Tiny questions with quick answers - continuing thread

Hi,
HE DIDNT TELL ME…
In 22 this is ddwywedodd e ddim wrtha I…

But just into 23 becomes…
Naeth e ddim dweud wrtha I …

Could someone clarify…please!

Don’t panic Mike! They are both valid ways of saying “He didn’t tell me”, they are just using different construction patterns. You’ll come across both but it’s fine to stick with whichever one you prefer or whichever comes to mind first. :slight_smile:

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Hi Mike,

I would look at these as just two different ways of essentially saying the same thing - use them as ways to inject variation.

For clarity, they are both forms of the past tense.

Dyweddodd e - follows the past tense of things like “Siaradais i”, “dechreuais i”, “welais i” “welodd e” etc.

Whereas

Naeth e ddim dweud… - follows the past tense of things like “Wnes i”, “wnaeth e”, “wnaeth hi”. Basically equals “I did”, “I did not” “He did” “he did not” etc.

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Cheers Siaron & Nicky,
Much appreciated :+1:

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Do non-Welsh Place names mutate?

For example, do i say “Dw i’n dod o Baltimore.” or “Dw i’n dod o Maltimore?”

Bryan

There was a huge discussion about this a while back and, if my memory serves me correct, was a bit fuzzy. Basically, you would mutate a Welsh place name wherever it is in the World otherwise not … I think.

Remember, no-one would mind either way.

BTW, Baltimore, if mutated, would become Faltimore with soft mutation after ‘o’.

Eta this …

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Yes, although country names often do mutate - o Gorea, yng Nghorea, o Ddenmarc, yn Nenmarc (but you hear them non-mutated as well); and some cities do as well - o Baris, ym Mharis sound OK and normal to me, not nearly so sure about (for example) o Ferlin and ym Merlin, however…

I think this is one of those issues that comes under the category of ‘Don’t Sweat It’ - only the Language Polizei and the Pedants’ League will criticise you anyway, and who cares about them? :slight_smile:

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But Corea and Denmarc are the Welsh names instead of Korea and Denmark, aren’t they?

I think we misunderstood what you meant by “Welsh place names wherever they are in the world”. You mean that if a place has a distinct Welsh name (and Welsh speakers aren’t just using the English name and spelling, as with “Stockton-on-Tees” for example) then that name gets mutated?

So Bristol / Bryste becomes O Fryste because it has a Welsh name, but Darlington is still O Darlington because it doesn’t have its own Welsh name. Is that what you meant?

Edit: and indeed, having looked on Welsh Wikipedia: https://cy.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darlington “Mae Caerdydd 355.4 km i ffwrdd o Darlington

But https://cy.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryste “Mae pont grog enwog ym Mryste

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If so, we’re at cross purposes. :slight_smile:

They are not Welsh names in the sense that Gwlad yr Iâ is the Welsh name for Iceland, or Llydaw is the Welsh name for Brittany. Or indeed Ffrainc for France, and yr Almaen for Germany.

Does this help? :confused:

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Yes. :slight_smile:

Yes. :slight_smile: Although, strangely, Denmarc is in my Welsh dictionary but Corea isn’t. No idea why.

My English isn’t very good either. :joy:

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It’s in mine, but then I have the excellent “Modern Welsh Dictionary” by a certain @garethrking:wink:

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Yay!! :slight_smile:

So, if it’s in any Welsh/english dictionary it must be the Welsh language word. Yes? No?

So Corea and Denmarc are Welsh, and Korea and Denmark are English I’m surmising.

So one step further, Denmarc and Corea would be subject to mutation as per normal rules?

Depends what you mean by ‘Welsh language word’. It seems to me that Denmarc is a Welsh word only in the sense that entrepreneur is an English one - it certainly is in all the English dictionaries, and is used by English speakers the world over, yet we know that actually it is French. Ditto spaghetti for Italian. My feeling with Denmarc and, even more obviously Hwngari, is that these are similarly borrowed terms into Welsh, from English. (The Hwngari example is a clincher, surely?). Whereas Yr Eidal Italy and Gwlad Pwyl Poland are much more obviously Welsh.

I mean, proper names are tricky anyway - and probably the best thing for Welsh learners, as usual, is to not lose sleep over this, and follow usage of the native speakers as and if you spot it. If Elin Fflur, in her lovely Ynys Môn Welsh, says o Baris or i Docio, then that’s good enough for me and would stand up in any court.

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Oh my word. Have the Heddlu Iaith actually started court proceedings now?

I’m doomed.

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We’ll bail you out! :slight_smile:

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Just say you’re a friend of mine. :wink:

On second thoughts…don’t! :confused:

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I kept all my doubts aside until the end of level 1. Some of them dissolved in the process, but some stuck. And even though I had planned a full weekend break I can’t stop thinking about them so I have to start with questions! :joy:

What is the difference between dweud, ddweud and dweud wrth?
(Maybe it’s not so clear in English as well to me, cause in Italian they’re both translated with the same word)

I hear that words like mynd and menyw changing sometimes into a v sound, and I have the impression that gofyn becomes ofyn. Is there some sort of rule about it?

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This letter-change at the beginning of words is called “mutation” (treiglad in cymraeg) and it’s a wide grammatical field, and yes, there are rules of when and how to mutate. What you noticed in mynd and menyw are both examples of the “soft mutation”, which is by far the most common mutation, and I can only tell you which letters change to which, but I won’t try to list any rules here, because a) that would be too long and b) I don’t even know all the rules myself.
The most important thing is to notice that these things happen, and as you become more exposed you will develop a “feeling” of when and how to mutate, and if you get it wrong, don’t worry, you will still be understood.
Now here is the list of letter changes in the soft mutation:
p -> b, m -> f, b -> f, c -> g, t -> d, d -> dd, ll -> l, rh -> r, and as you noticed, g just drops completely.

For more information I can refer you to this web-page: https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Welsh/Mutations, or the book “Modern Welsh Dictionary” by @garethrking which gives a short overview.

With what I wrote above you can now see that ddweud is just the soft-mutated form of dweud, so they are in essence the same word.

Now dweud wrth in english is “to tell”, which is the action of saying something to a specific person, but like you said, italian only knows dire for both actions, so this is also one of the things that you will pick up naturally as you go along, but again, it’s not the end of the world if you “get it wrong” from time to time.

And: Llongyfarchiadau mawr iawn am gwpla lefel 1! (Congratulations on finishing level 1!) :slight_smile:

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