Page:The Celtic Review volume 4.djvu/189

176 Ceithreamh only has this o in Kintyre, the other ordinals having u there.

In coinneamh and ullamh the sound is short ao in Arran, and in the former in Kintyre. The former represents an old conne, but is dealt with in some dialects as coinneamh.

Caitheamh, wearing, càramh, repairing, creideamh, and deanamh end with dh in lieu of mh in Arran, Kintyre, and Islay, as do also feitheamh and seasamh in Arran and with MacAlpine. Seasamh, however, is given as well by MacAlpine. In the literature of South Argyll and Arran dh is often found in place of mh in most or all of those words.

The sound of slender gh appears to be given by MacAlpine to final mh after a slender vowel in one or two instances. In cloimh, scab, and cnoimh, maggot, for example, mh is represented by him by yh, by which dh in déidh and gh in brigh, etc., are represented.

P

In some dialects, such as that of East Perth, p in medial or final positions sometimes is hardly, if at all, distinguishable from b, as in apa, capull, ceapaire, leapa, genitive of leabaidh, tapaidh, cnap, ceap, etc. In most dialects p in such positions sounds as with an aspirate before it. In Rannoch and in Strathspey this aspirate, if it has not altogether become ch, has come to sound very like that guttural. Thus tapaidh in both those districts strikes the observer as being sounded ‘tachpaidh,’ and so with apa, etc. A similar peculiarity in those two districts is observable in the case of broad t.

B

Gaelic b is commonly said to sound like English p, but is described more accurately as a surd or voiceless b and may be produced by trying to sound b without voice. Sonant or voiced b, i.e. b as in English, is occasionally heard in Sutherland, e.g. in beag, lèabag.

A change of b to p occurs in buinne, tide, current, which is puinn and pinn in West Ross and, according to the Rev.