Tag Archives: gealach
Saying Ordinal Numbers Out Loud in Irish: Ag rá orduimhreacha os ard i nGaeilge Posted by róislín on Aug 13, 2017
(le Róislín) I’ve sometimes seen otherwise-confident learners of Irish come to a dead stop when they’re reading out loud and come to some numbers. The basic numbers are challenging enough. First, one must deal with all the different mutations that follow (dhá chat but seacht gcat). Then there are all the exceptions due to the…
Discussing The Moon and Eclipses in Irish: Foirmeacha an Fhocail ‘Gealach’ agus Lánuruithe i 2018 agus i 2019 Posted by róislín on Aug 8, 2017
(le Róislín) Our last blogpost was on the following topic: lánurú na gréine le feiceáil i Meiriceá ar 21 Lúnasa 2017 (nasc thíos). Today we’ll talk about the moon and two upcoming eclipses that will be visible in Ireland (de réir timeanddate.com, nasc thíos). Not that we’ll really be waxing astronomical (ní réalteolaí mé!) but…
Lánurú na Gréine: Some Irish Words for Discussing Eclipses Posted by róislín on Jul 31, 2017
(le Róislín) Finally, a good chance to use the word “urú” (eclipse, eclipsis) aside from the context of Irish spelling! August 21, 2017 is the date of the first total solar eclipse to stretch from coast to coast in the United States since 1918. And a sort of eclipse-mania has set in. But we’ll just…
How To Say ‘Tweet’ and ‘Twitter’ in Irish Posted by róislín on Sep 30, 2013
(le Róislín) Remember when “tweets” and “twittering” mostly referred to birds, especially the “spideog” or the “smólach imirce“? Or perhaps the sound of “caint eachtardhomhandach” (the speech of extra-terrestrials) as in H. G. Wells’ insect-like Selenites? You might recall that they made “a slight elusive twittering,” as observed by Messrs. Bedford and Cavor (The First…
Who Says Irish Doesn’t Have Many Cognates with English? (Cuid a Trí/Pt. 3: Grian, Gealach, Sol, Luan) Posted by róislín on Apr 30, 2013
(le Róislín) Continuing the quest for cognates (naisc thíos), let’s look at another pair of words, sun and moon, each of which typically has many similar-looking cousins throughout the Indo-European language family. Given that the Irish word for sun is “grian” and the Irish for “moon” is “gealach,” it looks like we have a bit…
Stella, Étoile, Estrella, Stea … Réalta! Posted by róislín on Jun 20, 2011
(le Róislín) Sandwiched between Lá na Brataí (an American holiday celebrated on June 14th) and Lá na Saoirse (4 Iúil) might be a good time to talk about “réaltaí agus riabha” (stars and stripes). So we’ll take a sos (break) from the díochlaontaí for a while, and address, first, the “réalta” component. The “riabha” will…