5 ms·
The negative-interrogative for the first-person singular present indicative or "amn't" is historically supported and is evidenced in Scots and Hiberno english.
by xor99 4y ago
The negative-interrogative for the first-person singular present indicative or "amn't" is historically supported and is evidenced in Scots and Hiberno english.
- macleginn 4y agoThe reason for this is, probably, that in Irish the cluster -mn- became disallowed at some point and was obligatorily split by a schwa. As a result speakers of Hiberno English likely didn't have to simplify "amn't" because they pronounced it "ament" from the start.
- dorchadas 4y agoThe - mn - cluster is legal in Irish -- the plural of bean (woman) is mná even. It occurs a few other places too, though some dialects have gone away (though any Cn has become Cr unless it's sn, so not just mn) from it.
- macleginn 4y agoAFAIK, mná is never actually pronounced in this way, it’s either [mena] with an epenthetic schwa or [mra].
- dorchadas 4y agoAt least in Kerry, there's a tendency for /mna:/ (Ó Sé Gaeilge Chorca Dhuibhne, 33) and he explicitly states (32) that both /mn/ and /m'n'/ are legal consonant clusters at the beginning of words, no epenthesis (he gives 'don mbeannacht' as an example for the other, where the vowel is dropped). I'd suspect the rest of Munster to be the same.
- macleginn 4y agoCool, thanks! But word-final -mnt is a slightly different thing anyway.