--- title: "Dè an uair a tha e? – Lesson 4" date: 2014-10-19T07:09:19Z Blog: ["Kilted Scot"] category: - "Gàidhlig" - "Gaelic" - "term1" - "week4" images: ["/images/IMAG0612_1-edited.jpg"] Type: ["article"] draft: fal --- Unfortunately, I missed this week’s Gaelic class so this post will be a little shorter than the previous weeks’ efforts. Nevertheless my tutor advised that “We did lots of revision on past and future tense…and started ‘the time’!”, so that’s what we are going to do! ***An Uair*** **– The Time** As well as the two A4 sides of class notes, I’l refer to [Scottish Gaelic in Twelve Weeks](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Scottish-Gaelic-Twelve-Weeks-MacAonghuis/dp/B0092G6DEU/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1413715164&sr=1-2&keywords=scottish+gaelic+in+twelve+weeks "Amazon UK page for book") to pad things out a little bit. To ask what time it is you say _dè an uair a tha e_? where _e_ has previously been used as the personal pronoun ‘he’ in this case it refers to ‘it’, I suspect that will not always be the case in this devious language and that _i_ will be used in the case of feminine nouns. We shall see. To say ‘it is ..’ therefore is simply ‘_tha e .._‘ followed by one of the following: | **Gàidhlig** | **English** | | --- | --- | | _uair_ | one o’clock | | _dà uair_ | two o’clock | | _trì uairean_ | three o’clock | | _ceithir uairean_ | four o’clock | | _còig uairean_ | five o’clock | | _sia uairean_ | six o’clock | | _seachd uairean_ | seven o’clock | | _ochd uairean_ | eight o’clock | | _naoi uairean_ | nine o’clock | | _dech uairean_ | ten o’clock | | _aon uair deug_ | eleven o’clock | | _dà uair dheug_ | twelve o’clock | Note that _aon_ (one) isn’t used for one o’clock but is for eleven o’clock, apparently in Cape Breton Gaelic it can be used in the former case. Also 3-10 o’clock uses the plural form of _uair_ which is _uairean_ and also though I’m not sure why _deug_ from eleven o’clock is lenited to become _dheug_ in twelve o’clock. Just like in English the time clause can be modified to include further information such as in the morning, half past etc. Useful vocabulary: | **Gàidhlig** | **English** | | --- | --- | | _leth-uair_ | half an hour | | _cairteal_ | quarter | | _an dèidh_ | after/past | | _‘sa mhadainn_ | in the morning | | _‘san oidhche_ | at night | | _feasgar_ | (in the) evening | Examples: | **Gàidhlig** | **English** | | --- | --- | | _tha e leth-uair as dèidh sia_ | it is half past six | | _tha e aon uair deug anns a’ mhadainn_ | it is eleven o’clock in the morning | | _aig cairteal gu còic feasgar_ | at quarter to five in the evening | Note that when quarter/half past/to are used the word for o’clock is dropped, just like in English. At this stage I’m unsure how the time would be modified by say 5 minutes or 23 minutes etc. More examples of how to say time in Gaelic (as well as all of the Celtic languages) can be found on this [Omniglot page](http://www.omniglot.com/language/time/celtic.htm "Examples of pronunciation from omniglot"). ***A`cunntadh*** **– Counting** Other than time and revision on tenses, I’m not sure what else was covered in class but let’s have a look at numbers. We’ve previously looked at 1-10 and 11-19.. so let’s look at 20+. | **Gàidhlig** | **English** | | --- | --- | | _fichead_ | twenty | | _fichead `s a h-aon_ | twenty one | | _fichead ‘s a dhà_ | twenty two | | _fichead ‘s a trì_ | twenty three | | _fichead ‘s a deich_ | thirty | | _fichead ‘s a h-aon deug_ | thirty one | | _fichead ‘s a dhà dheug_ | thirty two | | _dà fichead_ | forty | | _dà fichead ‘s a h-aon_ | forty one | | _dà fichead ‘s a deich_ | fifty | Interesting, no? So numbers are counted in sets of twenty, and that set of twenty is in itself modified to bring the next set, which means in order to even say the correct number you need to be reasonably numerate. _Deug_ translates into ‘teen’ and it seems like it is always lenited when following _dhà_ (two). Also _aon_ is lenited from twenty-one upwards apparently. I would suspect due to their non-inclusion in the list that numbers 3-9 are never lenited. Finally, as always we have the weekly song, _Màiri Ruadh A’dannsa an Nochd_ by Arthur Cormack. The title translates to Red-haired Mairi will be dancing tonight. It’s quite upbeat but there is only one version on youtube to share here and the accoustics aren’t great, sorry!