Scottish Gaelic Dialects (Continued) Author(s): Charles M. Robertson Source: The Celtic Review, Vol. 4, No. 13 (Jul., 1907), pp. 69-80 Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30069921 Accessed: 27-06-2016 11:00 UTC

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This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 11:00:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms SCOTTISH GAELIC DIALECTS 69

SCOTTISH GAELIC DIALECTS

CHARLES M. ROBERTSON

(Continued from vol. iii. p. 332) The mutual action and interaction of vowels and consonants upon one another are exceptionally prominent in the pro- nunciation of Gaelic, and show themselves very insistently in the orthography of the language. The silent vowels that form a part of that orthography have their explanation in most cases in the history of the language, but practically they owe their retention, or their presence, in the modern spelling to the adjacent consonants. Cois, the dative of cas, foot, for example, derived the i from a retraction of the ending of coxi, the prehistoric form of the dative of the word, but phonetically the preservation of the i is due to the fact that s has its slender or narrow sound or the dis- tinctive sound that it has when in contact with either of the slender vowels e and i. On the other hand the retention and sometimes even the introduction of silent consonants are often due to adjoining vowels. One general use of such consonants in the modern language is to show that the vowels on either side of the consonant are to be sounded apart, or that, in other words, they belong to different syllables. Accordingly such consonants are introduced when required for that purpose in inflection and word formation. As Munro has it in his Grammar: 'In the course of inflecting a primitive word, or combining a termination or compositive syllable therewith, if two vowels belonging to distinct syllables meet together, they must be separated by a silent dh, gh, or th,' and he gives amongst other examples ceb, mist; but cebthar, misty. Silent consonants in this way serve the same purpose as the diaeresis mark in English orthography. Other purposes also are served by them. After liquids they indicate that the liquids are sounded long. After a vowel they often indicate that the sound of the vowel differs from what it

This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 11:00:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 70 THE CELTIC REVIEW would be otherwise, as when a and o are changed to ao before dh and gh. The number of instances in which consonants are absolutely silent, however, is by no means great. ' Silent' consonants are not always silent. They may be silent in one dialect and not in another. Indeed, apart from the cases in which there is immediate contact with a liquid or another consonant the instances of consonants that are silent in every dialect are comparatively few in number, and even where they are in contact with liquids or other consonants they are not without phonetic influence in the pronunciation of the word. Even th at the end of accented syllables in many instances is not silent in Arran, Kintyre, and Islay, or, though with a different pronunciation, in the west of Ross-shire. Silent consonants owe not only their retention or introduction in many cases to their vowel neighbours. They often owe their silence to those same vowels. They have lost their sounds through aspiration, and aspiration has been caused by the vowels. Aspiration took place whenever a single consonant stood between two vowels in early Gaelic speech. No consonant, unless supported by its own double or by some other consonant, was strong enough to resist the force of vowels on either side of it, and remain unchanged in such a position. In the case, for example, of those consonants called mutes or stops, b, p, c, g, d, t, the organs of utterance which should be closed completely so as to stop or intercept the emission of breath between the two vowels, were only partially closed in anticipation of the coming vowel, and so permitted an emission of breath or aspiration that in place of the 'stops' caused the sounds that were really uttered to be the corresponding ' aspirates' or aspirated consonants. The consonants that were themselves spirants, as v and s, when they came into such a position, vanished altogether. The liquids in such positions also underwent a change, and though it is not properly aspiration, though often conveniently included under that distinctive designation, it agrees with aspiration in that it takes place in the same circumstances and arises from the same cause. The great cause of many,

This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 11:00:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms SCOTTISH GAELIC DIALECTS 71 perhaps of most such changes, is ease of utterance. When one sound gives place to another the displacing sound is generally the easier to enunciate. Aspiration is not unknown of course in other languages. In English, for example, father shows what we call aspiration in f and th of the original p and t seen in the Latin pater, only th in this as in some other instances has the sound of dh-not that of th as in 'thin '-and is the aspiration of d which took the place of t as seen in the Anglo-Saxon form faeder, Gothic fadar, etc. In our Gaelic athair p as usual has been lost and t has become th now either sounded as h or altogether silent. Perhaps the most curious apparent parallel to this treat- ment of the particular consonant t is found in the Glasgow vernacular, as when such a word as 'water' is pronounced 'wa'er' or 'waher.' Though the process of change in this case is hardly to be called aspiration, the result certainly is oddly similar. Gaelic orthography, strange though it looks when first examined by those familiar with English and other languages, is in reality highly phonetic and well fitted to distinguish simply and effectively the sounds of the language. MacAlpine did not speak without knowledge when he uttered such an encomium as-' The orthography of the Gaelic shows more acuteness and ingenuity in its structure than any other language the author knows anything of.' In that orthography it is possible to distinguish simply and effectively four different sounds of each consonant in the event of its having so many. First there are the broad and the narrow or slender sounds. These are distinguished in spelling according as the flanking vowels are broad or narrow. If the vowel nearest to the consonant is broad, that is, if it is a or o or u, the consonant has what is called its broad sound. If the vowel is a narrow one, that is e or i, the consonant has its narrow or slender sound. This distinction in the sounds of the consonants is the foundation for the rule in Gaelic spelling that the vowels on either side of a consonant or group of consonants must

This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 11:00:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 72 THE CELTIC REVIEW be of the same class, that is, either both broad or both narrow. To quote the old couplet as given by Armstrong:- 'Leathan ri leathan is caol ri caol Leughar na sgriobhar gach facal 'san t-saoghal' 'Broad to broad and small (vowel) to small, you may read or write every word in the world.'

Then there are the aspirated sounds of both the broad and the slender consonants. These are marked, except in the case of the liquids, by writing h after the consonant, a method which both indicates the change of sound and preserves the identity of the consonant. In the case of some consonants the distinction of broad and slender, of course, is not, at least usually, recognised, and aspirated sounds that might be looked for and that did exist, no doubt, in the language at one time, are not now to be found, and have had their place taken by others. Thus dh gets the sound of gh both broad and slender, and sh, fh, and even in a few instances ch, get the same sound as th.

The liquids 1, n, r The four different pronunciations are recognised in the case of each of the liquids 1, n, and r, also in the orthography. That is without taking into account difference of length. There are broad and slender sounds, as in the case of the other consonants, and they are distinguished in the same way by means of the flanking vowels. Both the broad and the slender sounds here also have their respective changes of sound, which correspond in their occurrence to the aspirations of other consonants, and are therefore commonly called their 'aspirated' sounds. The plain or 'unaspirated' sound of a liquid is represented, except at the beginning of a word, by writing the liquid double and the 'aspirated' sound by writ- ing it single. This method of representation is in agreement with the law of aspiration, that a single consonant standing between two vowels in the primitive Gaelic speech became aspirated.

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In the Highland Society's Gaelic Dictionary, and in the first quarto edition of the Gaelic Bible, initial aspiration of the three liquids is marked in the case of 1 by a cross line near the top of the letter, and in the case of n and r by a dot above the letter. Those markings occur also in portions of some of the current pocket editions of the Bible. A more consistent way would have been to distinguish the aspirated from the unaspirated sounds at the beginning of words by the same means as they are distinguished in the middle and at the end, that is, by writing the liquid double when un- aspirated and single only when aspirated. This method has been followed in part of How to Learn Gaelic, by Dr. Alex- ander MacBain and Mr. John Whyte. Generally, however, in printed Gaelic there is no attempt to mark the initial aspiration of the three liquids.

1

The plain broad sound of 1 is represented, for example, in eallach, a load; mullach, top; call, loss; moll, chaff; and the plain slender sound in seillean, a bee; coille, wood; caill, lose; mill, destroy. The aspirated broad sound is represented e.g. in bealach, a pass; mulad, sadness; 1l, brood; bl, drink; and the aspirated slender sound in seileach, willow; uile, all; bail, economy; mil, honey. Initially broad and slender 1 are distinguished of course according as the next following vowel is broad or slender. The aspirated sounds are, or ought to be, heard when, for example, an adjective beginning with I-luath, swift; leathan, broad-follows a feminine noun, or a verb with initial 1 is used in the past indicative-labhair e, he spoke; leag e, he felled, and the unaspirated sounds when such adjectives follow masculine nouns, and when such verbs are used in the impera- tive or in the future indicative. Initial aspiration has become unchangeably fixed in the preposition le, with, and its derivatives leam, with me, leat, leis, etc. In stereotyped phrases like a leas--Cha ruig iad a leas, they need not-and a lion-A lion chuid 's a chuid, by

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degrees-the aspiration has also become fixed, but is there due to the preceding preposition, which was originally 'do,' but is now worn down to ' a.' The tendency to loss or confusion of distinctive sounds that has touched other consonants has extended to the liquids, more especially in the Northern dialect. A difficulty in differentiating the aspirated from the unaspirated sound of broad 1, as in a la, his day, and a la, her day, bealach, and eallach is general both in South and in North. Unaspirated broad I has a peculiar pronunciation in the island of Eigg. Clach, stone, sounds there like 'cwach'; mullach a' chladaich, top of the beach, like 'muwach a' chwadaich,' and so on. There seems to be a trace of, or an approach to, this enunciation also in the speech to the south and east of that island. Slender 1 loses one or other of its two sounds, at least with the younger people, to a great extent in Northern Gaelic. In Sunart, in North Argyll, it is the unaspirated sound that goes, and the aspirated sound may be heard invariably, e.g. in leanabh, never lleanabh, in leamh, leomhann, leann, ldine, leubh (read thou), leubhaidh (will read), sleamhuinn, sliabh, buille, maille, seillean, etc. L, that is to say, in such words, is apt always to have the same sound as in baile, town; mile, a thousand. In West Ross and in Sutherland, on the other hand, the unaspirated sound not only maintains its ground, but takes the place of the aspirated sound in initial position. Leanabh is apt to be always lleanabh, and An do lion e? 'An do lion e ?' So, An do fhliuch e thu ? in West Ross, is 'An do lliuch e thu ?' In Lewis aspirated slender 1 appears to be broadened in medial position. At all events, baile in the dialect of the island, is often heard in place-names as 'bala,' and Balallan (Baile-Ailein) as ' Bal-Alain.'

n

The different sounds of n should be heard, for example, plain broad in connadh, donn; aspirated broad in canach,

This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 11:00:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms SCOTTISH GAELIC DIALECTS 75 bhn; plain slender in cinneach, beinn; and aspirated slender in binid, min. In this case the sounds that are difficult to distinguish are the two aspirated, as in dhnadh, closing, and dhinidh, will close, and as is evinced in alternative spellings like cinealta for cionalta or ceanalta. Broad n tends to take its aspirated sound permanently, when initial, in North Argyll, West Ross, and Sutherland. NMire is apt to be always 'naire' and never ' nnkire,' and so namhaid, naoidhean, naomh, etc. Words like snkmh, swim; snkth, thread, which are pronounced respectively 'snnkmh,' 'snnhth,' elsewhere, follow suit in those districts. Initial slender n retains its plain sound in Sutherland, and takes its aspirated sound in North Argyll. Neart, strength, for example, is apt to be always ' nneart' in the former district and 'neart' in the latter, and so neamh, heaven; neimh, venom; Niall, Neil, etc. Words like sniomh, sneadh, again follow suit. In West Ross the leaning, so far as it has appeared there, is towards aspirated n. In North Argyll aspirated slender n for unaspirated often appears both medi- ally, as 'inean' for innean, anvil, and finally as gamhain for gamhainn, a stirk, and Samhuin for Samhuinn, Hallow-tide. The latter words, however, have final n, not nn, in Irish. In medial and final positions the plain sound of slender n is substituted for the aspirated sound in many instances in the West Highlands, more especially in the extreme south, but to some extent all the way northwards, and even into the south-east of Sutherland. Thus, words like minig, duine, min are sounded respectively minnig, duinne, minn, and so binid, muineal, l8ine, mbine, sine, teine, hine, grhin, maoin, muin, and so on. In Arran and Kintyre these and many others all have nn. Indeed, in those districts the number of words in which n is not sounded nn in such positions is very small. This same unaspirated slender sound of n is given to the n of the so-called diminutive suffix an when it follows a slender vowel in Arran, Kintyre, and Islay. Cuilean, a pup, for example, is 'cuileinn,' and so chirean, cirean, firean, innean, and names like Ailean, Ailpean, Cailean, etc.

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Ng Ng is very variable in most dialects. Perhaps in the greater number of instances it tends to disappear between vowels in the extreme south-Arran and Kintyre-and north -Sutherland. In North Argyll-mainland and islands-it becomes very generally ng-g both medially and finally. Ionga, a finger nail, for example, is iong-ga, i.e. has the sound of ng with a g added. So in other instances, as seangan, sreang. The sound is like that of ng in such English words as 'anger,' 'finger.' Indeed natives of the district in question often carry this peculiarity into their English pronunciation, and may be heard to say, for instance, 'hang-g' for hang, and 'king-g' for king. Final ng in words of two syllables is variously ng, nn, and g when broad, and nn and g when slender. A preference for nn appears in Arran and Kintyre, and for g in Northern Gaelic, e.g. in cumhang (narrow), tarrang (a nail), aisling (vision), bodhaig (bothy), eislinn (stretcher), cudainn (cuddy fish), faoileann (sea-gull), etc. Verbs borrowed recently from English appear to carry with them as a rule the present participle ending, and end in ig, as robaig, rob; ropaig, roup, sell by auction. (A sale by auction is ropainn!) At Lochtayside, or at least in one part of that district, such verbs uniformly end in inn, e.g. hisig, to use, is there ' hisinn,' and cuipig, to wllip, ' cuipinn.'

The four sounds of r should be heard, for example, in earrach, fearr, mearachd, fear, mirr, dirich, chir. Often only two sounds are recognised. These are a plain and an aspirated r, the distinction of broad and slender being then unobserved. Generally, however, the two aspirated sounds can be differentiated, but so much cannot be said of the unaspirated sounds. Duplicate forms like nhraich and nirich, to shame, an uraidh and an hiridh, last year, are due immediately not to failure to distinguish the different sounds,

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but to difference of dialect, though ultimately the difference of dialect itself may be referable to such failure. In Arran and with MacAlpine the word for shame is naire, but the adjective is nkrach and the verb nkraich. A mMreach, to-morrow, is in Irish a mtrach, in Early Irish, imbtrach, but Mr. Quiggin has found both amarach and amAireach in Donegal. An uiridh, so Perthshire, etc., Early Irish inn uraid, Old Irish urid, is an uraidh in Arran and in Modern Irish. Into such a word as uiread, so much, urad in Arran and with MacAlpine, the prepositional prefix ar, air, which takes so many diverse forms, enters. Initial aspiration has become fixed in the prepositions ri, to, with its derivatives rium, to me, riut, etc., and roimh, before, with romham, romhad, etc. Other instances of fixed aspiration are a riamh, ever; a rireadh, indeed; a rithis, again. The initial aspiration of slender r is disappearing both in North Argyll and in Sutherland. Da righ, two kings, is ' da rrigh,' and reoth e, it froze, 'rreoth e.' The aspiration is maintained in the case of broad r. At Alligin on Loch Torridon aspirated slender r sounds as though an attempt were made to say y at the same time. This is heard, e.g., in ri, to, with rium, riut, ris, rithe, riuthal; coire, cauldron; coire, fault; maireach, cuir, fhuair. Further north at Little Lochbroom r has dropped out of the combina- tion and only y remains. In part of Lewis aspirated broad r, for example in farum, noise, sounds like th in English 'then,' 'this.'

Long liquids The long sounds which have been noticed in connection with vowels (vol. iii. pp. 99, 330) differ from the other sounds only in length, and are found in the case of the aspirated, as well as the unaspirated sounds. Sean, old, to take an exceptional instance, occurs in different positions or dialects with three sounds of the liquid. When the word does not stand before its noun n has, as it ought to have etymologically, its aspirated sound and is short. Sometimes

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it retains this sound before a noun beginning with a vowel if the two words have become one, as in seanair, grandfather, for sean-athair. Generally before a noun n has become un- aspirated and has been lengthened at the same time, and accordingly is often written 'seann' in that position. In Arran and Kintyre n in that position remains aspirated but is lengthened; that is, it has the sound and the length that it has generally in seanmhathair, grandmother, and that are also heard probably universally in the words seanchaidh or seanachaidh, a genealogist, and seanchas, conversation. Sean with the same pronunciation of n has also the meaning of grandparent in Arran and Kintyre; Am fac thu sean ? have you seen grandfather? (or grandmother); Tha e aig tigh shean, he is at grandfather's (or grandmother's) house. The word is used also in the district of Ardnamurchan, but with the article there, Am fac thu an sean? and with the same aspirated and lengthened sound of n. The four sounds of I have been found amongst the older people in Donegal by Mr. Quiggin, but the aspirated sounds are not usual with the young. It is the same with n. There also, as on our own west coast, there has been an extensive substitution of unaspirated for aspirated slender n, as duinne for duine, man, gloinne for gloine or glaine, glass. Of un- aspirated slender r no trace was found, and aspirated slender r was not found at the beginning of words except in a few stereotyped phrases, such as, a r6ir, according to; a riamh, ever; a rist, again; a righ, 0 king. Except in such phrases initial r, whether broad or slender, gets the sound of aspirated broad r, and consequently 'is unaffected by aspirating words.' In Donegal in other words, with the few exceptions mentioned, initial r, whether its sound should be broad or slender and whether it should be plain or aspirated, always has the same sound, and that the sound of aspirated broad r.

Liquid Changes A substitution of one liquid for another is not an un- known occurrence generally, but appears with quite unusual

This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 11:00:20 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms SCOTTISH GAELIC DIALECTS 79 frequency in Sutherlandshire. The following instances have been noted there:-

gbireag for gbileag, or cbileag (a haycock) meireachadh ,, meileachadh Sgeireaboll ,, Skelbo, old Scelleboll abharn ,, abhainn, used as genitive of abhainn airm ,, ainm airmig ,, ainmig fiarnaidh ,, fiannaidh (a giant) gairmheach ,, gainmhbeach guilbearnach ,, guilbneach irinn ,, inghean (daughter) lormachd ,, lomnochd mearmainn ,, meanmainn seinnlear ,, seinnlean, seillean (a bee) Euraboll ,, Embo, old Eyndboll called Eunaboll by West Coast fishermen sparraban ,, bannaban (forehead bandage) earachainn ,, eanchainn fasaireadh ,, fasanadh (pasturing) mearbh ,, meanbh githil ,, githir (pain in wrist) grath-muing ,, gath-muing (name) torrasgil ,, toirsgean eilthir ,, oirthir falair ,, faraire talcuis ,, tarcuis.

The three last are from Rob Donn's Poems. 'Marachan,' in the same author's ''S mear a ni Ebri mire ri Debrsa,' seems clearly to be for manachan, the groin. Some of the words in this list are from the Rev. Adam Gunn. The following more or less peculiar instances of liquids from the same county may be noted here:-

garnardaich for [gannardaich 1] (yawning) gunnars ,, gunnas (gorse) ainig ,, aing (displeasure) ainigeach ,, aingeach (displeased) ainigidh ,, aingidh uinigneach ,, uaigneach miong ,, meag tastar ,, tartar.

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Garnardaich seems analogous to fiarnaidh for fiannaidh, and suggests connection somehow with English yawn, Old English gtinian, Scottish gant. Gunnars is found in West Ross (Applecross and Lochbroom) and in Easter Ross, but gunnas in the Black Isle and gunnais in Gairloch. Whether it is or is not based on conas is doubtful. The word aing and the form miong are used also in the Outer Hebrides. Tastar for tartar occurs in Rob Donn's Poems; in West Ross it is tatar. Guilbearnach is heard in Perth and West Ross, and irinn in Easter Ross. Airm for ainm, and also aram for anam, are met with in the book of the Dean of Lismore, and occur in Irish Gaelic.

CLIAR SHEANCHAIN

W. J. WATSON

THOUGH the last of the old time bards has long been gone, the memory of them still lives in the traditions of the Scottish Highlands, and from time to time one hears among the older people stories relating to those itinerant companies of bards, story-tellers, and other performers that were known far and wide as 'Cliar Sheanchain,' or Senchan's Company. In these stories the Cliar Sheanchain are represented as travelling in companies of twelve, more or less. Their custom was to quarter themselves on some well-to-do and hospitable family, where they were sure of food and lodging, and there they stayed till they often became a grievous burden to their hosts. The conventions of Gaelic hospitality were strict, and the satire of a bard was a thing not lightly to be incurred. The words of satire had strange power. They caused a man's face to redden even to blistering, and the man even unjustly satirised did little good thereafter. So the bards stayed on at their will, eating and drinking of the best, not without grumbling. There were, however, certain rules of the game. On the one hand, the Cliar were bound to get the best of

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