Normal Word Order
The normal word order in an Irish sentence is:
- Preverbal particle
- Verb
- Subject
- Direct object or predicate adjective
- Indirect object
- Location descriptor
- Manner descriptor
- Time descriptor
Only the verb and subject are obligatory; all other parts are optional (unless the primary or finite verb is transitive, in which case a direct object is required). In synthetic verb forms, the verb and subject are united in a single word, so that even one-word sentences are possible, e.g. Tuigim "I understand."
An example sentence:
| Labhraíonn | Mícheál | Gaeilge | le Cáit | go minic. |
| speaks | Mícheál | Irish | with Cáit | often |
| Verb | Subject | Dir.obj. | Ind.obj. | Time |
| "Mícheál speaks Irish with Cáit often." | ||||
Read more about this topic: Irish Syntax
Famous quotes containing the words normal, word and/or order:
“Marriages will survive despite enormous strains. A lover will ask, “Is he happy? Can he still love her?” They don’t realise that’s not the point, it’s all the normal things they do together—going to the supermarket, choosing wallpaper, doing things with the children.”
—Carol Clewlow (b. 1947)
“You have never by a word or a deed given me one moment’s uneasiness; on the contrary I have felt perpetual gratitude to heaven for having given me, in you, a source of so much pure and unmixed happiness.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“One must be something in order to do something.”
—Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)