Language/Irish/Grammar/Imperative-Mood

Introduction

Verbs in Irish fall into 3 categories:

• First conjugation
• Second conjugation
• Irregular verbs

Background

Imperative

To understand Irish verbs and how they conjugate, first let's have a look at the imperative and the different ways to say "you". In English, we don't use "thou" any more, so the word "you" is technically the second person plural and singular at the same time (like tu and vous) in French, being both formal and informal. In Irish, things are a little different. We have no formality.

1. To address one person, use the pronoun tú
   • Imperative is the dictionary form of the verb
2. To address 2 or more people, use the pronoun sibh
   • Imperative is formed from the dictionary form of the verb, adding an ending, for the first conjugation, (a)igí - see examples below.

Note: Just like in English, in Irish the imperative is never used with a subject pronoun.

Broad and Slender agreement rule

This rule applies everywhere in Irish except for composite words.

• Rule: "broad with broad, slender with slender"
• Broad vowels: a, o, u
• Slender vowels: i, e
• Description: the immediate vowel on either side of a consonant or consonant cluster must be in agreement of vowel type.
• Example:
  • Seas = stand! (to one person)
  • Seasaigí = stand! (to many people)
  • Seasigí is not possible, because the middle 's' has a broad to the left, a slender to the right.
• Exception: anseo (it is a composite word. Meaning: here)

Conjugations

First conjugation

} Table 1. Examples of first conjugation verbs in imperative. Remember the singular form, as presented above, is the "dictionary form".

Sources

1. Book: Teach yourself Irish grammar
2. Book: Basic Irish: A grammar and workbook
3. Google

Singular	Plural	English
lig	ligigí	let, allow
rith	rithigí	run
feic	feicigí	see
seas	seasaigí	stand
glan	glanaigí	clean
dún	dúnaigí	close
scríobh	scríobhaigí	write