Nouns As Verbs, Attack as a Verb

[Claidheamhair]

Back again with another noun related question.

In English, any word can be any other word. Verbs can be nouns, verbs can be adjectives. Adjectives can be verbs. You just end up sounding silly sometimes when you say “I purple him with my swim”; still purple acts as the verb and swim as an object.

Does this work in Gaelic?
On to the specific example!

I looked up the word “Attack”, which in English is primarily a Verb, then a Noun. In Gaelic the word turned out to be

Ionnsaigh; which means everything from Advance, Attack,Sally,effort,project,onslaught

They are all nouns though. I wanted to make the simple sentence “I attack him”. Using attack as a verb. All of the examples given for the word used it as a noun.

My first thought was, like in the motto of my Fencing school;Am fear a thug buaidh air fhein, thug e buaidh air namhaid; which in English is “He who conquers himself conquers an enemy, the literal translation is, I believe, something along the lines of “One who gives conquest unto him self, gives conquest unto an enemy”

If “One who gives conquest” translates in to “One who conquers” maybe “One who gives attack” might translate in to “One who attacks” and then in to “I attack”

So I guessed it would be “Thug me ionnsaigh air e” literally being, I give attack unto him; meaning “I attack him”

Am I going the right way, or I have I completed messed things up?

[GunChleoc]

You are going the right way

A lot of languages change their word endings when you change the word class, like e.g. from noun to verb or vice versa. Same with Gaelic. It is also a very noun-oriented language, so a lot of the time you use combinations of a verb like dèan, thoir, faigh or gabh etc in combination with the noun.

For this particular case, Colin Mark's dictionary gives "thoir ionnsaigh air", so you've got the right verb to go with it.

“Thug me ionnsaigh air e” - watch out for those conjugated prepositions - air + e = air, so it should be “Thug mi ionnsaigh air”. "I attacked her" would be “Thug mi ionnsaigh oirre”, and "I attacked them" would be “Thug mi ionnsaigh orra”.

[Claidheamhair]

Thank you very much! That clears that up.

So if that is the past tense, then, If I can assume like other verbs, the present tense is formed with the verb ‘to be’ and the verbal noun, then

“Thug mi ionnsaigh oirre” I attacked her
Would be in present tense

“Tha mi a’toirt ionnsaigh oirre” I attack her.

Right?

[GunChleoc]

Right! There is no simple present in Gaelic, so you'll have to use tha mi ag...

And the future would be:

Bheir mi ionnsaigh oirre

I am/was/will be attacking her would be:

Tha/Bha/Bidh mi a’ toirt ionnsaigh oirre

If you want to negate the sentence, don't forget to use the dependent form of the verbs.

[Aonghas01]

I believe that you are making a mountain out of a mole hill here ...Many things in gaelic do not translate easily from gaidhlig to english...Listen to some tapes (easier ones ) . Then move on to some more difficult ones .listen to them hundreds of times if you have to .Listen to bbc. gaidhlig if you can ..The language will improve for you ..The grammar will come .Its good to learn certain things without pulling it apart..for example.........Tha teid agam... is well used in everyday speech for........I can.......Tha teid agam air sin a dheanamh....I can do that..No need to dissect Tha teid agam....just learn what it means......By the way ,this is just my opinion . I'm just trying to help but am not an expert by any means.. It's just that I have seen so many people become
discouraged with so much grammar .

Le gach deagh dhurachd ............Aonghas

[Aonghas01]

Of course I have met people who like playing with the grammer..and met many who have learned the language well without dwelling on it so much , It came along as they spoke and listened.Oh well to each his own.

Le Speis

[GunChleoc]

In my experience it is always best to offer both options - then the student can choose what fits him/her best!