{"id":8184,"date":"2016-07-19T04:31:53","date_gmt":"2016-07-19T04:31:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/?p=8184"},"modified":"2016-07-28T18:16:07","modified_gmt":"2016-07-28T18:16:07","slug":"the-lazy-hazy-crazy-days-of-an-tsamhraidh-how-to-say-summer-in-irish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/irish\/the-lazy-hazy-crazy-days-of-an-tsamhraidh-how-to-say-summer-in-irish\/","title":{"rendered":"The Lazy Hazy Crazy Days of ‘an tSamhraidh’ — how to say ‘summer’ in Irish"},"content":{"rendered":"

(le\u00a0R\u00f3isl\u00edn)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since we just finished talking about the “lazy hazy crazy” days of summer in the most recent blogpost, this might be a good time to look closer at the Irish word for summer itself, “samhradh<\/strong>.”<\/p>\n

\"Sp\u00f3rt<\/a>

Sp\u00f3rt samhraidh — a summer sport. Uisce-sci\u00e1il chosnochta — barefoot skiing. Cad \u00e9 an sp\u00f3rt samhraidh is fearr leatsa? What is your favorite summer sport? And by the way, what slight change happened to the word “samhradh” in that phrase and sentence? Grafaic: \u00a0By Jergensen at English Wikipedia [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons<\/em><\/p><\/div>Like most Irish nouns, it has a variety of forms, including: samhraidh, shamhraidh, tsamhraidh, tsamhradh<\/strong>, and, in the plural, samhra\u00ed<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

So how do we use these and what would be some typical expressions with them?<\/p>\n

samhradh<\/strong> [SOW-ruh or in Donegal Irish “SOW-roo”, with both versions saying “SOW” as in “now” or “cow,” not as in “sowing seeds”].\u00a0 For any newcomers to Irish, it may be surprising that the “m” and the “d” are silent, but these are typical pronunciations.<\/p>\n

an samhradh<\/strong>, the summer.\u00a0 T\u00e1 an samhradh ann<\/strong>.\u00a0 It’s summer, lit. “The summer is in it.”\u00a0 Interesting that Irish makes “summer” definite here (an samhradh<\/strong>) and the typical English expression, “It’s summer” doesn’t.<\/p>\n

samhraidh<\/strong> [SOW-ree, with the “d” still silent], of summer (c\u00farsa samhraidh<\/strong>, a summer course; campa samhraidh<\/strong>, a summer camp)<\/p>\n

an tsamhraidh<\/strong> [un TOW-ree, with “tow” rhyming with “now” and “cow,” not as in “tow-truck” or “tow-headed”], of the summer.\u00a0 Deireadh an tsamhraidh<\/strong>, the end of the summer.\u00a0 L\u00e1r an tsamhraidh<\/strong>, the middle of the summer.\u00a0\u00a0 T\u00fas an tsamhraidh<\/strong>, the beginning of the summer.\u00a0 And, \u00a0to hark back to our previous blogpost, we could say “laethe suaimhneacha r\u00f3samhacha craice\u00e1ilte an tsamhraidh<\/strong>,” which would be one possibility for “The Lazy Hazy Crazy Days of Summer”\u00a0 — it might be a mouthful to sing in Irish, though, even for Nat King Cole, imagining him as a Gaeilgeoir<\/strong>.\u00a0 Note that while the English original does simply say, “of summer,” in Irish, it would be more typical to say “of the summer” (an tsamhraidh<\/strong>) in a context like this.<\/p>\n

shamhraidh<\/strong> [HOW-ree], also means “of summer,” and specifically would follow a feminine singular noun (o\u00edche shamhraidh<\/strong>, a summer night)<\/p>\n

In standard Irish, we’d say, “sa samhradh<\/strong>,” with no change to the spelling, for “in the summer.”\u00a0 But in Donegal Irish we’d have “sa tsamhradh<\/strong>” [suh TOW-roo], since in that dialect, even the masculine nouns pick up the initial “t” after “sa.”<\/p>\n

For the plural forms, we have:<\/p>\n

samhra\u00ed<\/strong> [SOW-ree], summers<\/p>\n

na samhra\u00ed<\/strong>, the summers<\/p>\n

And at least one variation (Conamara), samhra\u00edocha<\/strong> [SOW-ree-uh-khuh]<\/p>\n

Because of the specific way the word “samhra\u00ed<\/strong>” is spelled, there’s normally no change when we say “of summers”\u00a0 or “of the summers”:<\/p>\n

cuimhn\u00ed samhra\u00ed ag an tr\u00e1 i m’\u00f3ige<\/strong>, memories of summers at the beach in my youth<\/p>\n

cuimhn\u00ed na samhra\u00ed a chaith m\u00e9 ag an tr\u00e1 i m’\u00f3ige<\/strong>, memories of the summers I spent at the beach in my youth<\/p>\n

Possible, but less typical, would be “shamhradh<\/strong>,” which in theory could follow a preposition like “ar<\/strong>,” “de<\/strong>,” “do<\/strong>,” “faoi<\/strong>,” \u201d\u00f3<\/strong>,” “roimh<\/strong>,” “thar<\/strong>,” or “tr\u00ed<\/strong>.”\u00a0 But I have to confess that examples don’t leap to mind for most of these, except, let’s say, “\u00f3 shamhradh go samhradh<\/strong>” (from summer to summer).\u00a0 Also, theoretically, we could have “shamhra\u00ed<\/strong>” [HOW-ree] as a plural form, after these prepositions, but I don’t think it would come up in typical everyday speech.\u00a0 Maybe “\u00f3 shamhra\u00ed m’\u00f3ige<\/strong>” (from\/since the summers of my youth).<\/p>\n

Ar aon chaoi, sin iad foirmeacha an fhocail “samhradh,” le s\u00e9imhi\u00fa, sa tuiseal ginideach, agus san uimhir iolra.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Hope yours is turning out to be “pl\u00e9isi\u00fartha<\/strong>.”\u00a0 SGF — R\u00f3isl\u00edn<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

(le\u00a0R\u00f3isl\u00edn) Since we just finished talking about the “lazy hazy crazy” days of summer in the most recent blogpost, this might be a good time to look closer at the Irish word for summer itself, “samhradh.” Like most Irish nouns, it has a variety of forms, including: samhraidh, shamhraidh, tsamhraidh, tsamhradh, and, in the plural…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":8186,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3898],"tags":[460558,12013,111046,460556,254973,460557,254977,1327,359121],"class_list":["post-8184","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-irish-language","tag-lazy-hazy-crazy","tag-nat-king-cole","tag-samhradh","tag-samhrai","tag-samhraidh","tag-samhraiocha","tag-shamhradh","tag-summer","tag-tsamhraidh"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t