I was doing a grammar exercise where the correct pairing (in Standard Irish) of 'sa + srón' was given as 'sa tsrón'.

I understand that in Standard, lenition follows 'sa'. I am mainly interested in Connacht Irish where urú follows 'sa' and this made me wonder with the s + vowel, sl, sn, sr rule of adding 't'.

Would the GC dialects use: sa srón instead of sa tsrón?

What about other dialects?

Strictly speaking, lenition or t-prothesis can follow "sa" in the standard. Ó Dónaill explains "Sa lenites consonants b, c, g, m, p, and prefixes t to initial s of feminine noun; san lenites f".

The reason t is prefixed to initial s of feminine nouns specifically is rooted in the historical development of the language, but simply, the t used be part of the article, then at some point it began to be written at the start of the following word instead. Historically speaking, t-prothesis arose where the loss of vowels occurred in between Proto-Celtic and Old Irish. This reduced Proto-Celtic article forms like *sindos, *sosim and *sindā to the various article forms of Old Irish. That dental, d, that you can see in the middle of the Proto-Celtic forms (specifically of the feminine article, *sindā, dative *sindai) became the t you're seeing in Modern Irish. In Old Irish it was still part of the article. You'd expect this same expression to be written something like isint srón in Old Irish.



I can't speak very authoritatively about Connaught Irish, but I can't say it's ever struck me that speakers I've interacted with during my time living in Galway and Connemara wouldn't use sa + t before a feminine noun beginning in s, the same way it works in the standard. Given the historical development of this phenomenon, it has to have been adopted into the standard from at least one dialect, though my suspicion is that it works the same way in at least Munster and Connaught Irish.

sa tsróin

Ins an / sa ...
Donegal: tsró(i)n, tsagart, bhád
Erris, Mayo: tsró(i)n, tsagart, mbád
Acill, Mayo: tsró(i)n, tsagart, bhád
Galway: tsró(i)n, sagart, mbád
Kerry: tsró(i)n, tsagart, bhád
Cork: tsró(i)n, tsagart, bhád
Ring: tsró(i)n, tsagart, bhád (?)
Standard: tsrón, sagart, mbád/bhád

(Things different in bold: eclipsis in Connacht, no t with masculine nouns with initial s in South Connacht and Standard)
So, it is probably everywhere sa tsró(i)n. (sróin dative case of srón)

Ná cuir an tsrón ins an tsagart agus ná bíoḋ cac an tsagairt ins an tsróin.
(just to use sagart and srón in the same sentence )

So why is that the claimed Standard?
The answer is just that the Standardisers in Dublin wanted to abolish the dative case and all remnants of it. In fact, sa tsagart and sa tsróin are what has always been correct nearly everwhere apart from two villages in the Connemara.