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[MacPemmican]

This is a real interesting discussion, I spent quite a time here already and even I got a bit confused sometimes, I hope, you can help me a bit, too:

I'd like to know if both Irish and Scotish Gaelic are inflecting verbs while using a different person? - and if so - what's the pattern they follow?

English e.g. has nearly lost this inflection, just the -s in the 3rd person singular (he, she, it) present tense has remained. In every other case, there's just one form for every person:


to drive
I drive ------- I drove
you drive ----- you drove
-> he drives -- he drove
we drive ------ we drove
you drive ----- you drove
they drive ---- they drove


The inflection ending for he, she, it is an "-s" that is added to the stem (infinitive and stem have the same form in English).


On the other hand, German has still kept most of its inflection system - nearly every person has a different ending:


fahren (to drive)
ich fahre -------- ich fuhr
du fährst -------- du fuhrst
er fährt --------- er fuhr
wir fahren ------- wir fuhren
ihr fahrt -------- ihr fuhrt
sie fahren ------- sie fuhren


The inflection pattern goes like this:
You separate the stem (cut off "-en" of the infinitive) and add special syllables instead:

Pattern of
Present tense:
ich -e
du -st*
er -t*
wir -en
ihr -t
sie -en

(*) some irregular verbs take Umlaut in 2nd and 3rd person, like here and a becomes an ä.

All present tense forms of every verb are formed like this.
(except a few very irregular verbs)


So my question again
Do Irish and Scotish Gaelic also inflect verbs this way - it'd be great if anyone could give me some (complete) examples of how it is done in both Irish and Scotish.

Thank you very much

Mac

[Steaphan]

Originally posted by MacPemmican
This is a real interesting discussion, I spent quite a time here already and even I got a bit confused sometimes, I hope, you can help me a bit, too:

I'd like to know if both Irish and Scotish Gaelic are inflecting verbs while using a different person? - and if so - what's the pattern they follow?

English e.g. has nearly lost this inflection, just the -s in the 3rd person singular (he, she, it) present tense has remained. In every other case, there's just one form for every person:


to drive
I drive ------- I drove
you drive ----- you drove
-> he drives -- he drove
we drive ------ we drove
you drive ----- you drove
they drive ---- they drove


The inflection ending for he, she, it is an "-s" that is added to the stem (infinitive and stem have the same form in English).


On the other hand, German has still kept most of its inflection system - nearly every person has a different ending:


fahren (to drive)
ich fahre -------- ich fuhr
du fährst -------- du fuhrst
er fährt --------- er fuhr
wir fahren ------- wir fuhren
ihr fahrt -------- ihr fuhrt
sie fahren ------- sie fuhren


The inflection pattern goes like this:
You separate the stem (cut off "-en" of the infinitive) and add special syllables instead:

Pattern of
Present tense:
ich -e
du -st*
er -t*
wir -en
ihr -t
sie -en

(*) some irregular verbs take Umlaut in 2nd and 3rd person, like here and a becomes an ä.

All present tense forms of every verb are formed like this.
(except a few very irregular verbs)


So my question again
Do Irish and Scotish Gaelic also inflect verbs this way - it'd be great if anyone could give me some (complete) examples of how it is done in both Irish and Scotish.

Thank you very much

Mac

Well,

Scots Gaelic is quite different than both German and English here.

If you want to say "I drive" as in the present habitual tense.

You use the future of the verb "to be" (bidh) plus the verbal noun.(dràibheadh)

SO let's take "drive"

"I drive everyday" would be "Bidh mi a' dràibheadh gach latha."

Otherwise, you use present of "to be"(tha) plus verbal noun.

Tha mi a' dràibheadh---------Dhràibh mi
Tha thu a' dràibheadh--------Dhràibh thu
Tha e a' dràibheadh----------Dhràibh e
and so on...

the infinitive of "dràibheadh" is "dràibh" so you add "eadh" to form the verbal noun because "i" is the last vowel in the infinitive.

To form the past "I drove" (Dhràibh mi) you lenite the first consonant of the infinitive and this remains the same for every person. (mi, thu, e, i, sinn, iad, sibh)

[suzy_homemaker]

I would have to agree with tartantripper in my curiosity, as well. I live in the US Pacific Northwest, and have both Scottish and Irish in my ancestry, know that they both spoke Gaelic, but have absolutely no clue what the differences are. Seeing some of your guys' postings, showing a bit of each, I can see that, indeed, there is a difference, but what is it? Why is it? Are they just different dialects of the same language? I love languages, but am scared to death to even try to pronounce Scottish or Gaelic; it looks like a language that I'd butcher even better than I do French!