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Irish/The Article

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The Article

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English has a definite article ("the") and an indefinite article ("a" or "an").

Irish has only a definite article. In situations where "a" or "an" would be used in English, the noun is used with no article.

The definite article has two forms: an and na.

  • an is used in front of singular nouns
  • na is used in front of plural nouns (and feminine nouns in the genitive case).

Grammatical Changes

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The singular definite article "an" may change the noun it is applied to, depending on the first letter and gender of the noun:

Consonant
(b c f g m p)
Consonant
(d n t l r)
Consonant
(s but not sc, sm, sp or st)
Vowel
Masculine (no change) (no change) (no change) t-/t
Feminine séimhiú (no change) t (no change)

The plural definite article "na" changes the noun based only on its first letter:

Consonant Vowel
(no change) "h" prefix