Almost 100 year old recording of an Irish language speaker

Here's a video I edited from of Pádraig de Breit telling the old folk tale of Pilib an Chleite. I tidied up the original audio in audacity applying some noise reduction, as the original audio clip has a lot of background noise.
It was recorded in 1928 in University College Cork by Wilhelm Doegen. The dialect you hear is from Co. Waterford.
Original audio available here: www.doegen.ie/...

[@AnGhaeilge]

Bio of Pádraig de Breit (1850 - 1932) from Doegen.ie Pádraig de Breit was born around 1850 in Island, county Waterford. He attended primary school nearby in Stradbally. After growing up in Island, he spent many years in Waterford city, which is where he was living with his family during the censuses of 1901 [ www.census.nationalarchives.ie/reels/nai001237704/ ] and 1911 [ www.census.nationalarchives.ie/reels/nai003505637/ ]. He worked as a foreman with the Waterford-Dungarvan-Lismore Railway before being appointed inspector for the Waterford-Tramore Railway. He became vice-president of Conradh na Gaeilge in Waterford and helped organize the first Feis Phort Láirge in 1903. He was elected to the first management committee of Coláiste na Rinne in 1909, and became a member of the executive committee of Conradh na Gaeilge in 1914. He was a member of the Irish Parliamentary Party and, as a Redmondite, was elected as an Alderman to Waterford Corporation around 1920, a position he retained till his death. He married his wife, Susan, around, 1878. They had seventeen children, but only four survived. Pádraig died 11 February 1932. Some of his poetry was published in the Journal of the Irish Folk Song Society (vol. 12), An Claidheamh Soluis (17 September 1910), and in Irisleabhar Muighe Nuadhad (1917). Some material collected from him is found also in the National Folklore Collection, UCD. See also www.ainm.ie/Bio.aspx?ID=419.

[@pleasestop104]

Never stop uploading EVER!

[@cigh7445]

3:52 Agus le léim "Más te an áit"...

[@COM70]

Do you have recordings of Dublin Irish ? Would love to hear that. I have been assured many many times (anecdotally) at least that it existed until about 50 years ago.

[@adamender9092]

An even worse feeling then the language being endangered is the anglicisation of the phonetics. His Irish is pure, I wish everyones sounded like that

[@seppuku8716]

yeah, people speak it with an english accent

[@WerdnarTube]

Looking at my son, it seems Irish will get Ukrainian accent soon.

[@seppuku8716]

@@WerdnarTube LOL

[@andrewgoodbody2121]

​@@WerdnarTube Fucks mhaithe!

[@servantofaeie1569]

​@@WerdnarTube That might be a good thing, since Ukrainian has the "broad vs slender" thing.

[@herdware]

Category: Unexpected uploads.

[@deoirdanandrei1512]

Such a great piece of history! I love the accent he has, sounds so natural and true, all rolled r’s, all the Irish vowels and sounds! Unlike how most people speak Irish nowadays, pronouncing it as if it was English. Also many times “tá” was written when it sounds to me like he says “thá” which is the actual form that’s used in Port Láirge instead of tá, also there is “athá” which seems to confirm it.

[@AnGhaeilge]

Yes, we use thá in Port Láirge. The spelling however varies from person to person - I spell it thá, but I've seen others here spell it without the h, even when pronouncing it with it. It's a direct transcription from doegen.

[@mijosombrero]

the oh so dicouraging reason not to learn Irish is that even the irish natives nowadays speak Irish with a much more barbarised phonetics, obviously influenced by english. after such fine speech , listening to modern pronunciation gives me earbleed

[@cigh7445]

There are still very good speakers, especially in the Gaeltacht middle aged and up category. If you listen to Radio na Gaeltachta you can hear them. What you say is generally true though, people don't learn the native phonetics so the consonants/vowels/prosody all sound English

[@gavanwhatever8196]

Excuses. Where do you think the Irish accents came from?

[@cigh7445]

@@gavanwhatever8196 That depends, there's a variety of Irish accents. Most Irish accents share far more with Middle English and with modern English than they do with Irish. Many of the traditional rural accents (which are on the way out as the younger generations take on a more standardised accent based on the speech of the middle class of the heavily populated capital, a process which happens in every country and with every language) kept some of the prosody from the Gaelic dialects, but the phonemes are demonstrably English. Native Irish has, and always did have, a phonetic system which includes over 72 phonemes (roughly double the amount English has) and many of the consonants and vowels which are shared by the two languages are voiced differently (consonants like the Irish broad c for example are voiced further back in the palate than English ones). The exception would be men in the over fifties age category who grew up in strong Gaeltacht areas, they often speak/spoke English using Irish consonants and vowels as well as prosody and intonation. Linguists such as Raymond Hickey have researched much of what I've mentioned above in more depth. Even putting aside some of the finer phonetic differences between Irish as it has existed historically and until the present day in some areas and the English of Ireland and elsewhere, the speech of many 'new speakers' of Irish can be shown to be incorrect even when ignoring differences in accent and stress between them and natives. For example, non-natives often pronounce words like ceathar and cathair, bean and beann, bó and beo, the same, or they'll overcompensate and add an extra vowel, in both cases the pronunciation is wrong and ignores the slender consonant sounds which exist in Irish but not in English.

[@cigh7445]

Let me give one more example. Listen to new speakers of Breton, the Celtic language related to Welsh and Cornish, and tell me that their accent and phonetics 'come from Breton'. They don't. To the ear they sound French. The case of Irish and English is the same, people who are unfamiliar with the English language will have trouble telling the difference between most new Irish speakers and general English because all they have to go by is the general sounds. (Remember that as native English speakers the unique sound/s of the English language can often be invisible to us, the 'English r' for example does not exist in any other language and is a glaringly obvious marker of English to non-native speakers and foreigners, something we wouldn't even think about day to day). To say that the Irish accents 'come from the Irish language' is more of a national myth to soothe our consciences. If you listen to recordings of west country English accents, and look up recreations linguists and phonologists have done on 16th century English (as it would have been spoken in Shakespeares London) you will see where many accent features now considered 'Irish English' developed from. The modern stereotypical 'English accents' are probably among the least similar to older English accents due to innovative features such as loss of rhoticity etc. In short, we are lucky enough to still have native speakers (and almost hundred years of recordings of native speakers) with the true and historical continuation of the sounds of the Irish language. Those wanting to learn Breton do not have that luxury. It would be a mark of arrogance on our part to turn our backs on learning and mimicking the phonetics of these speakers on the grounds of some claim to ownership of the language based on heritage.

[@cigh7445]

@Gall Óglaigh Hi Gall. Look up 'Joe Heaney'. He was a sean-nós singer from Connemara. There is a website online with recordings of him telling some stories in English. Here's one www.joeheaney.org/en/anach-cuain/ On youtube there's a video also of him singing the 'Rocks of Bawn' in English, and you can hear the differences there also from the anglicised modern pronounciations of Irish English. If you talk to old native Irish speakers in Connemara or the isles you'll notice that their consonants are more strongly enunciated. This is because in (native) Irish broad t and d are 'dental' and broad consonants like g and c are voiced further back in the palate than an English speakers ones. The old traditional Kerry accents had a very 'Gaelic' quality to them also (you could say the same of the older English of recently strong Irish speaking areas such as Mayo too, and other areas down that western seaboard, such as West Clare. I say 'older' because younger people almost always have more 'standardised' features). Here is a video from 1963 of an interview with the oldest man of the west Clare fishing village of Quilty from that time. West Clare would have been strongly Irish speaking in his youth, whether Quilty was at the time of this interview I don't know, but the phonetics of the mans speech show features consistent with those of Irish. kzbin.info/www/bejne/joHTlKeogJKbhLM Here are three more from the West Cork/Kerry border. I know that the lad in the middle wearing the cowboy hat is a native Irish speaker as I've seen him on Molscéal more than once. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hZ7Xl5htocdgnac RTÉ news report. Skip to 1:18 to hear native Irish speaker of west Kerry dialect speak English kzbin.info/www/bejne/ZmKlkoyiiLB0epo Their (the Kerry gaeltacht sheep farmers) dialect of English will likely die with them but it is very 'Gaelic' sounding and many Irish people under a certain age and many Irish people of any age from outside Munster often have trouble understanding it. Even Micheál Ó Muircheartaigh, to give a famous example, has some Irish features in his accent. You'll notice that his r's are tapped, almost rolled sometimes, just like the broad r's in Irish should be.

[@peadarmacconnmhaigh4337]

Go raibh míle maith agat for posting this. It was lovely to hear.

[@Wapak95]

Beautiful and of historical value.

[@johng5261]

is there even a single person in ireland that has that level of fluency? Most irish spoken today has a thick english accent and even pronunciation and intonation. I would say an irish speaker would say this man sounds like he has an accent compared to just 200 years before him without any english influence or very little.

[@cigh7445]

@@johng5261 Do you listen to Radio na Gaeltachta much John? There are still native speakers (of the generation/s who were born in the sixties and earlier) who still speak with the Gaelic phonetics, intonation, fluency, idiom, and with minimal noticeable English influence. (There are some exceptional younger native speakers too, as young as thirties, but they are much rarer again, exceptions you could say) Among the Irish language community as a whole they are a rare breed, a minority. I recommend the papers of Tadhg Ó HIfearnain to you, he's done some interesting research on the topic we are talking about... It is vital that above all else the Gaeltacht areas and their minority linguistic communities are protected. The government needs to fully and wholly take on board and put into action the advice of sociolinguists such as Conchúr Ó Giollagáin. Secondly, it is vital that a standard for spoken Irish based on native Gaelic phonetics is implemented for non-Gaeltacht schools and those who for whatever reason don't want to specialise in a dialect or research the previous dialect of their area. The influence of the non-native Irish varieties of both schools and media have been shown by Ó hIfearnain and colleagues to be, as well as huge English influences, be influencing the pronounciation of many Gaeltacht teens in a process of undesirable dialect levelling, and I say undesirable because of the fact that this 'new Irish' currently has little base in or link with the native language of the ancestors of the people of Ireland mostly in terms of phonetics and sound, but also in other areas, depending on the speaker, such as idiom, grammar, etc.

[@johng5261]

@@cigh7445 even them are not the same as people 200 years ago. True gaelic didnt have germanic intonations, its not a stress timed language, its syllable. Most people I hear speak it do it stress timed. If you listen to many of the very old gaelic speakers, you will hear hey almost sound like southern US speakers accent wise. Most came from the lowlands so not speaking irish but influenced by some form of gaelic as well.

[@febobartoli]

Good things come to those who wait!

[@PeanutButter0004]

Hooray!! This channel has returned!

[@Enthemys]

After 7 years he's back! Fáilte ar ais mo chara

[@AnGhaeilge]

Grma :)

[@daisypeters3216]

Go raibh mile maith agat! 😘❤🇮🇪🇮🇪🇮🇪👍☘☘☘ blessings and loving Ireland.forever!

[@conormcdaniel2066]

Amazing bit of history. And an unprecedented return! Good to have you back.

[@jawswasnevermyscene4258]

The king has returned

[@kaproskarleto5136]

This is very nice. I wish we all still spoke irish fluently 😢 It also makes me think, is there a way to have more people speak irish?

[@donallbreathnach9998]

Seo dochreidte! Is é an taifeadadh seo ceann de taifeadadh ó "'The Doegen tapes". Tá scéalta, amhráin agus ábhar eile le fáil anseo ó chainteoirí dúchais Gaeilge ó 17 contae. Tá samplaí fíorluachmhara anseo de chanúintí atá imithe i léig ar fad ón uair a rinneadh na taifeadta. Chomh suimiúil❤️ Ag tnúth go mór le ná cín eile! mile buiochas !

[@suzannem2350]

Ar fheabhas. Cá bhféadfaimis éisteacht leis na doegen tapes?

[@suzannem2350]

@@donallbreathnach9998 aahh mo dhia.. Tá sé sin go iontach, grmma!!

[@kevinrawdon8573]

@@suzannem2350 is féidir leat a éisteacht leo ag doegen.ie

[@suzannem2350]

@@kevinrawdon8573 iontach, grma. Tá an suíomh an-maith, is grá liom

[@bruin730]

Truly amazing piece of history

[@김이박-u8t]

An old recording of irish gaelic. I love it.

[@gw2955]

Studying Irish for 2 years and it's all still Irish to me.

[@northcaucasian5027]

Omg 😳, sounds like Ghalgha language from the Caucasus republic of Ingushetia. We are native people of Caucasus and are known as a nation of towers, since each clan has its own towers in the mountains.

[@Bucolick]

Do you know of anywhere where this language can be heard online?

[@andyfarnan6]

Smart lad lots of old Irish stories about fooling the devil 🔑

[@anti-ethniccleansing465]

Hi there! I am trying to track down a video that displayed a bunch of recordings which I believe were recorded by Wilhelm Doege, whom I believe was the person who recorded this audio, as your video was the first to come up in a KZbin search when I plugged in his name… The video that I had seen some years ago showed a variety of British people in his recordings, and they were of World War I military men from from mostly England I believe, displaying all the different dialects/accents from the country. The video went over not only the different dialects, but even _WHY_ people spoke differently in the different regions... For example, someone that lived in an area of England that was especially cold/windy would speak mostly with their mouth closed as possible to keep the air in their mouth warm for their lungs… This obviously had a huge affect on their accent and made it more difficult for outsiders to understand them. I am having a very difficult time tracking down this video, and I saw comments left by other people here that said that your channel was down for some time. By chance, did your channel post a video like this a while ago? If not, do you know by chance what video I am talking about and can refer me to it? I’ve been looking for hours and I’m not having any luck. It’s very frustrating!

[@cigh7445]

Please let me know if you find that video. It sounds really interesting

[@anti-ethniccleansing465]

@@cigh7445 I haven’t had any luck, my friend. 😢 It really was a cool fucking video! The most info I found is that there is an article on the Guardian newspaper website titled “Uncovered: lost British accents from prison camps of First World War” that discusses the existence of the recordings. The subtitle is “British Library gets recordings of PoWs, captured by a German linguist, highlighting regional accents.” I remember in the video that these vinyl recordings were very precious… The people who handled the records even put on white gloves as they played them for the video, like historians do when they handle ancient documents or museum artifacts.

[@anti-ethniccleansing465]

@@cigh7445 P.S. The range of accents/dialects in the video I am trying to find was truly phenomenal... Some accents were/are much more sing-songy than others, and some were just sooo different that they didn’t even sound like EngIish! What is really sad about it is that so much of these different accents/dialects are very watered down or disappearing altogether now, and some are downright _GONE,_ as globalization has marched on. :( The King’s/Queen’s EngIish (it depends on who is sitting on the throne atm as to which version it is called - currently it would be the Queen’s English with Queen Elizabeth on the throne) is one of such dialects that is dying out fast.

[@cigh7445]

@@anti-ethniccleansing465 Thanks for replying its a pity you couldn't find it. If I ever find it I'll post the link here

[@anti-ethniccleansing465]

@@cigh7445 Yeah, still bums me out I could never track it down. I love educational videos like that, especially regarding aspects of history that people don’t give much thought to.

[@iseireannachme2006]

Seo iontach, maith thú :)

[@gavanwhatever8196]

Rugadh mo sin-sin-seanmháthair i bPort Láirge i 1834. N’fheadar go minic an raibh an teanga aici. Cuireann sé seo orm smaoineamh, "sea!"

[@AnGhaeilge]

Seans mór go raibh gaelainn aici :) go háirithe ag an am sin!

[@li0nheart05]

I'm Irish and can't even speak any Irish I definitely need to learn in the future 👍🏻🍀😎🇮🇪

[@gtc239]

Don't forget to not Anglicise the pronunciation, especially the broad-slender consonants and have the r either tapped or rolled. Good luck.

[@vertigognome6617]

I'm not sure if you will see my comment. But I am curious if I can contact you! I found your channel by chance and found the videos you guys posted years ago about Inis Oírr. Do you have an email or something that I can contact you with? I have questions regarding those videos! Thank you!

[@staffstaff3846]

👍

[@rmilrta]

Okay so he fancies going back up after seeing the place prepared. So how does he beat the Devil by having set his condition?

[@PyckledNyk]

This accent of Irish reminded me a lot of older American accents from the 1900s in terms of intonation. Fascinating.

[@CCc-sb9oj]

You should check out Simon Ropers channel for comparisons between older American English and certain English dialects, it's fascinating stuff. The English of the 17th century and before has many features today considered quintessential to Irish/Hiberno English, and it's not completely unfeasible that Waterford Gaelic picked up some influence from those early English dialects, despite the core phonology remaining Irish, however I don't hear the similarities with 1900s American accents you are talking about. If you look up the Newfoundland dialect of English there's definitely a similarity.

[@FPSIreland2]

An bhfuil aon rud eile mar sin ann le fáil? An spéisiúl le cloisteáil. Agus tá an aistriú ann an cabhrach d’fhoghlaimeoirí mar mise féin

[@mmurney7889]

Curious to how easily modern Irish speakers, either native or learner, understand this recording?

[@AnGhaeilge]

A native munster speaker would understand most of it, a learner probably not very much at all. I'd consider myself somewhere in between. Not a born native speaker, but reasonably competent at conversational Irish. I can understand a good deal of it, but there are some parts where I'd find difficulty without the subtitles I added. I think someone from outside Munster would have more difficult with it as our dialect has some unique traits.

[@mmurney7889]

@@AnGhaeilge I left a comment near the bottom of the comments to a question regarding mutual intelligibility with Scots Gaelic. As a Scots Gaelic speaker, I can’t believe how relatively easy this is understand compared to other examples of Irish I’ve heard

[@cigh7445]

@@mmurney7889 That's mad! Have you heard any of the Donegal dialects?

[@dazpatreg]

@@mmurney7889 Ben Ó Ceallaigh said you should really look at the map of Ireland and Scotland on their sides and then you realise how similar Waterford Irish would be when you think of it geographically. Stuff like thá and Dé etc would be immediately recognisable to a Scots Gaelic speaker such as yourself

[@thought-provokingvideos5464]

Can anyone tell me what the old "sin" and "arsa" meant? It looked like 'sin' was 'said' but "arsa Pilib" is "said Pilib" so now I think "sin" is "HE" or "HIM"! When I look up modern Gaelic for 'sin' they just tell me it's the English for "sin"!

[@AnGhaeilge]

Sin means "that".

[@ptsm]

Learn Irish lesson 3??

[@crispypopped2148]

How did you understand Gaelige so fluently An Ghaeilge?

[@QueenDynamo]

Non-native Gaeilge learner here. Does "nín" really translate as the English "no"?

[@AnGhaeilge]

No. There is no word in the Irish language for "yes" or "no". You reply to a question using the verb used in the question. For example: - "Did you run to the shop?" - We would reply with "I did run" rather than "yes". Here you can see you're simply responding using the verb "run" that was used in the question. This is how questions and answers work in Irish and an important concept to learn for beginners. As for "Nín" - it is a dialectal form of "Níl" here in Waterford. Níl means "is not". For example - "Níl sé dorcha" = It is not dark. Or here in Waterford - "Nín sé dorcha". Níl itself is actually a contraction of "ní fhuil", which is no longer in use.

[@cristobalito1966]

Can a Scots Gaelic speaker understand this?

[@AnGhaeilge]

No, for many reasons. Firstly, this is an Irish language speaker who was born in 1850 in Co. Waterford in Munster. This is the most distant dialect of Irish to Scottish Gaelic. Scottish Gaelic sounds phonetically closest to the Ulster dialect. Secondly, the audio can be a little difficult to understand even for many modern Irish speakers.

[@mmurney7889]

@@AnGhaeilge I have to say as a Scottish Gaelic speaker from a native speaking background, how easier this recording is to understand compared to present day speakers of Irish. The tone, accent and delivery remind me a great deal of the Southern Scottish Hebrides, and while there are some interesting differences in word choice and spelling; the sentence structure and grammar look nearly identical to that of modern day Scottish Gaelic. While the transcript assists a great deal, it wouldn’t be difficult for native speaker or someone with a good knowledge of spoken Scottish Gaelic to discern what this man is saying without it. A very interesting recording indeed. My questions on this would be, 1. Do Irish speakers today have difficulty understanding Scottish Gaelic, either present day or archive recordings? 2. Does modern Irish still follow the spelling, grammar and structure of the transcript in the video? Tapadh leibh agus go raibh maith agat

[@cigh7445]

@@mmurney7889 1. Beyond basics, yes. But also depending on levels of exposure 2. Yes

[@patrickmurphy9266]

@kennymacdonald5313 Northern Scotland had a lot of norse influence . Waterford was a very skandinavian area too , so perhaps that's the reason .

[@tribaounidadedonstania]

as a irish speaker, i can understand around 20-30% of this. i think its because im not from waterford, and the dialects are different and also because, irish changes. i don’t understand most of it because now, we speak irish with english mixed in. also, here is a difference in pronunciation i found: urlár / floor. it was said like “oohlahr” but now, we say “awlahr”

[@AnGhaeilge]

Urlár is pronounced ooh-lore here in Munster. If you go to www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/ - you can check any Irish word and it will show you how to pronounce it in each dialect. Very useful!

[@tribaounidadedonstania]

@@AnGhaeilge thanks! i never knew that *_this_* was just the waterford dialect! ill check out the link now!

[@Amcc38383]

We don't speak Irish with English mixed in. Only people who aren't fluent do that

[@Oi325]

Do the Irish still speak Gaelic? It hasn't been lost yet right?

[@AnGhaeilge]

Yes, it is still spoken here. Just not by a majority.

[@Thomas-nd2om]

You know, one of the things that I hate about Irish is how poor its current orthography is at expressing things. Say what you will about the Caighdeán, but it did a decent job of standardising spelling - clo Gaelach is just infinitely better at expressing the variety of broad and slender vowels in this language.

[@ucNguyen-qr3fh]

Hi. I really like your youtube channel. I want to buy your channel again.

[@adamender9092]

I have come to a conclusion! The Latin alphabet is not fit for the Irish language 😀

[@Gaeilgeoir]

The Latin script, certainly not. Irish has its own perfectly functioning script (bunchló/gaelchló). The old excuse of it being “too expensive to print in” is completely outdated and irrelevant - has been for decades now. I say we return to that beautiful, sensible script full time - not just to be used for whimsy or in touristy areas. I, for one, don't like writing/typing H's all over the place to show lenition when a lenition dot over the changed consonant is much smaller and elegant, and it's quite a space saver!💡

[@RebelofIreland]

The way this language was shoved down our throats in school turned many away from their own native tongue

[@Ancraichead]

It also gave you a foundation which you'll fine very helpful if you return to learning it one day.