Irish Translation Forum

Dia dhuit
I was just curious, being ignorant as I am about the languages, how close Irish Gaelic and Scotch Gaelic are in comparison. I really enjoy reading the goings-on in here, and look forward to learning what I can from you all. (I'm trying some of the phrases listed under the"Phrases" link, but somehow feel like I'm cheating! ) Thanks for your time in answering this!
Rath Dé ort

Dear gennie,

As languages go Irish and Scottish Gaelic are very close. The difference is about like that between Standard German and Bavarian or Standard Italian and Sicilian. May be a little more. Basically Scotts Gaelic is just an older, more conservative form of Irish Gaelic.

Manx Gaelic is a little further removed. Perhaps because Manx began separating from Irish in the 5th or 6th century A.D. while Scotts Gaelic didn't begin separating from until at least the 10th century. Manx speakers were also in closer contact with Brythonic Celtic (Welsh, Cumbrian) speakers and Norse speakers than were Scotch and Irish speakers. This resulted in the language undergoing some simplification. Dates for the last speaker of Manx have been placed variously at 1957, 1962 and 1972.

Brian,
Thank you so much for your reply, it was very informative. It's fascinating to me how languages vary like that. If I may ask, how is it that you know so much about Irish? Anyway thank you again for taking time to educate an ignorant!!
slán,
Gennie

Since it seems that Brian has covers the celtic languages, I would like to ask if anyone knows Welsh or Manx. I am interesting in learning Scottish and Welsh as well as Irish. As for Manx, I've never seen it written or heard it spoken, so I'm not sure about that one.

Wolf wrote:Since it seems that Brian has covers the celtic languages, I would like to ask if anyone knows Welsh or Manx. I am interesting in learning Scottish and Welsh as well as Irish. As for Manx, I've never seen it written or heard it spoken, so I'm not sure about that one.

Hey Corey,

I find that Manx is quite similar to Irish Gaelic and when written down many of the words are practically identical to the corresponding Irish one.

Here's a link to a sample of Yn Ghailck (Manx), there's a WAV file so you can hear it too.
http://www.smo.uhi.ac.uk/gaelg/goo/samples.htm

A modern day magazine article:

http://www.iomonline.co.im/ftpinc/manxlanguage/manxlanguage.asp

Some other good links here:

http://babel.uoregon.edu/yamada/guides/manx.html


As an example of similarities to Irish Gaelic have a look at this book title in Manx, Irish and English:

Coraaghyn Shinney: Cheer, Mooir as Chengey
Glórtha níos Sine, Tír, Muir agus Teanga
Older Voices: Land, Sea and Tongue

They sound almost identical. Interesting eh?

Slán,
Ailill.

I had the pleasure of meeting a group of fluent Manx speakers on Rathlin Island last autumn. I spoke to them in Irish and they spoke to me in Manx (they were quite militant and refused to speak English!) and we were able to communicate quite well (though often having to resort to several synonyms of words and sometimes 'the direct method' ). I was (usually) even able to understand them when they were talking among themselves. My impression is that Manx is closer to Irish than Scots Gaelic is (but it's closer to Scots Gaelic than it is to Irish) - i.e. it's between Irish and Scots Gaelic not only geographically but linguistically.

Na Gaeil abú!

I'm trying to put this in perspective, to help myself understand the relationship between Irish, Manx, and Scotts Irish. They are all Latin based, right? So they are similar as are French and Spanish, with corresponding or similar words? "comment ca va?" in French corresponds with "como estas" in Spanish, and "how are you" in English. Each sepparate language is a part of the same "branch" of the Latin based "tree", for lack of a better instance, right? Would Welsh be yet another variation of what was once the same language? Or is Welsh it's own separate "branch"? And if anyone knows of a Welsh language site I would love to get that from you. Slán,
gen

Hi gennie,

Yo've drifted way off course here somehow. Celtic languages are a totally different branch of the Indo-European family tree to Latin languages.

There's a good diagram here which demonstrates far beter than words:

http://www.georgetown.edu/faculty/ballc/oe/oe-ie.html

slán,

Ailill

The link was very helpful, thank you.

Corey wrote:

I am interesting in learning Scottish and Welsh as well as Irish. As for Manx, I've never seen it written or heard it spoken, so I'm not sure about that one

Such aspirations! I really hope that you can do it! Go for it!