Irish Nouns

Book excerpt: This book presents the first comprehensive reference on noun declensions in Modern Irish. Whereas traditional descriptions of noun inflection are notoriously complex and filled with exceptions and irregularities, this reference guide provides a systematic and straightforward characterization of nominal paradigms, which also captures important generalizations about the inflection of nouns. Andrew Carnie proposes ten declension classes instead of the traditional five and separates off seven major types of plural formation. He provides fully inflected paradigms for 1200 nouns, and a reference list of 10,000 Irish nouns annotated with their new declension class, their plural type and the form of the genitive singular and common case (nominative) plural. The book also includes parallel information on the inflection of adjectives and prepositions. This unique reference tool will be invaluable not only to language researchers and authors, but to teachers and students of the language, whether they are native speakers or beginners.