Middle Irish

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Middle Irish Gaoidhealg
Pronunciation:	IPA: [ˈɡɯːjelɡ]
Spoken in:	Ireland, Scotland, Isle of Man
Language extinction:	Evolved into Early Modern Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx about the 12th century
Language family:	Indo-European  Celtic   Insular Celtic    Goidelic     Middle Irish
Writing system:	Latin
Language codes
ISO 639-1:	none
ISO 639-2:	mga
ISO 639-3:	mga

Middle Irish is the name given by historical philologists to the form of the Irish language from the 10th to 12th centuries; it is therefore a contemporary of late Old English and early Middle English.^[1][2] The modern Goidelic languages Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx are all descendants of Middle Irish.

At its height, Middle Irish was spoken throughout Ireland and Scotland; from Munster to the North Sea island of Inchcolm. Its geographical range made it the most widespread of all Insular languages before the late 12th century, when Middle English began to make inroads into Ireland, and many of the Celtic regions of northern and western Britain.

Few medieval European languages can rival the volume of literature extant in Middle Irish. Much of this survival is due to the tenacity of a few early modern Irish antiquarians, but the sheer volume of sagas, annals, hagiographies (etc) which survive shows how much confidence members of the medieval Gaelic learned orders had in their own vernacular. Almost all survives from Ireland, however very little from Scotland or Man. The Lebor Bretnach, the "Irish Nennius", survives only from manuscripts preserved in Ireland; however, Thomas Owen Clancy has recently argued that it was written in Scotland, at the monastery in Abernethy.^[3]

[edit] References

1. ^ Mac Eoin, Gearóid (1993). "Irish", in in Martin J. Ball (ed.): The Celtic Languages. London: Routledge, 101–44. ISBN 0-415-01035-7. 
2. ^ Breatnach, Liam (1994). "An Mheán-Ghaeilge", in in K. McCone, D. McManus, C. Ó Háinle, N. Williams, and L. Breatnach (eds.): Stair na Gaeilge in ómós do Pádraig Ó Fiannachta (in Irish). Maynooth: Department of Old Irish, St. Patrick's College, 221–333. ISBN 0-901519-90-1. 
3. ^ Clancy, Thomas Owen (2000). "Scotland, the ‘Nennian’ recension of the Historia Brittonum, and the Lebor Bretnach", in in Simon Taylor (ed.): Kings, Clerics and Chronicles in Scotland, 500-1297. Dublin & Portland: Four Courts Press, 87–107. ISBN 1-85182-516-9. 

[edit] See also

• Dictionary of the Irish Language

v • d • e Irish linguistics
History of the language | Primitive Irish | Old Irish | Middle Irish | Early Modern Irish | Modern Irish
Connacht Irish | Munster Irish | Newfoundland Irish | Ulster Irish
Initial mutations | Morphology (nominals, verbs) | Phonology | Syntax | Orthography | Ogham | Gaelic script

v • d • e Scottish Gaelic linguistics
Primitive Irish | Old Irish | Middle Irish | Early Modern Irish | Scottish Gaelic|Canadian Gaelic
Alphabet | Grammar | Names

v • d • e Manx linguistics
Primitive Irish | Old Irish | Middle Irish | Manx language