Unlike many European languages, Irish does not distinguish between "familiar" and "polite" second-person pronouns.Tú is used to address any one person, regardless of how well known that person is to the speaker.
The emphatic formtusa is also used as thevocative:Haigh tusa! — "Hey you!"
c.800, Würzburg Glosses on the Pauline Epistles, published inThesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 499–712, Wb.5b28
Nítú nod·n-ail, acht is hé not·ail.
It is not you that nourishes it, but it that nourishes you.
c.800–825, Diarmait, Milan Glosses on the Psalms, published inThesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 7–483, Ml. 92a17
Bed indbadigthi .i. bed chuintechti .i. cid fáilte ad·cot-sa ⁊ du·ngnéu, is túsu immid·folngi dam, a Dǽ; cid indeb dano ad·cot, istú, Dǽ, immid·folngi dam.
To be enriched, i.e. to be sought, i.e. though it is joy that I obtain and make, it is you who effects it for me, O God; so too, though it is wealth that I obtain, it is you, God, who effects it for me.
When more pronouns are included in the same sentence, it is consideredimpolite to say the pronounyo at first, it must be the last one, andtú must be said after any third person (this applies also forti andmí):
Like other masculine words, masculine pronouns can be used when the gender of the subject is unknown or when the subject is plural and of mixed gender.
Treated as if it were third person for purposes of conjugation and reflexivity.
Ifle orles precedeslo,la,los, orlas in a clause, it is replaced withse (e.g.se lo dije instead of*le lo dije).
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