cétmuinter

Old Irish

Etymology

From cét- (“first”) +‎ muinter (“family, household”).

Noun

cétmuinter f (genitive cétmuintire)

1. (law) a spouse, implied to be at the top of the household

Usage notes

The term primarily appeared in legal texts in Old Irish, and could be used to refer to a spouse of either gender depending on the context.

Inflection

Feminine ā-stem
	Singular	Dual	Plural
Nominative	cétmuinterL	cétmuintirL	cétmuinteraH
Vocative	cétmuinterL	cétmuintirL	cétmuinteraH
Accusative	cétmuintirN	cétmuintirL	cétmuinteraH
Genitive	cétmuintireH	cétmuinterL	cétmuinterN
Dative	cétmuintirL	cétmuinteraib	cétmuinteraib
Initial mutations of a following adjective: H = triggers aspiration L = triggers lenition N = triggers nasalization

Mutation

Old Irish mutation
Radical	Lenition	Nasalization
cétmuinter	chétmuinter	cétmuinter pronounced with /ɡ(ʲ)-/
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

Further reading

• Gregory Toner, Sharon Arbuthnot, Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, Marie-Luise Theuerkauf, Dagmar Wodtko, editors (2019), “cétmuinter”, in eDIL: Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language