12
| The Irish | Is sounded like the | i.e., like the vowel |
| Vowel | phonetic sign | sound in the word |
| ó long | ō | note |
| o short | ŭ | done, much |
| ú long | oo | tool |
| u short | u | put, full, took |
Note.—Final short vowels are never silent; thus, mine, míle, are pronounced min′-ě, meel′-ě. From the above table it will be seen that a is never like a in fate, e like e in me, i like i in mine, o like o in not, or u like u in mule. The short vowels, as will be seen, are sometimes modified by the following consonant. In giving the vowel-sounds we will follow the western Irish, as the most consistent. The Munster and Ulster sounds of the vowels are treated separately below.
§ 18. CONSONANTS.
| b, f, m, p | are sounded | like | b, f, m, p | in | § 16 |
| d BROAD (see § 8) | „ | dh | „ | „ | |
| t „ | „ | th | „ | „ | |
| g, l, n, r, s, often like g, l, n, r, s. | |||||
§ 19. The Article and the Noun.
There is no INDEFINITE article in Irish; thus, gort means “a field.” The DEFINITE article is an, “the” (ăn: like the an- in “annoy”), as, an gort, the field. In such phrases (compare the English “a field”) the stress is laid on the noun; there is no stress on the article, and the vowel-sound of the article is obscure, as an gort (ăn gŭrth). In the spoken language the n of the article an is often omitted before nouns beginning with a consonant.
§ 20. The Adjective and the Noun.
Adjectives, as a rule, are placed AFTER
