Old Irish

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Etymology

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From imm- (around) +‎ gaibid (to take). The prefix imm- is reduplicated in deuterotonic forms. Occasional spellings with imc-, suggesting the pronunciation /imɡ-/, lead Pedersen and Thurneysen to suggest the original form may have been imm- +‎ uss- +‎ gaibid.[1][2]

Pronunciation

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Verb

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imm·imgaib (prototonic ·imgaib, verbal noun imgabáil)

  1. to avoid, evade, shun
    • c. 800–825, Diarmait, Milan Glosses on the Psalms, published in Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 7–483, Ml. 51b10
      In tan as·mber Dauid “intellectum tibi dabo”, sech is arde són do·mbéra Día do neuch nod·n-eirbea ind ⁊ génas triit con·festar cid as imgabthi do dénum di ulc ⁊ cid as déinti dó di maith. Aithesc trá lesom insin a persin Dǽ.
      When David says, “I will give thee understanding”, that is a sign that God will give to everyone that will trust in him, and work through him, that he may know what evil he must avoid doing, and what good he must do. He has then here a reply in the person of God.

Inflection

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Descendants

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  • Middle Irish: imgaibid

Mutation

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Old Irish mutation
Radical Lenition Nasalization
imm·imgaib
(pronounced with /h/ in h-prothesis environments)
unchanged imm·n-imgaib
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every
possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

References

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  1. ^ Pedersen, Holger (1913) Vergleichende Grammatik der keltischen Sprachen (in German), volume II, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, →ISBN, § 734.11, page 531
  2. ^ Thurneysen, Rudolf (1940, reprinted 2017) D. A. Binchy and Osborn Bergin, transl., A Grammar of Old Irish, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, →ISBN, § 543, page 351

Further reading

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