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Another Irish Word Beginning with the Letter ‘Y’ (‘Yólais’ as well as ‘yó-yó,’ etc.) Posted by on Aug 4, 2018

(le Róislín) A few years ago I ran a mionsraith of blagmhíreanna about Irish words that started with some of the litreacha neamhthraidisiúnta in the Irish alphabet, like v, w, x, and y (naisc thíos).  Among the few examples that we have for “y” are “yó-yó” (not surprisingly, just add the síneadh fada) and yaincín…

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An bhfuil peata agat?  Talking about Pets in Irish: Piscíní (Kittens) Posted by on Jun 16, 2017

(le Róislín) Bhuel, we’ve just discussed coiníní as peataí in our sraith nua (faoi pheataí), so let’s go now with an even more popular pet, piscíní, and we’ll look more later at “cait,” which have been covered in some previous posts. As you can see in the picture above, we have an image of a…

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How to Say ‘Happy New Year’ in Irish and How to Pronounce the Consonant Cluster “thbhl” Posted by on Dec 31, 2014

(le Róislín) Athbhliain faoi shéan is faoi mhaise duit.  Happy New Year to you. Athbhliain faoi shéan is faoi mhaise daoibh.  Happy New Year to you (plural). So how do we pronounce that, what does it literally mean, why are the actual words “happy” and “new” not in the phrase, and where does a consonant…

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Terms for Grandchildren “as Gaeilge” (in Irish): Garmhac, Gariníon and Other Compounds with “Gar” Posted by on Apr 21, 2009

(le Róislín)   Unlike English, where the prefix “grand-“ is used with “mother,” “father,” “parent,” “son,” “daughter,” and “child,” in Irish, there is a major shift in the qualifier used for “grandchildren.”  As you may recall from the previous blog on grandparents, there are three widely used options: seanathair / seanmháthair, athair mór / máthair…

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