Irish Declension - Adjectives

Adjectives

Almost all adjectives in Irish can be used either predicatively or attributively. A predicative adjective is one that forms a part of the predicate, like red in the sentence The car is red. An attributive adjective directly modifies a noun, as in the red car.

A predicate adjective in Irish does not inflect:

• Tá an fear sin beag. "That man is small."
• Tá na fir sin beag. "Those men are small."
• Tá an bhean seo beag. "This woman is small."
• Tá na mná seo beag. "These women are small."

A predicate adjective expressing a value judgment is often preceded by the particle go. This particle attaches an h to a following vowel.

• Tá mé go maith. "I'm fine" (lit. "I am good.")
• Tá an scéal go holc. "The story is bad."
• Bhí an aimsir go hálainn. "The weather was beautiful."

In Ulster, go is not generally used in these cases.

An attributive adjective mostly follows the noun and is inflected:

• an fear beag "the small man"
• an fhir bhig "of the small man" (genitive)

There are three classes of declension of adjectives in Irish, which correspond to the first four declensions of nouns: