Has anyone seen this before? I did try an Internet search to no avail.

Smaoiním is "I think", however I find the contrasting Irish examples for the famous Pascal quote :

I think, therefore I am - déanaim smaoineamh, dá bhrí sin táim ann.

I think, therefore I exist - tá mé in ann smaoineamh, mar sin tá mé ann.

Is there one that is considered the classic translation?

Thanks

I personally like the last one. It translates to something like "I am able to think, therefore I exist".

Also, I believe it was Descartes, not Pascal, who said it.

Thanks for the input and correction. What was I thinking!

You have to be on the top of your game around here!

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Tá mé in ann ól, mar sin tá mé ann.

As Monty Python might say....

I'll drink to that. Tá mé in ann ól, mar sin tá mé annsa phub.

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Múinteoir Gaeilge - Irish Teacher
My "specialty" is Connemara Irish, particularly Cois Fhairrge dialect, but I can also speak Ulster and Munster Irish with native-level pronunciation.
Is fearr Gaeilge ḃriste ná Béarla cliste, cinnte, aċ i ḃfad níos fearr aríst í Gaeilge ḃinn ḃeo na nGaeltaċtaí.
Gaeilge Chonnacht (GC), go háraid Gaeilge Chois Fhairrge (GCF), Gaeilic Uladh (GU), Gaelainn na Mumhan (GM), agus Gaeilge an Chaighdeáin Oifigiúil (CO).

Breandán, can you explain the annsa bit? Like, I understand what it is, but I was just wondering what dialects used it, and what the full declension paradigm is (like, would the plural be annsan?)

I just vaguely remember it as one link in how they got from in to sa.

Dinneen says "ann or anns is sometimes found as a prep. for in or ins.

Technically, it should probably be anns an phub (plural would be anns na).

Conamara uses eclipsis after sa so it would be (in)sa bpub there.

I think it may still be used in Donegal? (Better check with Lughaidh on that.)

I'm out of my depth beyond that. Maybe Cian or someone can fill us in on the history?

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Múinteoir Gaeilge - Irish Teacher
My "specialty" is Connemara Irish, particularly Cois Fhairrge dialect, but I can also speak Ulster and Munster Irish with native-level pronunciation.
Is fearr Gaeilge ḃriste ná Béarla cliste, cinnte, aċ i ḃfad níos fearr aríst í Gaeilge ḃinn ḃeo na nGaeltaċtaí.
Gaeilge Chonnacht (GC), go háraid Gaeilge Chois Fhairrge (GCF), Gaeilic Uladh (GU), Gaelainn na Mumhan (GM), agus Gaeilge an Chaighdeáin Oifigiúil (CO).

The distinction between 'ins (an)/ ans (an)' is purely orthographic, they are both schwa i.e. unstressed
vowel sounds /ə/.

It has a very interesting history. At the end of the Old Irish period, beginning of the Middle Irish period c. 900 AD, the paleography record suggest that previously distinctive unstressed vowel sounds began to fall together as schwa. However, the loss of unstressed vowel sounds in the vernacular was probably occurring much earlier than 9th century, as writing tends to be a lot more conservative than the spoken language.

The schwa encouraged many of the changes that occurred to Irish in the Middle Irish period. For instance, it helped in bringing about the collapse of the Old stem/ declension system for nouns and adjectives, as many stems and cases were distinguished by unstressed vowel sounds in Old Irish , i.e. u-stems and i-stems etc..., and since unstressed vowel sounds were no longer being distinguished from each other, many of the stems fell together.

As a result of the unstressed vowels becoming schwa /ə/, gradually all unstressed vowels came to be written interchangeably as 'a' (broad), or 'i/e' (slender), as all unstressed vowels had the same pronunciation in unstressed position anyway, i.e /ə/, and therefore could no longer be distinguished.

Back to the preposition 'i'. In Old Irish, 'i' (Dative/ Accusative) was written and pronounced as /i/.

Hence, Old Ir. isin* tech 'in the house'

(*isin = i + historical 's' + the def. article 'in'. In standard Irish this is written as ins an/ insa/ sa, the switching of the historical 's' with the 'n' is due to metathesis. The same issue with the schwa occurs with the def. article, if you see above it is written as 'in', but it gradually becomes 'an' in the Middle Irish period.)

However, due to schwa coming into play, 'i' lost its distinctiveness and hence it often came to be written as 'a'. And that's why you find the variation in spelling today:

ans an/ ins an/ ann sa/ insa/ sa etc... .

Actually, until quite recently, c. 1900, Gaelic scribes, in both Ireland and Scotland, preferred to represent the preposition 'i' as 'a', 'i' was rarely used.

Edit: Just to add, this difficulty in representing the schwa sound occurs everywhere the preposition 'i' is used, e.g. innso/ innseo becomes annso/anseo, isteach/ asteach, ist(o)igh/ ast(o)igh, im(ma)ch = amach, imuich = amuigh etc...

Cian

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Please wait for corrections/ more input from other forum members before acting on advice

Modern Scottish Gaelic uses "a" exclusively, as it's got a (very) broad N sound after it.

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