Slendering and Broadening in the Irish Language

There are situations in Irish where you have to make the final consonant of a word broad or slender. For example, to form the genitive of some nouns you make the final consonant slender; for others, you make the final consonant broad.

Slenderisation (Caolú)

The most common way to make a final consonant slender is to insert an "i":

bád -> báid

But some vowel combinations require special treatment:

Broadening (Leathnú)

The most common way to make a final consonant broad is to remove an "i":

máthair -> máthar

But again, some vowel combinations require special treatment:

Community Comments

mhwombat, on 8th Aug 2007: I must have been tired when I wrote this section. "Slendering" is not a word, as far as I know. I meant to say "Slenderisation".

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• Noun declensions
• Plurals
• Verbs