Gaelic Language

The Gaelic Language

The Gaelic group of languages are also referred to as the Goidelic languages. They are one of the two major categories of the Insular Celtic Languages (spoken around the British Isles). There are 3 languages in the group: Irish, Scottish Gaelic, and Manx.

The Irish and Manx languages are referred to simply by those names respectively. The word Gaelic usually refers to the Scottish Gaelic language and that is how the Scottish refer to it themselves.  Because of the political history and deep-seated regional pride, there are some Irish individuals who feel offended if the term Gaelic is associated with them at all. Likewise, some of the Scottish people are put off by the term Erse ("Irish"), which is sometimes applied to them, when referring to their language.

The Gaelic languages were once limited to Ireland. At some point between the 3rd and 6th centuries, some Irish Celts (who were called Scoti by the Romans) left Ireland and settled in what is known today as Scotland. They meshed with a native tribal group known as the Picts, and became what we know today as the Scottish people. There is evidence that the Gaelic languages were at one point spoken along the Western coast of Europe, including modern Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, and Austria.

The Gaelic languages had their own distinctive written form called Ogham.  Evidence shows that it was in use from the 5th until the 15th century. The oldest known written Gaelic language is known as Primitive Irish, demonstrated in inscription written in the Ogham text that date up to the 4th century. Old Irish was in use from the 6th to the 10th century. Middle Irish, from which the modern Gaelic languages are derived, was used from the 10th to the 16th century.

Today, the Irish language is the official language of Ireland, in addition to the English language. Something like 260,000 people in the Republic of Ireland use Irish fluently but also speak another language (probably English), while 80,000 use it as their primary form of communication. The areas of common Irish-speaking defined by law are known as the Gaeltacht.

The Scottish Gaelic language is waning in use, due to emigration from the areas in north and west Scotland, where there are still a few remaining native speakers. Roughly 60,000 native speakers of Scottish Gaelic remain in Scotland. Scottish Gaelic was the lone language spoken in Scotland until the late 15th century.  By the 17th century, speakers of the Scottish Gaelic language were limited to the mountainous regions (the Highlands) and the outer islands because of the increasing prevalence of Middle English that had begun in the early 16th century. The decline of the Scottish Gaelic language unfortunately continues today.

Today, the Manx language is considered extinct. It was once spoken on the Isle of Man (located in the center of the British Isles).  It is closely related to the other Gaelic languages, Scottish Gaelic and Irish, but it also was influenced by the Old Norse language, as well as the Middle English and Welsh languages.
The political turmoil and internal conflict of the region that contains the nations of Ireland and Scotland have for many years been a direct influence on the prevailing cultures that make it up. The Gaelic languages have suffered great shifts, and some have even been extinguished altogether. Due to emigration from native lands, and the historic incursion of foreign settlers, some of the Gaelic languages have been banished to the remote areas of the lands and only spoken by a few, or nearly replaced altogether with the English language.

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