do not have the same spelling.]
and as Mac Cárthaigh notes for this passage, “this teaching reflects later pronunciation and is not in accord with the practice of the poets, who gave th its full pronunciation and rhymed chth as two consonants.”
This means that during that period two pronunciation systems were coexisting: spoken pronunciation, and a literary system used for poetry recitation.
Vowels
[edit]Short accented vowels: ⟨a, o, u, i, e⟩ /a, o, u, i, e/. These in certain conditions were lengthened to middle length.
Long accented vowels: ⟨á, ó, ú, í, é, ao(i)⟩ /aː, oː, uː, iː, eː, əː/.
Unstressed /ə/.
Two long diphthongs: ⟨ua⟩ /uə/, ⟨ia⟩ /iə/.
The vowels /a, aː, ə/ in absolute final position had slender offset variants spelt ⟨ae, áe⟩. Their pronunciation was probably the same as of those spelt ⟨a, á⟩, but they required slender variants of clitics (emphatic suffixes, demonstrative clitics, etc.) when added to them. This is common in 2nd sg. present active verb ending -ae and some variant noun forms (eg. giollae beside giolla).
While this “slender offset” vowel is most commonly an unstressed /ə/ it also has a stressed and a long counterparts, pronounced /a/ and /aː/ respectively but requiring the attachment of slender variants of enclitics.[2] This long vowel exists eg. in variant nom. pl. forms like gáe (beside gaoi, nom. sg. gá) or láe (beside laoi, nom. sg. lá). Modern editions of texts tend to normalize all early spellings like ⟨áe⟩ and ⟨aí⟩ with slender offset to ⟨aoi⟩ (or ⟨áoi⟩), ie. as the /əː/ phoneme – probably losing the original distinction. The short stressed variant occurs in hiatus as a shortened form of the long vowel.
Hiatus
[edit]Classical Gaelic kept hiatus inherited from Old Irish in some words. TODO.
Middle length
[edit]Classical Gaelic had a third vowel quantity, middle length (síneadh meadhónach). In dialects of Munster, Connacht, and Scotland this is often preserved in stressed syllables as either lengthening of the vowel or its diphthongization or in some cases epenthetic vowel inserted into a consonant cluster.
Middle length occurs in historically short vowel before:
- syllable final fortis sonorants (ie. firm consonants, consaine theanna):
- a consonant cluster consisting of a light (consaine éadtrom) or firm (teann) consonant and:
- optionally before a light and a rough (garbh) consonant or s: manchaibh /ˈman.xəβʲ/ or /ˈmaˑn.xəβʲ/, insibh /ˈinʲ.ʃəβʲ/ or /ˈiˑnʲ.ʃəβʲ/, feartha /ˈɸʲeɾ.θə/ or /ˈɸʲeˑɾ.θə/ (but BST 210.30–211.3 condemns the rhyme fear-sa : leam-sa),
- optionally before (n)nd, (l)ld (if the /d/ is not assimilated into fortis /n̪ˠ, l̪ˠ/): seanda /ˈʃeˑn.d̪ə/ or /ˈʃe.n̪ˠə/, gallda /ˈɡaˑl̪ˠ.d̪ə/ or /ˈɡa.l̪ˠə/, saoghalda /ˈsəː.ɣəˑl.d̪ə/ or /ˈsəː.ɣə.l̪ˠə/.
Later developments
[edit]Low and high off-glides that developed after vowels take over the original values over time, especially in Ireland, /e/ before broad consonants move towards /a/ (eg. fear /ɸʲeɾ/ > [ɸʲeᵃɾ] > /ɸʲaɾ/). Similarly /u/ before a slender consonant moves towards /i/ (eg. buidhe /ˈbuðʲə/ > [ˈbuʲɣʲə] > /ˈbiɣʲə/). In Scotland this development is mostly limited to front vowels before more strongly velarized consonants (eg. meallaidh /ˈmʲel̪ˠəðʲ/ > /ˈmjãl̪ˠi/ but beag /bʲeɡ/ > /beɡ/).
Nevertheless there are poems following dán díreach rules which sometimes rhyme ⟨ea⟩ /e(ˑ)/ > /a(ˑ)/ with ⟨a⟩. This Irish development is explicitly confirmed by the author of IGT i who wrote:[3]
.Ea. .i. ‘fear’, .éa. .i. ‘fér’: ionann guthaidhe dhóibh ⁊ nī hionann foghar nō síneadh; óir, dā sgríobhthāoi ailm san b[h]focal-sa ‘fér’, do mheasgfadh an t-ionannus litreach an léghthóir.
[Ea as in fear, éa as in fér: they have the same vowels but not the same sound or length; because, if a were written in this word, fér, use of the same letters would confuse the reader.]
Mac Cárthaigh takes this remark to mean that by the 16th century the author of the tract pronounced fear as /ɸʲaɾ/ (ie. with a front glide followed by an open vowel, rather than /ɸʲeɾ/) and contrasted this with féar said as /ɸʲeːɾ/ (with a long front vowel).
Around the 15th and 16th century the ⟨ao⟩ vowel is pronounced /iː/ in Connacht and there are occasional poems from this region showing this in rhyme too.[4]
Bibliography
[edit]- Damian McManus (1994), “An Nua-Ghaeilge Chlasaiceach”, in K. McCone, D. McManus, C. Ó Háinle, N. Williams, L. Breatnach, editors, Stair na Gaeilge: in ómós do P[h]ádraig Ó Fiannachta (in Irish), Maynooth: Roinn na Sean-Ghaeilge, Coláiste Phádraig, →ISBN, Foghraíocht (§2), pages 343–356
- Eoin Mac Cárthaigh (2014), The Art of Bardic Poetry: A New Edition of Irish Grammatical Tracts I, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, →ISBN
- Christopher Lewin (2018), “The vowel /əː/ ao in Gaelic dialects”, in Papers in Historical Phonology[1], volume 3,
References
[edit]- ^ Eoin Mac Cárthaigh (2014), The Art of Bardic Poetry: A New Edition of Irish Grammatical Tracts I, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, →ISBN, §81 lines 861–7 note, pages 112, 250
- ^ Mícheál Hoyne (2017), “Early Modern Irish miscellanea”, in Ériu, volume 67, , 2 A detail of vowel shortening in hiatus in Classical Modern Irish, pages 174–178
- ^ Eoin Mac Cárthaigh (2014), The Art of Bardic Poetry: A New Edition of Irish Grammatical Tracts I, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, →ISBN, §11, pages 62–3
- ^ Eg. ríodha : craobha rhyme in lines 35bd of a 15th c. poem Forais na gcliar clann Mhaoil Ruanaidh, see Mícheál Hoyne (2018), Fuidheall Áir: Bardic poems on the Meic Dhiarmada of Magh Luirg c. 1377 – c. 1637, →ISBN, page 102