The Story Of The Irish Language

by Edward Purdon

Concise illustrated treatment of Irish from ancient times to the development of the modern language.

Genres: Nonfiction, Language

80 pages, Paperback

First published February 6, 1999

Reviews

[Jené · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is quite short and yet the content is very dense. As to be expected, I suppose, considering the book is only about 70 pages and the language is 2,000 years old. It focuses on the actual history of how much the Irish language was spoken in Irelands and less on the linguistics or changes of the words/pronunciation of the language. It also assumes the reader has a lot of prior knowledge about Irish history, but glazes over important history markers such as the famine and the world wars. While some of the information was very interesting and valuable, it wasn’t the ultimate guide for those interested.

[Patrick Neylan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short history (80 pages) that's a little hard to follow in places. One can't be entirely confident in it, since on p10 it states that Latin "replaced" Brittonic in Roman Britain, which it certainly didn't, and all we're told about the author is that "Edward Purdon is the pseudonym of an Irish writer with many books to his credit". But it seems like a decent short overview.

[L ✨ · Rating 3 out of 5]

it was interesting to know more about how the Irish language is so diverse but I liked the first two chapters more I think, because we had information about the culture, the language and literature; while at the end it was mostly a list of books and I was lost.