--- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, John Cowan <cowan@...> wrote:

> Michael Everson scripsit:
>
> > Only because what you are saying is rubbish. Why do you

consider=20

> > Gaelic orthography to be eccentric? It marks the palatal and=20
> > non-palatal consonant series rather well, and indicates

consonant=20

> > mutation rather conveniently, preserving the basic spelling of

the=20

> > root while also showing the mutation. Is this unusual? Perhaps.

Is it=20

> > unnatural or inauthentic? No.
>
> Of course Cyrillic script would have been better.

I used to like the Cyrillic 'option,' generally. A seemingly fuller,
non-Roman alphabet, seemingly Christian in origin, and (at the time)
with strong Communist associations; 32, the number of its letters,
makes an interesting mnemonic with the number of human teeth in a
full adult set. Then its Communist associations were somewhat
undermined, and I read somewhere that 'St.Cyril,' its purported
inventor, although a 'monk,' was an early 'ethnic cleanser.'
Alphabets are quite awesome when you're young, but as you get older
you don't feel too much in awe of them to devise one ot two of your
own.

The chief problem with

> current Irish orthography is that one must memorize a large number

of

> contextually dependent pronunciations of vowel digraphs and

trigraphs.

Thank you for concurring and allowing these imperfections in the
current Irish system, John, and for contributing to this topic
without any hint of vitriol or seeking to 'crap on' or 'rubbish'
fellow contributors.

Richard Comaish