Hi! I’m trying to understand and memorize all the lenition rules for Standard Irish. So far, I’m making progress and having great success… but I’m a tad bit stuck…

According to http://www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/subst2.htm#genitivlen , indefinite genitive nouns after masculine nouns (ending w/a slender consonant) that are also in the genitive themselves, are lenited.

E.g. an fhir chéile (of the husband).

teach pobail bhaile (a church of a town).

But, AN CAIGHDEÁN OIFIGIÚIL states…

Ní shéimhítear ainmfhocal éiginnte atá faoi réir ag ainmfhocal atá sa tuiseal ginideach.
(An indefinite noun subject to a noun in the genitive case is not lenited. [I had to use Google translate])

I trust both sources, but they appear to contradict each other… is there something I’m not understanding?

And, also, according to AN CAIGHDEÁN OIFIGIÚIL, singular indefinite genitives starting with f are not lenited…if Nualeargais ends up being correct regarding my first question, does this f rule apply in those cases too?

And, lastly, http://www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/lenition.htm states that to avoid side-by-side genitives, the first genitive is lenited and remains in nominative, while the second is genitive and unlenited…then why is it “teach pobail bhaile”…instead of “teach phobal baile”?

Sorry for the barrage of questions…just really wanna understand. Thank you to anyone who knows!

Rosie, I'm far from an expert on the made-up nonsense of the Caighdeán Oifigiúil, but on this phrase:

teach pobail bhaile

the thing is how the phrase is divided up. [teach pobail] of a [baile].

Teach pobail is a phrase - church. The church of a town. So "baile" qualifies "teach pobail".

teach phobal baile would mean [teach] of a [pobal baile], the house of a town's congregation.

Lenition often functions with an eye on the mental division of phrases.

Graiméar Gaeilge na mBráithre Críostaí: (relevant part in bold)

Lenition after masculine genitive (e.g. an fhir chéile)



Lenition of f:



You don't say deoir fhuisce (because it sounds like deoir uisce), so: deoir fuisce

"then why is it “teach pobail bhaile”…instead of “teach phobal baile”?"

As David said:

teach pobail baile - teach pobail is a term on its own (an "ionad brí", "meaning unit", as they call it in the CO).
So, it is helpful to use brackets for such "units" and colors for case (genitive form)
[[teach pobail] baile] = a town church ([teach pobail] = church + [baile] = town)

if "pobal baile" would be such a meaning unit (e.g. "town congregation"):
You can avoid a double genitive and pobal is still in nominative form:
[teach [pobal baile]] = a house of a town congregation
teach is nominative masculine, so no lenition, I'd say. (only difference: pobail vs. pobal)
But you can alternatively put pobal in [pobal baile] in genitive form, so:
[teach [pobail bhaile]] = a house of a town congregation

In case of a feminine noun, [oifig]:
[oifig [phobal baile]] = an office of a town congregation
or
[oifig [phobail bhaile]] = an office of a town congregation

Rosie, if you have to run Irish grammar through Google translate, then it might be useful to know that there is an English-language translation of Graiméar Gaeilge, and I don't mean the pamphlet-sized English grammar of Irish. Someone called Pól Ó Murchú published A Grammar of Modern Irish: An annotated guide to Graiméar Gaeilge na mBráithre Críostaí. It is basically a translation of Graiméar Gaeilge, but he adds in many points that he gleaned from reading Ó Dónall's dictionary, as there are some minor points where that dictionary differs from the published CO. The ISBN is 978-0-9836605-1-4 and you can buy it from teangaleanga.com . It is a great book, but it is (slightly) marred by some silliness over the "English language", which is referred to, in English, as Béarla throughout. For example, he says things like "translations into Béarla", and refuses to call the English language English, as if he views Béarla as a word conveying contempt for English. But my view is that Béarla in Irish is a neutral word, and not used to convey contempt in the way Ó Murchú thinks. But if you can overlook that, it is basically the book you will need.

Grma, both of you! To David, thank you for the book suggestion! I ended up getting it from siopagaeilge.ie! And I’m SO excited about it! And, guess what? I showed my dad the website, and he started perusing it himself. He told me that he bought me a birthday present from there, and that he was the 3,000th order…got his purchase for free! (He went ahead and told me what it was…the Gaeilge version of Scrabble! )

To Labhrás, thank you VERY much! …seeing the groupings helped my brain to process it better!
I do have a question though about the following version…

teach [pobal baile]

Is the reason it’s ok to have “pobal” in nominative, so that a double genitive is avoided?
If so, according to http://www.nualeargais.ie/gnag/subst2.htm#fnverweis1 ,

“When two nouns in the genitive directly follow one another, to avoid a double genitive
Instead the first is lenited in the nominative and only the second is in the genitive. This is the so-called "functional genitive", the first noun is "functional" in genitive relation, but keeps the nominative form and is lenited.”

So, following that, wouldn’t it be …

teach phobal baile ? …even if “teach” is masculine?

Thank you again for having taken the time to so thoroughly answer my earlier question! Very thoughtful/helpful!

Rosie, Labhrás is your grammar guy, and he will give you a better explanation. But the "rule" on non-concatenation of genitives relates in the main to a following DEFINITE noun.

In 9.25, GGBC says:

Ní úsáidtear an ginideach sna cásanna seo: ainmfhocal a bhfuil ginideach cinnte faoi réir aige: cóta mhac Sheáin; hata fhear an tí, etc.

The word "cinnte" means "definite".

In teach pobal baile - pobal baile is indefinite. The whole phrase is a bit artificial: a house/building of a congregation of a townland (baile - townland, not town).

But in: teach phobal an bhaile - you see that lenition is there because pobal an bhaile is definite (the house of the congregation of the townland).

Yes.



No,
- definite nouns are lenited in genitive relation (in genitive form or not) when following masculine or feminine nouns, e.g. teach mhac mo mhúinteora = the house of the son of my teacher; teach Sheáin = Seán’s house

... but:
- indefinite nouns in genitive relation aren’t lenited when following masculine nouns, e.g. bata fear siúil = a walking stick , a stick of a wanderer
- indefinite nouns in genitive relation when following feminine nouns ...
... are either lenited or not - depending on their function
-- they are not lenited in case of possession, e.g. eiteog gabhlán gaoithe = a wing of a (certain) swift, a wing belonging to a swift
-- but they are lenited in most other cases, e.g. eiteog ghabhlán gaoithe = a (typical) wing of a swift, a swift wing

Thank you both again so much! I think it’s finally clicked with me!

I had to process it, but I finally think I understand. Thank you, Labhrás!

And thank you, David again the help and book suggestion! I can’t wait for it to get here!

So it seems that there are two alternative grammatical methods that can be employed where an indefinite noun phrase - consisting of a noun qualified by another noun in the genitive - in turn qualifies an indefinite noun:

Method 1: second of the three nouns remains in the nominative (double genitive avoided)
Method 2: second of the three nouns is in the genitive. (double genitive not avoided)

What I'm curious about is this: is the method chosen dependent on dialect?

--

There is the potential for ambiguity with Method 2 if the first of the three nouns is feminine.

E.g. Oifig phobail bhaile: This could mean a) [Oifig phobail] bhaile i.e. a congregation office of a town (Methods 1 & 2); or b) Oifig [phobail bhaile] i.e. an office of a town congregation (Method 2 only)

In this particular example, arguably the two interpretations essentially amount to the same thing in the end but there could be other examples where this would not be the case.

--

Djwebb, as an aside, in your first post you had this.

I think this should be 'teach pobal baile', since 'teach' is masculine. Although, you implied as much in a later post.

yes, and I think Labhrás obliquely pointed it out too.

I think these phrases are all odd - you could read several books in traditional Irish and not come across three indefinite nouns in a noun phrase like this.