Where is your kettle?

Càit a bheil an coire agad?

Joy tells us how to say where things, or people, are in the home.

We have enough knowledge of household items and rooms to start talking about where things are located.

Càit a bheil ...?
Where is ...?

We have come across this question before AND we know how to answer it! Gasta!

Càit a bheil am bòrd agad?
Where is your table?
Càit a bheil an leabaidh agad?
Where is your bed?
Càit a bheil an coire agad?
Where is your kettle?

We know how to ask the question but do we know how to answer it? We do! We learnt the principles of talking about where we live! Math dha-rìribh!

ann an
in a

Use  ann an  for objects or places  without the definite article .

ann an seòmar-cadail
in a bedroom
ann an seòmar
in a room
ann am
in a

Use  ann am  for place names  without the definite article  which begin with  B,M, F  or  P. 

ann am preas
in a cupboard

Use  ann an  for nouns  without the definite article  which begin with  any other letter.

ann an cathair
in a chair
ann an amar
in a bath

We’ve learnt lots of countries which take the definite article  An | A’.  

What’s the difference between  anns   an  and  ann an?

The difference is  anns   ann  means  in the  and  ann an  means  in a.

Gaelic nouns take a gender. We are looking at masculine nouns here.

If the masculine noun begins with an  add the  t-  after  anns.  

an seòmar
the room
anns an t-seòmar
in the room
anns an t-seòmar-shuidhe
in the sitting room

The  an  changes to  a’  and the noun lenites (or takes an h after the first letter) if it can lenite.

an cidsin
the kitchen
anns a' chidsin
in the kitchen

What is lenition?  

Lenition means softening and it often means a change in the spelling of a word, by adding an ‘h’ after the first consonant. 

What letters take lenition when you spell them?  

B, C, D, F, G, M, P, S, T 

What letters never lenite?  

Vowels  never lenite.  The letters d ,  t  and  s  don’t usually lenite if the word before them ends in an  n , and words beginning with sg, sm, sp and st never lenite. 

The  an  stays on its own in any other circumstance.

an àmhainn
the oven
anns an àmhainn
in the oven

The fancy title for when a noun follows a preposition is the dative case (or the prepositional case) and when we use anns it is  with the article