Learn to read Irish
A short, active path into reading Irish: sound out eight real words before the alphabet, learn to undo séimhiú and urú on sight, put the verb at the front of the sentence, and read a story whose pronunciation and English begin hidden.
Number lookup: one to ten, and what they do to a noun
- Irish counts in three ways — out loud, counting things, counting people — but you only ever produce the first.
- The list to learn runs a haonuh HEEN to a deichuh JEH, and the little a is part of it.
- In front of a noun, two to six soften it and seven to ten eclipse it — both changes you already know how to undo.
- The noun stays singular after a number: trí chat is literally “three cat”.
- People have numbers of their own: beirtbertch for two, triúrTROOR for three.
You do not need numbers to finish — neither story counts anything. Open this when a number in a book stops you, or when you want to say one out loud.
Counting out loud
| Irish | Said | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | a haon | uh HEEN |
| 2 | a dó | uh DOH |
| 3 | a trí | uh TREE |
| 4 | a ceathair | uh KYA-hir |
| 5 | a cúig | uh KOO-ig |
| 6 | a sé | uh SHAY |
| 7 | a seacht | uh SHAKHT |
| 8 | a hocht | uh HUKHT |
| 9 | a naoi | uh NEE |
| 10 | a deich | uh JEH |
Notice a sé: the number six is the same word as sé“he”. Irish is a small language and it reuses its sounds.
Put a number in front of a noun and two things happen: the number changes shape slightly, and it pulls a mutation onto the noun. Two through six soften; seven through ten eclipse.
Numbers in front of a noun
Counting people, and two quantity words
| English | Irish | Said |
|---|---|---|
| two people | beirt | bertch |
| three people | triúr | TROOR |
| many dogs | a lán madraí | uh LAWN MOD-ree |
| a few dogs | cúpla madra | KOOP-luh MOD-ruh |
So “two friends” is beirt chairdebertch KHAR-juh, not dhá chairde. If a number looks unfamiliar, check whether the thing being counted is a person.