Middle Irish, also called Middle Gaelic (, , ), is the Goidelic language which was spoken in Ireland, most of Scotland and the Isle of Man from AD; it is therefore a contemporary of Late Old English and Early Middle English. The modern Goidelic languagesâÂÂModern Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx GaelicâÂÂare all descendants of Middle Irish.
Middle Irish retained most of Old Irish's phonemic inventory, including all short short vowels and consonants. Nevertheless, some innovation occurred. Unstressed vowels were reduced to /ÃÂ/, while the Old Irish diphthongs /ai/, /oi/, and /ui/ first shifted to */ÃÂi/, and were then monophongised to /ÃÂÃÂ/. This created the following inventory of vowels and diphthongs:
In addition to the changes in consonant inventory, the nuclei of multisyllabic vowels shifted from those of Old Irish to the initial secondary articulations of the succeeding syllable, e.g. Old Irish duine ("person") /ÃÂdu.nòe/ > */ÃÂduò.nòe/ > Middle Irish /ÃÂd÷i.nòe/. A similar process occurred in monosyllabic words whose nucleus was /e/ and possessing broad final consonants; a ephenetic /áµÂ/ was briefly inserted before the coda that eventually replaced the /e/ altogether, e.g. Old Irish fer ("man") /fòer/ > */fòeáµÂr/ > Middle Irish fear /fòar/. Disyllabic proclitics also lost their initial vowels, e.g. Old Irish inna ("of the" [fem.]) > Middle Irish na.
As with phonology, Middle Irish spelling remained similar that of Old Irish until the end of the period, except when indicating sound shifts. Scribes used the digraph ao to indicate the new vowel /ÃÂÃÂ/.
Middle Irish is a fusional, VSO, nominative-accusative language, and makes frequent use of lenition.
Nouns decline for two genders: masculine and feminine, though traces of neuter declension persist; three numbers: singular, dual, plural; and five cases: nominative, accusative, genitive, prepositional, vocative. Adjectives agree with nouns in gender, number, and case.
Verbs conjugate for three tenses: past, present, future; four moods: indicative, subjunctive, conditional, imperative; independent and dependent forms. Verbs conjugate for three persons and an impersonal, agentless form (agent). There are a number of preverbal particles marking the negative, interrogative, subjunctive, relative clauses, etc.
Prepositions inflect for person and number. Different prepositions govern different cases, depending on intended semantics.
The following is an untitled poem in Middle Irish about Eógan Bél, King of Connacht.