Dressing up for Halloween – Useful Phrases in the Irish Language

We already have several free lessons on the topic of Halloween, including its mysterious origins and all the spooky traditions surrounding it, but in this lesson we’re going to focus on one of the most fun parts of the festival: dressing up.

Here we present a few handy phrases to help you talk about dressing up as Gaeilge. Bear in mind that a lot of them could also be used for everyday dressing or getting ready for a snazzy occasion, as well as the most ridiculous of Halloween outfits. So not just useful at the end of October!

Dressing up

The basic verb we use to talk about dressing up is gléas suas:

Here are a couple of other examples of this verb in action:

Put it on

Another phrasal verb which seems to reflect the English quite directly is cuir ar for “put on”:

As you can imagine, these structure is very useful for under-pressure parents trying to get the kids ready in the morning:

Costume vocab

Here are some words for clothing and accessories which may make up part of your Halloween costume.

What are you wearing?

The simplest way to talk about what you’re wearing is to say what is “on you”, using the preposition ar like in the examples above.

To say what you have on, you can simply substitute the word “measc” for any other word in the list above.

Famously, the verb caith has many meanings, including “throw”, “smoke” and “spend”, but it also means “wear”:

However, to use this verb to say what you’re wearing, you’ll need one of three slightly varying structures:

1. á + séimhiú 

Use the structure á + séimhiú if it’s referring to a masculine noun, such as cochall.

Here are some other masculine nouns:

2. á + no change

Use the structure á + no change if it’s referring to a feminine noun, such as aghaidh fidil.

Here are a couple more feminine nouns you could use:

3. á + urú

Use the structure á + urú if it’s referring to a plural noun, such as giobail. The gender of the noun doesn’t matter when it’s plural.

Some other plural options:

NB Don’t forget to check out the nouns in the list above also, to see whether they are masculine, feminine or plural.

What are you dressed as?

Hopefully your choice of costume will be self-evident, but it’s nonetheless useful to be able to say this, as much for talking about past Halloweens or future plans as the present time.

To express this we will use the preposition mar, which causes séimhiú to the following noun:

Of course, you might just say “I’m a witch”, in which case there are a few possible structures:

Note that in the second example we need séimhiú on a noun after the possessive adjective mo, and that the third example ends with a form of the pronoun i – in fact, both of them do!

The word ionam literally means “in me”. This is one of the less common prepositional pronouns but it has the full range of forms just like the common examples agam, dom, liom and orm. You can find the full form by searching for “in” or “i” on Foclóir or Teanglann.

Note also that the above structures are used for saying “I am a…” – that is, for generic kinds of creature or monster. This is the same we indicate our nationality or job title in Irish:

However, to say that you are a more specific character, especially if they are named, we use the following structure:

And of course this is the same structure when we identify ourselves by name or role in normal circumstances:

NB You can find more example of Halloween monsters and ghouls in previous lessons in the Samhain lessons bundle.

Further practice

If you’re up for a challenge, here’s a little account of the best Halloween party – and costume – I ever saw…

An chóisir agus an feisteas is fearr a chonaic mé riamh

Is as Doire dlúthchara de mo chuid, agus tamall de bhlianta ó shin thug sí cuireadh dúinn teacht go dtí an chathair álainn sin le haghaidh Oíche Shamhna. Bhí gach duine sa chathair gléasta suas don fhéile, ach bhí an feisteas is fearr ar an chara chéanna a thug an cuireadh dúinn.

Bhí sise gléasta mar an bhean sa phictiúr cáiliúil Drowning Girl le Roy Lichtenstein. Tá an pictiúr sin cosúil le painéal ó ghreannán, agus mar sin bhí bolgán cainte aici, greamaithe le banda gruaige os a cionn. Chomh maith leis sin, bhí bréagfholt ghorm uirthi agus poncanna beaga bána ar fud a haghaidhe, chun dathanna agus stíl an ghreannáin a athchruthú.

Bhí gach duine ar an tsráid tógtha le feisteas mo charad agus bhí oíche den scoth againn uilig.

Gluais

You can find more lessons for cultural enthusiasts, language beginners and dedicated learners on our Aistear learning platform, including access to online community and live sessions with Explore and Grow membership.

Don’t forget to check our other free Halloween resources.