faoileag wrote:Not quite.
There's a difference between the few verbs of movement, and
all the other verbs.
Let's start with the majority section, that is, the standard way of doing things.
After an introductory phrase, like 'I like...', 'I can...', 'I want to...' , 'You ought to...' this can all happen:
Tha mi ag iarraidh càr.
I want a car.
Tha mi ag iarraidh cluiche.
I want to play
Tha mi ag iarraidh òl.
I want to drink.
Tha mi ag iarraidh fighe.
I want to knit.
Tha mi ag iarraidh càr a cheannach.
I want to buy a car. 'Inversion' of verb and object, and lenition of verbal noun and 'a' before it.
Tha mi ag iarraidh ball-coise a chluiche.
I want to play football. (Inversion)
Tha mi ag iarraidh cofaidh òl.
I want to drink coffee. (Inversion, but as vowel, no lenition or 'a')
Tha mi ag iarraidh geansaidh fhighe.
I want to knit a pullover. (Inversion, f+vowel lenites, no 'a')
Regarding the Majority Section:
Okay, the VSO is intact for the first part of the sentence, and when it is a simple sentence. I have noticed that in Gàidhlig that Verbs and Nouns are more closely inter-twined than in other language families like Germanic and Latin (I speak German and Spanish too). It seems in Gàidhlig that once one knows a Verb, that one also knows the corresponding Noun if one can add the right ending and jigger the thing properly otherwise (the exact mechanics of this I am still figuring out at the moment). I have noticed that in the sentences where there is a direct object of "ag iarraidh" the word is being treated as a Noun. According to
http://www.dwelly.info/, the word "òl" means both "drink" and "drinking", depending on usage in the sentence. In the case of "cluiche", according to
An Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language by Alexander MacBain 1982 lithograph reprint by Gairm Publications and Clark Constable LTD on page 90 "cluich" means "play, a game". Hence my reasoning that these words are all being used as a direct object of "ag iarraidh". In the case of "fighe" it seems to be saying that the person is wanting a "knitting session". It seems reasonable to say then, that due to the seemingly extremely apparent close linkage in Gàidhlig of Verbs and Nouns, that in order to give clarity to the usage of the word itself, the usual positioning of the Noun and Verb is inverted. For example, one could possibly get the impression that a speaker was "wanting to have a game" or "wanting to have a knitting session" etc. if the usual word order were not inverted. Also, one could possibly get confused about which thing the speaker was wanting for example, "was the speaker wanting 'to buy' or wanting a car?", since it seems (I could be quite wrong on this point) that in Gàidhlig like many Indo-European languages that the combination of the Verb and the subject can express a complete thought as in the sentence "I want to buy." or "Tha mi ag iarraidh a cheannach.". Based on the assumption regarding complete sentences and also the apparent extreme closeness in Gàidhlig of the relationship between the Verb and the Noun, it seems reasonable to say that in expressing "wanting", "liking", "can/be able to", and "should/ought" one
must invert the Noun and Verb in this instance, in order to provide entire clarity.
faoileag wrote:If you have a verb of movement after the initial phrase, this happens.
Tha mi ag iarraidh a dhol ann - I want to go there. Lenition + 'a', even though no object.
If you say you want to go somewhere in order to do something, this happens:
Tha mi ag iarraidh a dhol a chluiche ball-coise - I want to go to play football. Both 'a dhol' and the following verb are lenited with 'a' and there is no inversion.
Tha mi ag iarraidh a dhol a dh'òl cofaidh - I want to go to drink coffee. (a dh' before vowels)
Tha mi ag iarraidh a dhol a dh'fhaicinn maids ball-coise - I want to go to see a football match (a dh' before f+vowel)
The 'a' after a dhol, as Niall Beag says, is the preposition 'a' meaning 'to' (after a dhol = go to), which lenites or uses a dh' before vowels.
Tha mi a' dol a Ghlaschu.
Tha mi a' dol a dh'Inbhir Nis.
Regarding Verbs of Motion:
Okay, so things are still generally VSO, but when a verb of motion is used after a statement of liking or wanting etc., the the verb of motion gets "a +lenition if possible, and if there is a verb coming after the verb of motion gets (in other words the third verb being seen in the sentence), then this verb gets " a + lenition or, a +dh' ". In the case of the verb coming after the verb of motion (the third verb in the sentence that is), the " a + lenition or, a + dh' " is acting sort of like "in order to" would act in English, so that it is clear to the listener/reader that the speaker/writer is clearly stating purpose of "the wanting" or "the going" or "the liking". I think I was confused because I was seeing "a dh" (in "a dhol" and " a dh' " (in "a dh'òl") without understanding the difference between the two. Whereas in the case of "a dhol" one is making the verb an infinitive with the "a dh", with the " a dh' " one is meaning "in order to". The two different cases look very similar to a beginner ( at least me
). It seems from the examples that "a+lenition" makes the verbs infinitive. In the case of " a' ", this is abbreviating for aig--> ag --> a', which again for the beginner can create confusion because " a' " looks an awful lot like " a dh' " but is a completely different preposition (at least it is a bit confusing to me). The example of "a dhol a dh'òl" also makes the point quite clearly as to why accents are so extremely important in Gàidhlig. Due to the number of particles in Gàidhlig (like ag, a', dh' etc.), there are a number of instances where without the accent, complete and utter chaos would reign in comprehension of a word's meaning because the sounds of the consonants are combined so regularly as per the broad and slender vowels. It is even nicer that in the originally Latinized Gàidhlig writing that the monks used both downward and upward facing accents to not only indicate stress, but also proper pronunciation of the vowels. This is truly a beautiful gift!
If any of my thinking needs to be changed or clarified, please do tell me. As a beginner, I am still questing for the total picture of how the verb works and I have not had a lot of luck in finding coherent detailed explanations of the inner-workings of the verb-noun relationship, but I can see there is a clearly close entwining of the two. Gàidhlig seems to have perfected the relationship between Nouns and Verbs to an extent that I have not seen in German and Spanish, nor in English for that matter. German places Nouns and Verbs in such opposite corners, that constructing a Noun from a Verb quickly can be quite tricky as there can be very little of the Verb remaining by the time it has become a Noun. In contrast, Gàidhlig seems to have brought the two closely together in a near state of marriage. It is quite a beautiful thing.
Thank you so much faoileag for taking the time to write a clarifying post regarding the grammatical points. This is going to change greatly my approach to pronunciation of Gàidhlig. This also opens up a great realm of investigative possibility. One of the strategies that I take to learning Gàidhlig is to grab as much of the grammar as possible, and then slather on the vocabulary as I understand the grammar better. Once I understand the connection between Verbs and Nouns better, my vocabulary will increase greatly. Thank you for the help faoileag. My Gàidhlig is unfortunately not yet good enough to post this in Gàidhlig, tha mi duilich.
Scott
edited to fix quotes - GC
