Quote:
What would be the correct pronunciation of "a ghníos",
"nees" roughly.
Some write "níos" but historically there's a gh- there (the root gni- is very old in Irish, and it corresponds to Welsh gwn-, Breton g(w)r- etc which are the roots of the verb "to do/make" as well).
Quote:
and is there any other form of that verb stem used in other tenses, participles, etc?
the present tense (but not the dependent form, which is déan or déanann) uses that root:
ghním, ghníonn tú, ghníonn sé... (you can also say "ghní tú, ghní sé...")
Quote:
I am not familiar with it?
because unfortunately, nowadays too few people even in Ulster write in their dialect. And they aren't taught to write it either. But in the "old" Donegal literature (Ó Grianna etc) writers would use these forms all the time.
Quote:
Also, is it something heard throughout Donegal or just in Gaoth Dobhair?
Throughout Donegal, and also in whole Scotland and in the Isle of Man. And it's an old thing since it existed in Old Irish (do-gní = he does), but all other dialects have regularised it by using déan- or dein- in the present tense (for both independent and dependent form). As often, Donegal has kept the old verbal forms.
You might be interested by the book An Teanga Bheo, Gaeilge Uladh
http://www.litriocht.com/shop/product_i ... ts_id=1441It's entirely in Irish but I think you can use it because it's easy to see where the conjugations are, where the prepositional pronouns are, the examples are easy to understand, even though you don't understand all the explanations that are given between two sets of forms.