Calan Gaeaf means hallowe’en Gwrach means witch Ysbryd means spirit or ghost Bwgan means ghost Bwci Bo means bogeyman Fampir means vampire Anghenfil means monster Gwaed means blood Y Meirw means the dead Dychrynllyd means frightening Dychryn means to frighten Ofn means fear Arswyd means horror Pwmpen means pumpkin
Gaeaf means winter Rhew means ice or frost Rhewi means to freeze Wedi Rhewi means is is frozen or it has frozen Barrug means hoar frost Pibonwy means icicles Eira means snow Eirlaw means sleet Lluwch Eira means snow drift Lluwchio means blizzard or to drift/driving snow Cenllysg means hail Cesair means hail
Ugh! Is it winter already? I shall dutifully add these words to the SSiW living dictionary, but hopefully I won’t have to unpack them until January or February. It’s too early to contemplate some of them, wedi rhewi, pibonwy, lluwchio. Yuck!
Is hail a winter phenomena in Wales? Where I’ve lived in the United States it is exclusively a summer thing. Hail totaled my car back in the 80’s during a summer hailstorm.
Yes, mainly a winter thing here. It often comes a day or so before sleet, then the actual snow. To be honest it’s usually more common than snow in the South.
We do occasionally get hail in the summer, sometimes with thunder. When it happens, we like to talk about it for the next month - a bit like when we get an earthquake
Hi @CatrinLliarJones,
Thank you so much for another excellent collection of words.
The attached sound file seems to be the previous collection of winter words, but I found the fireworks words by going to SoundCloud.
“Ffrwydrad” has already come in useful. Maybe I am reading the wrong sort of books.
Sue
Or my Wife apparently. She told me this weekend it is Halloween (Calan Gaeaf) when she reluctantly admits to herself summer is over and hopes her vitamin D she has stored from the summer sun carries her through the cloudy, bleak Delaware winters until Spring…or until we visit the Florida family who still has 80 degree (26 Celsius) through most of the winter.
Tymestl means tempest or storm Tymhestlog means tempestuous, blustery or stormy
Storm is the most commonly used word for storm in Welsh. Then sometimes, but not very often, you may hear the word drycin = druck-inn. Though I would personally say that it’s a word mostly in use by the older generation and also in literature. But somewhere in the middle, you have these glorious words tymestl and tymhestlog, which are wonderful to say once you get your tongue round them and in my opinion, sound as dramatic as the weather they’re describing. What’s more, just like the word tempestuous in English, tymhestlog can be used to describe an impassioned and fiery relationship - perthynas dymhestlog, a volatile and often angry individual - person tymhestlog and an erratic and turbulent life - bywyd tymhestlog.
I keep hearing in Wales “but that word is restricted to older generations/literature” … is this anything to do with the decline of first language Welsh speakers (100,000 estimate out of 600,000 overall speakers (very rough estimate for now from Welsh language commissioner).
I say this because I hear it a lot. Young people not using words of the older generation is common everywhere I admit, but when I went to Caernarfon and the youth were speaking more welsh-english mix than some older types … mor slow for mor araf"…just got my braining ticking :). peace/heddwch merrily walks into minefield!
Just thinking out loud -
Another simplified statistic, well three added together actually:
Around 120,000 children in Welsh medium education. Nursery, primary and secondary schools.
Just something that I’m throwing into the generation mix subject.
I don’t think this includes children in bilingual schools.
I appreciate that this doesn’t tell the whole story. Could they all be counted as (defacto) first language speakers? How many of these children actually speak Welsh outside school?
It’s just that a part of me wants to think that 100,000 first language speakers might be slightly academic/pessimistic. However, as I say, that’s just me thinking.
I think you’ve got something there John - my grandchildren at Welsh primary school have all their lessons in Welsh & have to use Welsh on the school yard too. BUT at home they speak English between themselves & friends & don’t want to watch teledu Cymraeg - this may be because Mam & I don’t have enough laith for them. Having said that, they do help me out with learning, bless’em.
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