How to Say "Birthday" in Irish

lá breithe

masculine

The English phrase 'birthday' is translated into Irish as lá breithe or breithlá.

Meaning: anniversary (noun)

Ways to say it

“birthday” in Irish
Irish	Note
lá breithe	masculine
breithlá	masculine

The term is used as a masculine noun to refer to the anniversary of a person's birth.

The phrase lá breithe is a compound meaning 'day of birth', consisting of lá (day) and breithe (of birth).

Lá breithe is the standard way to express 'birthday' using a noun followed by a genitive noun, while breithlá is a single-word compound form.

The compound noun breithlá can be used interchangeably with lá breithe in most contexts.

In Irish, the word for 'birth' in breithlá comes from the same root as the word for 'judgment' or 'verdict'.
In traditional Irish culture, the concept of a 'birthday' was less central than the 'name day', the feast day of the saint after whom a person was named.
Because Irish uses a system of initial mutations, the word lá can change its form in other contexts, though it remains stable in the phrase lá breithe.

Is é amárach mo tríochadú breithlá.
Tomorrow is my thirtieth birthday.
This sentence is useful for mentioning a specific thirtieth birthday using breithlá.
Tatoeba #10317628 by koala, translation #10317584 by CK

Siobhán and Cathal are talking about a friend's special day.

Sources

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