Focal an Lae #194
The Word of the Day in Irish

Word: agus (AH-guhs) [agəs]

Meaning: agus = and


History: Old Irish “ocus” (and) is a semantic extension of the word “ocus” meaning “near” and “nearness”, so that “X ocus Y” originally meant “X beside Y”. The noun and adjective meanings of “ocus” survive in Modern Irish in the word “fogas”. The reconstructed Common Celtic predecessor of “ocus” is *onkus-tus. *onkus alone yields Old Irish “oc” (Mod. “ag”, at) and Welsh “wng” (near), and appears to derive from the Indo-European root *nek- (to reach, attain).

Scottish Gaelic: agus

2008-06-19 CPD