Gweld cod y dudalen Irish/Relative clauses

There comes a time in the life of every learner of Irish when they have to face Irish relative clause constructions, and it can be a challenge. Relative clause is one that
refers back to something that was mentioned before (or, in some languages, will be mentioned later) – often providing more information about it,
for example in the English sentence:

* ''The man '''whom I had seen before''' walked in''

the ''whom I had seen before'' is a relative clause that refers back to ''the man'' of the outer clause (''the man … walked in'').

The thing the relative clause refers back to (so ''the man'' in the example above) is called the '''antecedent'''.

Irish is famous in having two types of relative clauses – [[#Direct relative|'''direct''']] and [[#Indirect relative|'''indirect''']] ones
(the latter being an Irish innovation, this form didn’t really exist in Classical Gaelic and isn’t found in other Gaelic languages).

== Direct relative ==

Direct relative clauses are formed with the relative particle ''a'' and the '''lenited independent''' form of the verb (or [[#Relative form of the verb|the relative form]]
if a given dialect uses those).

Clauses of this type have their verb refer '''directly''' to their antecedent – this means that there is no word, like a pronoun, referring
back to the antecedent and that the antecedent is closely related to the verb of the relative clause.

This means that you use the direct relative clause when the antecedent is one of the following:
# the subject of the relative clause,
# the direct object of the relative clause,
# an adverb describing the manner or time of the verb of the relative clause.

[TODO: examples]

[TODO: ''atá'', no “particle” in Classical Gaelic, etc.]

=== Relative form of the verb ===

Dialects of Ulster and Connacht have special relative forms of verbs in the present and future tenses (but not in the past). Those forms are not used
in Munster dialects (except for set phrases), the relative form is optional but allowed in Caighdeán Oifigiúil.

In the present tense in Ulster and Standard Irish the ending is ''-(e)as'' or ''-(í)os'' replacing the present ending ''-(e)ann, -(í)onn'':

[TODO: examples]

In Connacht the ''-s'' is added to ''-(e)ann, -(í)onn'', resulting in ''-(e)anns, -(í)onns'':

[TODO: examples]

In the future tense the ending is ''-f(e)as'':

[TODO: examples]

There is one verb whose relative form is required by an Caighdeán Oifigiúil, that is ''lean'' ‘follow’ which in present tense direct relative clauses
is required to be ''leanas'' ‘which follows, that follows’.

=== The copula ===
The relative form of the copula is ''is'' {{IPA|/əs/}}, just like the independent form. It is sometimes written ''as'' in older texts.<ref>In Old Irish
there was actually a distinction between non-relative ''is'' {{IPA|/is/}} and relative ''as'' {{IPA|/as/}} but due to vowel reduction this distinction
was lost around the time the language transitioned to Middle Irish in the 10th century. In later times both forms of the copula are most commonly written
as ''as'' and the modern standard spelling ''is'' is basically bringing back the original Old Irish way to spell the non-relative form…</ref>

[TODO: examples]

== Indirect relative ==

Indirect relative clauses are formed with the '''other''' relative particle ''a'' (sometimes ''go'' or ''na'', see [[#Alternative forms of the particle|below]]) and the '''eclipsed dependent''' form of the verb (the relative
form of verbs is '''not''' used in this type!). In the past tense with regular nouns leniting ''ar'' is used instead.

Clauses of this type generally have some type of pronoun referring back to their antecedent, this might be:
# a prepositional pronoun (like ''air'' ‘on him / it’, ''léi'' ‘with her / it’, ''acu'' ‘at them’, etc.),
# a possessive pronoun (''a'' ‘his / her / their’, also merged with a preposition like ''dá'' ‘to his’, etc.),
# or a direct object pronoun (''é'' ‘him / it’, ''í'' ‘her / it’, ''iad'' ‘them’).

Some examples of the first one would be:
* '''{{color|green|an bord}} a bhfuil an cat {{color|green|air}}''' — ''the table that the cat is on'', ''air'' ‘on it’ refers back to ''an bord'' ‘the table’,
* '''{{color|green|an cailín}} a raibh mé ag caint {{color|green|léi}}''' — ''the girl I was talking to'', ''léi'' ‘with her / to her’ refers to ''an cailín'' ‘the girl’,
* '''tuigim {{color|green|an teanga}} ar scríobh tú an teachtaireacht {{color|green|inti}}''' — ''I understand the language in which you wrote the message'' (literally ''… that you wrote the message in it''), ''inti'' ‘in it’ (feminine) refers to ''an teanga'',
* '''{{color|green|na leabhair}} ar fhoghlaim mé {{color|green|uathu}}''' – ''the books I learned from'', ''uathu'' ‘from them’ refers to ''na leabhair'' ‘the books’.

Note that the prepositional pronoun agrees in number and gender to the thing referred to (in case of ''cailín'' ‘girl’ it actually agrees with the
“natural” perceived gender rather than the noun’s gender, as is common when talking about humans).

When the pronoun is a possessive one then the clause translates as a ‘whose’-relative clause to English:
* '''{{color|green|an buachaill}} a bhfuil {{color|green|a}} mháthair breoite''' — ''the boy whose mother is sick'', the leniting ''a'' ‘his’ refers back ''an buachaill'' ‘the boy’,
* '''sin í {{color|green|an bhean}} a raibh mé sa scoil {{color|green|lena}} mac''' – ''this is the woman with whose son I was in school'' (lit. ''… that I was in school with her son''), ''lena'' ‘with her’ refers back to ''an bhean'' ‘the woman’,

[TODO: the rest + examples]

[TODO: explain “exceptions” like ''an fáth a bhfuil…'', ''an áit a bhfuilim'', etc. – historically prepositional clauses]

=== Preposition + relative pronoun ===

=== Alternative forms of the particle ===

In Munster dialects generally '''go''' is used instead of ''a'' in indirect relative clauses. This generally affects only the “normal” indirect relative
clauses – not the prepositional ones with the preposition before the clause, those remain the same.

[TODO: examples]

Sometimes ''go'' gets used in Connacht too, but it’s rarer there.

Another particle is ''na'' which also happens in Munster, especially in older texts – it’s generally interchangeable with ''go'' as the marker
of indirect relative clause.

[TODO: examples]

== Other relativizers ==

[TODO: ''mar'' ‘where’]

[TODO: ''dá'' ‘when’]

=== Generalizing relative pronoun ===

== References ==

== Footnotes ==
<references/>