bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Ciamar a chanas mi.... / How do I say...
Níall Beag
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by Níall Beag »

akerbeltz wrote: Sat Nov 02, 2019 3:30 pm I don't think Niall's explanation above is quite right. Dependent and independent verbs in Gaelic are fairly well defined concepts and that's nothing to do with the juxtaposition of sentences.
The distinction between dependent and independent is an established concept in linguistics in general, and functions at a clausal level. The only wrinkle in Gaelic is the reanalysis of copular constructions as pre-verbal particles. That's not a major wrinkle though, as the same logic holds -- the verb's meaning is dependent on what preceded it.
It merely boils down to what particle sits in front of the verb. In Gaelic, that boils down to 3 options:
It manifests itself in the particles in front of the verb. The distinction in meaning is why we use the particle.

I mean we wouldn't say the main distinction between "duck" and "goose" is the word -- the real difference is the meaning of what the words refer to.


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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by GunChleoc »

And some good news for you: bi is actually regular in the future tense!

Base form: bi

Independent: base + -idh = bidh
Dependent: base = bi
Relative: lenited base + -as = bhios. The only departure from the regular verbs here is the spelling; the pronunciation is the same.

You might find these verb tables useful: https://www.foramnagaidhlig.net/index.php?page=142
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by Ionatan »

GunChleoc wrote: Mon Nov 04, 2019 8:52 pm And some good news for you: bi is actually regular in the future tense!
Say what?!? :o What is this "regular" of which you speak? Seriously though, this is moderately encouraging.
GunChleoc
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by GunChleoc »

Regular future tense forms are:

Independent: add -(a)idh
Dependent: Use base form
Relative: Lenite and add -(i)eas

Examples:

ith

Ithidh mi ubhal
An ith thu ubhal? - Thuirt mi gun ith!
Seo cuideigin a dh'itheas ubhal

gabh

Gabhaidh mi cupan tì
An gabh thu cupan tì? - Thuirt mi gun gabh!
Seo cuideigin a ghabhas cupan tì

bi

bidh mi ann
Am bi thu ann? - Thuirt mi gum bi!
Seo chuideigin a bhios ann
Oileanach chànan chuthachail
Na dealbhan agam
akerbeltz
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by akerbeltz »

The distinction between dependent and independent is an established concept in linguistics in general, and functions at a clausal level. The only wrinkle in Gaelic is the reanalysis of copular constructions as pre-verbal particles. That's not a major wrinkle though, as the same logic holds -- the verb's meaning is dependent on what preceded it.
Good luck trying to get 99% of learners to even understand that, never mind construct a grammatical sentence using those instructions. :roll:
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by Níall Beag »

akerbeltz wrote: Fri Nov 08, 2019 10:32 am
The distinction between dependent and independent is an established concept in linguistics in general, and functions at a clausal level. The only wrinkle in Gaelic is the reanalysis of copular constructions as pre-verbal particles. That's not a major wrinkle though, as the same logic holds -- the verb's meaning is dependent on what preceded it.
Good luck trying to get 99% of learners to even understand that, never mind construct a grammatical sentence using those instructions. :roll:
I wasn't talking to 99% of learners -- I was responding to you and what you'd said. And what do you mean by that last part anyway?
Ionatan

Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by Ionatan »

GunChleoc wrote: Wed Nov 06, 2019 10:08 am Regular future tense forms are:

Independent: add -(a)idh
Dependent: Use base form
Relative: Lenite and add -(i)eas
Thanks for those examples - that was very useful. That is exactly what Can Seo was try to teach and it's a lot clearer now!
Thanks to everybody for their help!
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by silmeth »

Sorry for reviving the topic – it’s been recently linked in a Duolingo discussion about dependent/independent forms and that brought me here. An example from one of the first replies caught my attention, I think it might be a mistake, but I’d like to make sure I understand things correctly.
Níall Beag wrote: Sun Oct 27, 2019 5:19 pm Tha mi anns an àite anns a bhios mi a-màireach -- I am in the place that I will be in tomorrow.
Shouldn’t this use the dependent form: tha mi anns an àite anns am bi mi a-màireach?

Colin B.D. Mark in Gaelic Verbs Systemised and Simplified in ch. 5, §C., p. 82 writes “Note that the relative future has only an independent or affirmative form. When a dependent form is required, the normal dependent form of the verb is used” and as far as I know the relative particle/pronoun that has a preposition before it takes the dependent form (a’ chaileag ris a bheil mi a’ bruidhinn ‘the girl to whom I am speaking’) – but I cannot find any direct example of future tense used in a relative clause with a preposition before a.

I cannot Google any occurrences of anns a bhios mi outside of this forum subject and one online book with something that looks like tr*nsl*t**n from German – so is this just a simple a mistake, or is such usage also possible?
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by Níall Beag »

silmeth wrote: Tue Aug 11, 2020 1:08 pmI cannot Google any occurrences of anns a bhios mi outside of this forum subject and one online book with something that looks like tr*nsl*t**n from German – so is this just a simple a mistake, or is such usage also possible?
It's possible I'm wrong (I'm not a native speaker) but if you drop the "mi", and Google "anns a bhios" and "anns am bi", you'll find 293,000 for the former, and only 37,000 for the latter. But among the matches for the latter (i.e. not my form) you'll find some fairly old and high brow examples.

I suspect I'm guilty of "hyper-correction" here, but that a heck of a lot of people hyper-correct the same way as me while writing...!
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by silmeth »

Weird. If I google "anns a bhios" from my regular browser I get only 23 results. If I do that in a private window, I suddenly get the 293 000 figure too (but still only 2–3 pages of results). For "anns am bi" I get ~40 000 in both cases (and dozens of pages). Seems Google does some weird things targeting and counting the results…

So I tried Corpas na Gàidhlig DASG where I can find 302 instances of anns am bi and none of anns a bhios.

I tried also ris am bi (32 results) and ris a bhios (7 matches, but in all of them ris is part of either cò ris a requiring the independent form or in one case còmhla ris unrelated to the relative clause that follows).

EDIT: but then the corpus has only literary language. I guess it might be similar to Irish where independent form starts to appear in spoken language in indirect relative clauses – where in the standard and older literary language only dep. forms would be used.
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by Níall Beag »

Yeah, I'm pretty sure I'm hypercorrecting because I expect a + relative, but I would never ever say "anns a tha", only "anns a bheil", so it really seems like I'm doing it wrong here.
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by akerbeltz »

So I tried Corpas na Gàidhlig DASG where I can find 302 instances of anns am bi and none of anns a bhios.
That's because it's usually contracted to sa bhios/sa bhitheas :priob:
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by silmeth »

akerbeltz wrote: Mon Aug 17, 2020 2:51 pm
So I tried Corpas na Gàidhlig DASG where I can find 302 instances of anns am bi and none of anns a bhios.
That's because it's usually contracted to sa bhios/sa bhitheas :priob:
I can’t find any example of that in the Corpas either. There is a lot of sa bhios (and a few sa bhitheas) there, but almost all of them are either:
  1. fhad sa bhios (which stands for agus a bhios and not anns a, right? and you’d say fhad ’s a tha, not a bheil in the present tense),
  2. or cho fada, cho luath sa bhios (again agus a bhios),
  3. or things like agam-sa (a) bhios, leam-sa bhios, or mo mhac-sa bhios, etc.
and I don’t see an obvious example where anns a would fit (but I didn’t read all of them very carefully, so I might be missing something).

So it still would be an taigh anns am bi (could it be shortened to sam bi too?), right?
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by taic »

Cluinnear gu tric an cruth giorraichte: anns am bi > sam bi
Gheibhear cuideachd e le na tràthan eile: anns a bheil > sa bheil; anns an robh > san robh; anns am biodh > sam biodh
Chan fhaicear tric e ann an sgrìobhadh foirmeil

The shortened form is frequently heard : anns am bi > sam bi
It can also be found with the other tenses: anns a bheil > sa bheil; anns an robh > san robh; anns am biodh > sam biodh
It's not often used in formal writing
Nach iongantach an rud a th' ann ann
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Re: bhitheas vs bhios and bithidh vs bidh

Unread post by akerbeltz »

I can’t find any example of that in the Corpas either. There is a lot of sa bhios (and a few sa bhitheas) there, but almost all of them are either:
Fair point, I didn't check for bad parsing :lol:
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