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.
The script
4 sectionsYour first reading job: some vowels are only labels
- Irish uses eighteen letters: no j, k, q, v, w, x, y or z in a native word.
- Every consonant comes in two flavours, broad and slender; swapping them changes the word.
- The vowels beside a consonant label its flavour: a, o, u broad — e, i slender. Some vowels are labels, not sounds.
- The stroke over a vowel — a fada, “long” — is a different sound and part of the spelling.
Every consonant comes in two flavours — broad, tongue flat and back; slender, tongue pushed up and forward. Swapping them changes the word. Irish has no letters for the second set, so it uses the vowels next to a consonant as a label.
The vowels as labels
| These vowels | label the consonant beside them as |
|---|---|
| a, o, u, á, ó, ú | broad — tongue flat and back |
| e, i, é, í | slender — tongue up and forward |
If a word has more vowels than sounds, the spare ones are labels — do not say them.
Vowels that are only labels
The five vowels, and the same five wearing a fada
| Short | Long |
|---|---|
| a — between cat and cot | á — aw as in law |
| e — as in bed | é — ay as in day |
| i — as in sit | í — ee as in see |
| o — often closer to the u in but | ó — oh as in go |
| u — as in put | ú — oo as in moon |
The fada is part of the spelling, not decoration: seanshan“old” and Seánshawn are not the same word.
Find the letter that is only a label
Say which vowel is doing no work of its own. Reveal after one attempt.
- bean
One of the two vowels is a sign on the b, not a sound.
Show answer +Hide answer −
The e is the label; only the a is heard. beanban“woman”. - Are sean and Seán the same word?
Show answer +Hide answer −
No. One fada apart: “old”, and a man’s name.