"Tha mi a' dol a-steach a-rithist."
Translation:I am going in again.
3 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
Yes, it depends on motion. No, it doesn’t depend on whether the verb is transitive (takes a direct object) or not (doesn’t take a direct object), or if there is any verb at all…
a-staigh just means inside as a stationary thing, something being and staying inside; a-steach means into (a house), inwards.
a-staigh actually comes from the precursor of anns meaning in the + dative of house, taigh; while a-steach comes from anns + old accusative-nominative form teach (which no longer exists in Gaelic, but is still used in some Irish dialects) – as Old and Middle Irish still had the typical Indo-European difference between stationary in + dative/locative and dynamic in + accusative for motion (cf. German). Thus a bit over a thousand years ago a-staigh (or rather istaig or istig as it was in OIr.) really meant in the house and a-steach (or rather istech) meant literally into the house.
As a trivia-addition to Silmeth's comprehensive answer, it might be interesting to know that typically speakers from the Isle of Skye (and perhaps a few other places) do not make that distinction anymore and use a-staigh in both cases. So don't be surprised/"grammatically offended" if a native speaker (or a learner taught by a Sgitheanach) tells you e.g. thigibh a-staigh! "come in!" instead of thigibh a-steach, that might just be a feature of their dialect :-)