slå

Slá is a term that appears in several languages with distinct meanings. In Irish Gaelic, slá is a historical root connected to health and safety. Its most familiar appearance is in sláinte, the word for health, which is used in the traditional toast Sláinte! meaning “to health.” In modern Irish, slá is rarely used on its own outside of etymological discussion or compound forms.

In Icelandic, slá is a common verb meaning “to strike” or “to hit” and is used in everyday conversation as well as in idiomatic expressions related to impact or force. The verb is part of standard syntax and participates in regular conjugation patterns for tense and person.

Orthography: The form slá uses diacritics in these languages to indicate vowel length or quality; the acute accent on á signals a lengthened vowel in both Irish and Icelandic orthographies. Although the spelling is the same, the words belong to different language families and are not cognate in meaning.

Etymology and relations: The Irish sense of slá derives from a historical concept of health and well-being, reflected in the word sláinte. The Icelandic sense derives from a Germanic root meaning to strike, a common semantic field in the verb across related languages. The two uses are etymologically distinct despite the shared diacritic form.

See also: sláinte; to strike in Icelandic; Irish health-related terms.