How to say “must”

Irish is in many ways a more expressive language than English.

We have four different meanings covered by the English word ‘must’, and five ways to express them.

‘I absolutely must’ is Is éigin dom.

Is éigin dom mo thicéid a cheannach chun na laethanta saoire inniu, nó beidh sé ró-dhéanach.
“I must book my tickets for the holiday today, or it will be too late.”

The plain ‘I must, I have to’ is caithfead, caithfidh mé or ní mór dom.

Caithfead fanúint, caithfidh mé fanacht, sa bhaile anocht.
“I must stay at home tonight.”

Ní mór do dhaltaí gach ceist a fhreagairt.
“Students must answer every question.”

‘I morally must’ is Tá orm.

Tá orm bheith cróga nuair a thugaim cuairt chuig an dochtúir.
“I must be brave when I visit the doctor.”

‘It logically must be’ is Ní foláir nó go bhfuil sé.

Bhí sé ag stealladh báistí lasmuigh – ní foláir nó go bhfuil tú fliuch báite.
“It’s teeming rain outside – you must be soaking wet.”

How to say “can”

There are several ways to express this in Irish.

‘You can go there’ can be expressed as:

Féadann tú dul ann. (The older literary form, still in use).

Tá tú ábalta dul ann. (’You are able to go’ – perhaps the commonest Munster form).

Tig leat dul ann (’It comes to you to go’ – an Ulster expression using an older form of the word for ‘comes’ – tagann in Standard Irish.)

Tá tú in ann dul ann. (’It is in you to go’ – a common Connacht form).

Tá sé ar do chumas dul ann. (You are capable of going).

“Féidir” activates the le/do distinction seen throughout the language: le refers to opinion, do to objective fact:–

Is féidir leat dul ann (You think you can go there [but you might be wrong]).

Is féidir duit dul ann (You really can go there [whether you believe it or not]).

N.B. that the phrases with ‘ábalta’ and ‘in ann’ can be used with any of the tenses:

Bhíos/Bhí mé ábalta; Bhíos/Bhí mé in ann: I was able

Táim/Tá mé ábalta; Bhíos/Bhí mé in ann: I am able

Béad/Beidh mé ábalta; Béad/Beidh mé in ann: I will be able

Bheinn ábalta; Bheinn in ann: I would be able

N.B. that b’fhéidir means ‘perhaps’. It is followed by go + an indirect relative clause:–

b’fhéidir go bhfuil siad in ann imeacht (perhaps they’ll be able to go away)

Irish, like most lanugages, has verb forms for first, second, and third persons, as well as singular and plural. These link an action being performed with the person or thing performing the action:

brisim — I break

briseann tú — you break

briseann sé — he breaks

brisimid — we break

briseann sibh — you break

briseann siad — they break

briseann an fear — the man breaks

briseann na mná – the women break

But Irish also has a form that is impersonal, that simply expresses an action being performed without any reference to who or what does the action. This is used when the person performing the action is either unknown or unimportant.

In some cases, this can be translated as “One…” or “People…” or an indefinite “They…”

Óltar a lán tae in Éirinn – One drinks a lot of tea in Ireland

People drink a lot of tea in Ireland

They drink a lot of tea in Ireland

An bhfuil a fhios agat cad a thugtar ar Big Mac san Fhrainc?

Do you know what they call a Big Mac in France?

A Dhia! Mharaíodh Cionnaith!

Oh my God! They killed Kenny!

It can also be translated by the English passive:

Dúntar an geata gach oíche ar a dó an chloig.

The gate is closed every night at two o’clock

They close the gate every night at two o’clock

Briseadh an fhuinneoig agus mise ag an oifig

The window was broken when I was at the office

They broke the window when I was at the office

Certain verbs have specialized meanings in the autonomous form:

Faightear a leithéid seo ar fud na tire

One finds things like this all over the country =Things like this are available all over the country

Feictear dom nach bhfuil sin ceart

It is seen to me that that is not right

=That doesn’t look right to me

Samhlaíodh go raibh sé chun cur

It was imagined that it was going to rain

=It seemed like it was going to rain.

Forms of the Autonomous Verb

• In the Present Tense, the ending is -tar for verbs ending in a broad consonant, and -tear for verbs ending in a slender one.
• In the Past tense, the ending is -(e)adh or -(a)íodh
• In the Past Habitual, it ends in -t(a)í
• In the Future, it ends in -f(e)ar
• and in the Conditional it ends in -f(a)í

Firstly, every verb has a particular verb form (the autonomous form) that is “impersonal” or “subjectless”. In other words, the person doing the action is not identified.

For example:

Briseadh an fhuinneog.

This can be translated by the English passive:

The window was broken.

There is no mention of who/what broke the window and, the fact that this type of construction is not used to say who/what did a particular action is worth emphasising. If we wish to say who broke the window (say it was Somhairle), we would usually revert to the active form of the verb:

Bhris Somhairle an fhuinneog.

Somhairle broke the window.

This autonomous/impersonal form of the verb has been described in the Autonomous Verb lesson and is not the focus of discussion here.

[It would be useful for anyone who is not confident about the autonomous verb to read that article in conjunction with this one.]

Below, I’ll be describing another type of passive construction that is used in Irish. To avoid confusion between the 2 passive constructions (i.e between the one to be discussed below and the autonomous), I will be using the term “passive” only to describe the former and not to describe the autonomous verb form.

This passive is a construction that involves the usage of an active form of the verb “bí” (e.g. “tá” or “bhí“) as well as a verbal noun that is preceded by a preposition and a possessive pronoun.

Essentially, this construction is used to convey the idea that an action is being done, was being done, etc while the autonomous form of the verb usually described an action that was done, is done, will be done, etc.

[I have to admit that I am not telling the complete truth here since the autonomous form of one particular verb (the verb "bí") can also be used to convey this sense of an action "being done" (i.e an action that is being done, was being done, etc. However, I’m going to conveniently ignore this fact since a)I’m not concentrating on the autonomous here

and, more importantly, b) it would complicate matters unduly – at least for me!]

So, to start giving examples that, hopefully, might make things clearer.

If we want to say :

Eoghan cuts the grass in the summer.

We would use the active form of the verb and say:

Baineann Eoghan an féar sa tsamhradh.

But, if we want to say:

The grass is cut every fortnight in the summer

[and it’s not really important to say who cuts it]

Then, we could use the autonomous (agentless) form of the verb and the sentence might be translated as follows:

Baintear an féar gach uile choicís sa tsamhradh.

However, if we want to say:

The grass is being cut right now.

It would be usual to use a construction like the following:

Tá an féar dá bhaint anois díreach.

Literally: the grass is to its cutting right now.

This construction is arrived at as follows:

Tá an féar do a bhaint anois díreach.

The grass is to its cutting right now.

“do” is a preposition meaning “to”.

“a” is a possessive pronoun meaning “his”/”its”

“bhaint” come from “baint” the verbal noun meaning “cutting”.

“Baint” becomes “bhaint” because it is a noun (albeit a verbal noun) preceded by the possessive pronoun “his” – in the same way that “cóta” (coat) becomes “a chóta” (his coat).

The “do” and “a” are combined to form “dá“.

The combination “dá” is shortened in the Standard to “á” so, in the Standard, the above sentence would read:

Tá an féar á bhaint anois díreach.

[However it should be noted that the non-standard "dá" and even "dhá" will be commonly encountered. The important thing to remember is that whether you use dá, dhá or á, a possessive pronoun ("a") is contained within and this may affect the following verbal noun.

So, while our autonomous construction

Baintear an féar means that "the grass is cut",

Tá an féar á bhaint means that "the grass is being cut".

[It will be noticed that, in this particular example, our passive construction, like the autonomous, is "agentless" (i.e the identity of grass-cutter is not specified). However, it will (hopefully) be seen later on that we could modify this construction very easily to say who is doing the cutting).

We have already seen (above) that we can use the autonomous form of the verb to say, "the window was broken". [Briseadh an fhuinneog.]

However, if we wanted to say:

The window was being broken downstairs but I was afraid to go down.

Then, we could again make use of our passive construction.

All we have to do is:

-get the appropriate tense of the verb “bí” (it’s the past tense in this example because we’re saying that something was being done)

- use an appropriate verbal noun (in this case, the verbal noun meaning “breaking”)

- and precede the verbal noun with the preposition “do” in combination with a possessive pronoun (as before, in this case, the combination is “á“).

Which gives us:

Bhí an fhuinneog á briseadh thíos an staighre ach bhí faitíos orm dul síos.

which means, literally:

The window was to its/her (window being feminine) breaking downstairs……etc.

In this case the verbal noun is not lenited because the possessive pronoun refers to a feminine noun (fuinneog) – the same rule that means “her coat” is “a cóta”.

If we wanted to say:

The windows were being broken, we could say:

Bhí na fuinneoga á mbriseadh.

Literally:

The windows were to their breaking.

Here, the “á” is again a shortened form of “do” and “a“. However, in this case the “a” is the possessive pronoun meaning “their”.

“Their” means that we must have “á mbriseadh” in this example – in the same way that “their table” would be “a mbord“.

The preposition “do” along with the list of possessive pronouns and the subsequent effect on the following verbal noun can be shown as follows:

do mo bhriseadh “to my breaking”

do do bhriseadh “to your breaking”

á bhriseadh “to his breaking”

á briseadh “to her breaking”

dár (do + ár combination) mbriseadh “to our breaking”

bhur mbriseadh “to your (plural) breaking”

á mbriseadh “to their breaking”

As stated above, this passive construction (unlike the autonomous) can be used with an agent i.e. we could say that something is being done by someone.

So, if we wanted to say that Oisín was being hit, and we also wanted to let it be known that Méabh was the guilty party, we could say:

Bhí Oisín á bhualadh ag Méabh

Oisín was being hit by Méabh [Literally: Oisín was to his hitting at Méabh.]

Likewise:

Bhí Oisín á bhualadh aici.

Oisín was being hit by her [Literally: Oisín was to his hitting at her.]

So, using the same construction that we used above to say things like “the grass is being cut” or “the window was being broken”, we can now add in an agent/ “do-er” by using the preposition “ag” (or by a special personal form of “ag” which combines it with a preposition i.e. agam, agat, air, aici, againn, agaibh acu).

Examples:

The grass is being cut by Pól [Literally: the grass is to its cutting at Pól]

Bhí an fhuinneog á briseadh ag Conor.

The window was being broken by Conor [Literally: the window was to its breaking at Conor.]

Bhí na milseáin á gceannach ag na páistí.

The sweets were being bought by the children [Literally: the sweets were to their buying at the children.]

Nach bhfuair tú an litir uaidh? Ní bhfuair, ach de réir cosúlachta tá sí á seoladh inniu aige.

Didn’t you get the letter from him?  No, but apparently it is being sent by him today.

[Note that "litir" is a feminine noun so it is "á seoladh" (to its/her sending) rather than á sheoladh.]

Word of warning

Unfortunately (and I wish I didn’t have to mention this) this passive construction can, on some occasions, be potentially ambiguous.

Take the following example:

Bhí Oisín á bhualadh.

From what we have said already, this should mean:

Oisín was to his (i.e Oisín’s) hitting i.e Oisín was being hit.

Thankfully, all that has gone before has not been a lie and yes, it could mean this but it could also mean that Oisín was hitting some other guy – or any masculine noun). In other words, the “his” in “to his hitting” could refer to someone else. So this sentence could also mean:

Oisín was hitting him.

Of course,this type of ambiguity could not arise with the following:

Bhí Oisín á bualadh.

This is because “á bualadh” (rather than “á bhualadh”) means “to her hitting”. Thus, in this case at least we’re safe enough – we know that Oisín is hitting a woman (or at least a feminine noun) and that’s it’s not he himself who is the victim of violence.

On a brighter note, the potential for ambiguity described above often depends on the context and it will often be the case that we don’t need to worry about it.

For example, with regard to our grass-cutting sentence:

Tá an féar á bhaint anois díreach.

It’s unlikely that anyone would misconstrue the intending meaning and come up with a translation like:

The grass is cutting him right now – even though this is a possible translation.

[And of course, even if the grass was going around cutting people, such activity would merit a verb such as "gearr" rather than "bain" in this context!]

However, it is important to be aware that a sentence like

Bhí Oisín á bhualadh.

can cause problems out of context and might need to be altered slightly. Thus, if we mean that Oisín was the person being hit, we should, if possible, consider naming the aggressor (i.e. add an agent) to avoid confusion (as was done earlier by adding “ag Méabh“).

Alternatively, if we were trying to say that Oisín was the agent of aggression i.e that “Oisín was hitting him”, we could just cheat slightly and turn things around to say:

Bhí sé á bhualadh ag Oisín ["he was being hit by Oisín]

Similarly:

Tá sé á cheannach could mean either:

He is buying it/him.

Or

It/he is being bought.

So, again, if the intended meaning is unlikely to be clear from the context, a different construction should be considered.

To summarise very briefly

In Irish, every verb has an autonomous or “impersonal” verb form.

Constructions using this verb form are sometimes translated with the English passive e.g

Crádh na léitheoirí/The readers were tormented. There is no mention of who was doing the tormenting.

However, there is another passive construction which may be used with an “agent” i.e. the tormentor can be specified:

Bhí na léitheoirí á gcrá ag Eoghan/The readers were being tormented by Eoghan.

Finally, this passive construction may be ambiguous out of context:

Bhí na léitheoirí á gcrá could mean:

The readers were being tormented.

Or

The readers were tormenting them.

Firstly submitted by: Merryploughbhoy

You don’t aspirate with níor, cár, ar, gur, murar, nár, sular etc. when in the past autonomous form (you would normally if it was not in the autonomous form)

eg.

Cár chaill sé? but Cár cailleadh é?
Ar chiall sé? but Ar cailleadh é?
Níor chiall sé? but Níor cailleadh é?

etc etc.

So, where you put in the “h” in bold you can take it out

For example, the aspiration here is incorrect:

Dúirt sé gur dhúnadh an doras
He said that the door was closed

It should be:

Dúirt sé gur dúnadh an doras

The rule
When the verb is in the Autonomous form of any other tense don’t aspirate.

How does the verb particle a affect Autonomous Verbs in the Past Tense?

Normally a (the direct relative conjunction) aspirates the verb (incl all autonomous forms of the verb in all tenses except PAST AUTONOMOUS or if it begins with a d’) eg.

Example of Indicative (Normal) Tense aspirating: “An fear a chuireann an síol”

Example of Present Autonomous aspirating: “An síol a chuirtear”

However

Example with Past Autonomous not aspirating: “An síol a cuireadh”

Example of Verb beginning with d’ not aspirating: “An fear a d’olfadh é”

Written by Conor.

Mura ndéanaim ragobair gach lá, ní féidir liom mo chuid a shaothrú.

If I do not do overtime each day, I cannot earn my living.

[There is a reasonable probability that the person does not do overtime every day.]

Mura mbeidh siad anseo ag a seacht a chlog, caillfidh siad an bád.

If they are not here at 7 o’clock, they will miss the boat.

[There is a reasonable chance that they will not show up at 7]

Mura stadfaidh siad den ragairne, ní ghnóthóidh siad cluiche eile go brách.

If they don’t stop the carousing, they will never win another match.

[If appears to be unlikely that they will stop the carousing.]

[Note: The last 2 examples show that, unlike má, mura can be used with the future tense (mura mbeidh, mura stadfaidh) to express a future condition.]

In case it is encountered elsewhere, it is also worth noting (but not worrying about) the fact that, rather than the future, the present subjunctive may be used with mura to express a future condition:

Mura bhfágfaidh tú eochair faoin mata, beidh orm fuinneog a bhriseadh.

If you do not [more accurately: if you will not] leave a key under the mat, I will have to break a window.

[There is a reasonable probability that a key will not be left under the mat.]

Here, not surprisingly, the verb fág is in the future tense.

However, this sentence could also be written with the present subjunctive rather than the future to give the very same meaning:

Mura bhfága tú eochair faoin mata, beidh orm fuinneog a bhriseadh.

Examples of using mura to express unlikely negative-ifs

(i.e ones where there is a remote chance of the if……not condition being fulfilled or attained and where dá would have been used if they were positive if-clauses)

Before going further, I will refer back to a previous example lest I inadvertently caused confusion (although this is somewhat foolhardy since I may muddle things even more):

Mura raibh tú caochta, an raibh tú beagáinín súgach?

This was translated as:

If you were not paralytic/blind drunk, were you a little bit merry?

This is a likely if-clause. The person asking the question is accepting that there is a reasonable likelihood that the other was not completely inebriated. However, at first glance it may have appeared to have been an unlikely if-clause because of the word were in the if-clause. That is to say that I may have created some confusion by translating previous unlikely-if-clauses with the word were and the English past subjunctive (if you were to marry him, etc…). But, of course, were is not only used in the past subjunctive. It is also used in the “ordinary” (indicative) past – which is how it is being used in our if you were not paralytic example. If we were dealing with an unlikely if-clause, it would need to be handled differently as may be seen from the following:

Mura mbeifeá caochta, ní bheadh dhá thaobh an bhealaigh leat.

If you would not have been paralytic, you would not have been all over the road.

This is an unlikely if-clause. It could also be translated as:

If you were not paralytic/were you not paralytic, you would not have been all over the road.

Unlike the other example (which was also translated as if you were not paralytic), here, it is being suggested that there is practically no chance that the person was not paralytic i.e, the suggestion is that the person was well and truly inebriated. So, we have 2 different if-clauses – both of which may be translated into English as if you were not paralytic – but each conveying opposite meanings. The first one suggests that the person was not completely intoxicated and the other suggests that complete intoxication reigned supreme!

The clue, should one be needed, that one is an unlikely if-clause is that mura has been followed by the conditional mood (mura mbeifeá). Similarly, the clue that our other example was a likely if-clause is that mura was followed by the past indicative rather than the conditional (mura raibh).

Looking at this example again:

Mura mbeifeá caochta, ní bheadh dhá thaobh an bhealaigh leat.

If you would not have been drunk, you would not have been all over the road.

We can see that it illustrates another issue to which we referred (briefly) earlier – i.e. that the conditional mood is the same for all tenses.

This is to say that the same construction would be used even if we were talking about present or future time:

Mura mbeifeá caochta anois, ní bheadh dhá thaobh an bhealaigh leat.

If you would not be drunk now, you would not be all over the road.

Mura mbeifeá caochta Dé Sathairn seo chugainn, ní bheadh dhá thaobh an bhealaigh leat.

If you would not be drunk next Saturday, you would not be all over the road.

Other examples:

Mura mbeinn i mo spásaire, bheinn i mo mheicneoir.

If I would not be an astronaut, I would be a mechanic.

[Or - if I were not an astronaut/were I not an astronaut…i.e. the likelihood of me not being an astronaut is low i.e. I am an astronaut.]

Mura rachfá ar scoil, ní éireodh na scrúduithe leat.

If you would not go to school, you would not pass the exams.

[or – if you were not to go to school/were you not to go to school,.........i.e.the likelihood of this person not going to school is low – this person is attending/is going to be attending school, like it or not.]

Chuirfeadh sé an t-éadach ar crochadh amuigh sa ghairdín anois, mura mbeadh sé ag cur báistí.

He would put the clothes hanging out in the garden now, if it would not be raining.

[Or – ….if it were not raining……i.e. the chances of it not raining are remote – in fact, it is raining.]

Before moving on, it might be fun to try to turn all of our previous examples on their heads i.e. to create unlikely if clauses where we previously had likely ones – and vice versa. However, maybe we will content ourselves with doing this with the last example only. This could be made into a likely negative if-sentence by getting rid of the conditional mood of the verb:

Cuirfidh sé an t-éadach ar crochadh amuigh sa ghairdín anois, mura bhfuil sé ag cur báistí.

He will put the clothes hanging out in the garden now, if it is not raining.

The sense here is that there is at least a reasonable chance that it is not raining – unlike our last example where there was the definite sense that the weather was wet.

Brief note on “murach”

Murach (a contraction of mura mbeadh) is a useful word that can be translated as if it were not for// only for//without. It is typically used when describing a particular state of affairs/situation that would come to pass if a certain existing condition did not apply. It will not be discussed in detail here but the following points are worth noting:

The verb in the main clause is usually (but not always) in the conditional mood.

Murach (unlike má, dá or mura) may be followed by a noun or pronoun (rather than a verb).

If it is followed by a verb, a verbal particle (e.g. go or nach) is needed and the meaning becomes if it were not that// only that (rather than if it were not for//only for).

Examples

Murach thusa,
A lao, ní fhéadfainn an doras a fháil,
Ní fhéadfainn an t-urlár féin a fheiceáil,
Bheinn brónach is dubhach,
Murach thusa.

“If not for you,
Babe I couldn’t find the door,
Couldn’t even find the floor
I’d be sad and blue,
If not for you.” [From “If not for you” by Bob Dylan]

Murach a chuid airgid, ní bhfaigheadh sé bean ar bith.

Only for his money, he wouldn’t get any woman at all.

Murach go ndearna tú do dhícheall, ní bheinn sásta leat.

If it were not that you did your best, I would not be satisfied with you.

Murach gur thit sí, bheadh an báire lei.

Only that she fell, she would have won.

In the last example above, the verb in the main clause above could also be in the past tense (see our rule above that stated that the verb in the main clause was usually but not always in the conditional mood):

Murach gur thit sí, bhí an báire lei.

Only that she fell, she had won.

If and the copula (briefly)

Má, dá and mura may also be used with the copula. This will not be discussed in any detail, other than to point out, by means of a few examples, that, as above, má is used with likely if-clauses, dá with unlikely if-clauses and mura with both types. At this stage, to avoid flogging the point even further, I will refrain from following each example with a laboured explanation as to the likely or unlikely nature of the if-clause.

Examples

Is spásaire é Liam.

Liam is an astronaut.

Más spásaire é Liam, caithfidh sé a bheith ina shláinte.

If Liam is an astronaut, he must be in good health.

[Má combines with is to become más]

Mura spásaire é Liam, cén fáth a mbíonn sé ag feamaíl timpeall na háite agus culaith spáis air?

If Liam is not an astronaut, why does he gad about the place in a space suit?

Is meicneoir é Liam.

Liam is a mechanic.

Ba mheicneoir é Liam.

Liam was a mechanic or Liam would be a mechanic.

[Note: In this type of copular construction, ba can mean both was or would be depending on the context]

Má ba mheicneoir é Liam, is dócha go raibh breithiúnas maith aige ar ghluaisteáin.

If Liam was a mechanic, it is probable that he was a good judge of cars.

Murar mheicneoir é Liam, cén tslí bheatha a bhí aige?

If Liam was not a mechanic, what was his occupation?

[Mura combined with the copula becomes murar in the past tense and in the conditional mood]

Dá mba mheicneoir gluaisteáin é Liam, ní bheadh air eolas a chur ar an réaltfhisic.

If Liam would be a car mechanic, he would not have to acquaint himself with astrophysics.

[Or - If Liam were a car mechanic/were Liam a car mechanic,…..]

Murar mheicneoir é Liam, bheadh áthas air a bheith ina spásaire.

If Liam would not be a mechanic, he would be delighted to be an astronaut.

[Or – if Liam were not a mechanic/were Liam not a mechanic,..]

Summary

Anyone who has chosen to make straight for this section after reading the opening paragraph may well have done exactly the right thing because the core of the whole if topic can be summarized succinctly as follows:

If we have a likely if, we use má.

If we were to have an unlikely if, we would use dá.

Firstly submitted by: Merryploughbhoy