Word of the day – šišlat

The word šišlat is Czech and is usually translated as to lisp. However it refers to a form of speech impediment that involves substituting s /s/ sounds with sh /ʃ/ sounds. For example, slimák (slug) is pronounced šlimák. This isn’t quite the same as a lisp in English, which usually involves replacing s /s/ sounds with th /θ/ sounds.

Can you think of a good English version of šišlat?

I’ve come up with “to shish”.

Yn ôl ym Mrighton

Cyrhaeddais i yn ôl i Brighton nos Sadwrn diwethaf ar ôl taith hir iawn ar y trên. Arhosais i ym Mhwllheli nos Wener ar ôl i mi orffen y cwrs yn Nant Gwrtheyrn. Darllenais i y nofel Blas y Cynfyd gan Islwyn Ffowc Elis bron i gyd ar y trên.

Dim ond saith dyn roedd ar y cwrs, a fi roedd yr un ifancaf. Roedd y llaill yn dod o Gymru, neu yn byw neu yn treulio eu gwyliau yno. Cyd-dynnon ni’n dda efo’n gilydd, a siaradon ni Cymraeg bron drwy’r amser. Roedd tua phum awr a hanner o ddosbarthiadau y dydd ac roedden nhw’n ddiddorol ac yn ddefnyddiol. Heblaw cryn dipyn o eiriau, ddysgais i ddim llawer o bethau newydd, ond roedd hi’n wych cael cyfle i ymarfer yr iaith.

Un o’r lleoedd harddaf a thawelaf dw i erioed wedi ymweld arno ydy Nant Gwrtheyrn. Roedd y bwyd sydd wedi darparu yng Nghaffi Meinir yn flasus ac yn doreithiog, ac roedd y tywydd yn braf trwy’r wythnos hefyd, heblaw tipyn bach o law ddydd iau.

Ar ais i mBrighton

D’fhill mé ar ais i mBrighton oíche Shathairn seo caite i ndiaidh turas an-fhada sa trén. D’fhág mé i bPwllheli oíche hAoine agus mé indiaidh an cúrsa i Nant Gwrtheyrn a chroichnaithe. Labhair mé an chuid is mó de úrscéal Breatnaise sa trén.

Níl ach seachtar fear bhí ar an cúrsa agus ba mise an daoine is óige. Ba ón Bhreatain Bheag na daoine eile, nó i bhur gconaí nó ag ceatheadh ár leathanta-saoire ansin. Reitigh muid go maith le cheile agus labhairt muid as Breatnaise beagnach an t-am ar fad.Bhí cúig uaire a chloig go leith ceachtana againn gach lá, agus bhí siad suimúil agus usaideach. Ach oiread cuid mhaith focalaí, ní d’fhoghlaim mé go leor rudaí nua, ach bhí sé go hiontach.

Is áit iontach álainn agus suaimhneach í Nant Gwrtheyrn. Bhí an bía a raibh ar fáil i gCaffi Meinir an bhlasta agus flúirseach, agus bhí sé go bréa an seachtaine ar fad, ach amháin giota beag baisteach ar Déardaoin.

Word of the day – gwyddbwyll

In Modern Welsh, gwyddbwyll means chess, (lit. “wood wisdom”), however it originally referred a different board game which is mentioned in the ancient Welsh tales of the Mabinogion.

According to this site, the original game was often played on a pegged board with a king and four princes (or defenders) against eight opponents (or raiders). The exact rules have been lost in the mists of time.

The Cornish equivalent of gwyddbwyll is goedhboell, while in Breton it’s gwezboell. The Irish word for this game is ficheall, or fidchell in Old Irish, which comes from the same root as the Welsh and means the same thing. There are more details of the Irish game of fidchell here.

The Welsh names of the chess pieces are:

Teyrn / Brenin = King
Brenhines = Queen
Castell (castle) = Rook
Esgob = Bishop
Marchog = Knight
Gwerinwr (peasant/pawn) = Pawn

My Language Notebook

My Language Notebook is a free program I heard about the other day that helps you to keep and organise notes on the languages you’re studying.

You can use the program to make notes of sentences and longer texts, add translations and notes, and also record audio. You can also upload your notes to the site to share with other learners, and download notes made by others.

This has potential to be a useful tool, and the author has plans to add more features, such as a spaced repetition system.

Return to Brighton

I arrived back in Brighton last night after an enjoyable week of studying and using Welsh in Nant Gwrtheyrn. There were only six others on the courses – all men – and I was the youngest. Most of the others were Welsh, or had Welsh connections, or at least make regular visits to Wales. Most of us were roughly at the same level, but there was one bloke from the Rhondda who spoke Welsh almost like a native speaker, and another who could read and write Welsh very well and had a huge vocabulary, but who couldn’t speak Welsh all that well.

A view of Nant Gwrtheyrn

We had about five hours of classes a day, which were interesting and useful. There were also a couple of organised evening activities, and an afternoon trip to Caer Gors, former home of one of Wales’ best known Welsh language authors, Kate Roberts (1891-1985), after which we had a look round Caernarfon. The rest of the time we spent chatting (mainly in Welsh), stuffing ourselves with the delicious food provided in the on-site restaurant, Caffi Meinir, and admiring the spectacular views.

Nant Gwrtheyrn is in a very isolated, beautiful and peaceful spot on the Llŷn Peninsula in North Wales. It’s surrounded on three sides by mountains with the sea on the fourth side. The nearest village, Llithfaen, is three miles away up a narrow, winding and very steep road. On a clear day you can sea Anglesea, and on a very clear day you can apparently see Ireland.

A view of Nant Gwrtheyrn

Apart from a bit of rain on Thursday, the weather was fine and fairly warm, and the sun made quite frequent appearances. I was expecting a lot more of the wet stuff to be falling from the sky, so was pleasantly surprised.

There are a few more of my photos of Nant Gwrtheyrn on Flickr.

Nant Gwrtheyrn

Tomorrow I’m off to Nant Gwrtheyrn, the Welsh Language and Heritage Centre in North Wales, where I’m going to learn some more Welsh. I’ll be there for a week and probably won’t have internet access, so won’t be able to answer your emails. I’m also going to turn off comments to prevent the usual flood of spam that inundates this blog.

In the meantime, here’s a recording of a poem in a mystery language. Can you work out which language it is? I’ll give you the answer when I return from Wales.

Polyglot Scrabble

Today I received an email from someone at Mattel, the owners of Scrabble, about their plans to celebrate the 60th Anniversary of Scrabble this year.

One idea they’re working on is to run a polyglot Scrabble game where you can play Scrabble in a number of languages at the same time. It’s likely to be staged in Spain and there will be a monetary prize for the winner.

They’d like to tap into a network of people who speak a number of languages who might represent their countries. Do you belong to or know of any Scrabble clubs or organisations that might be interested in this? Or might you be interested in it yourself?

If you can help, please contact Philip Nelkon at Mattel Games.

Foreign Language Expertise

On a website I came across today, there’s some useful and interesting advice about studying languages. The author of the site, Alexander Arguelles, is a professor of linguistics and has studied many many languages – you can find out which ones on the how to learn any language forum.

There’s also some discussion of polyglottery, which is described as “a quest to develop an encyclopedic mind and to philosophically understand the nature of your own consciousness through the passionate, in-depth, and respectful study of as many different languages as possible, focusing both upon their diachronic evolution of as actual entities and upon the intellectual heritage they have left in the form of great texts”.

Prof. Arguelles has plans to set up a foreign language academy where he will teach people how to teach themselves languages. His methods include shadowing, which involves listening to a foreign language and repeating what you hear in a loud, clear voice while walking outdoors as swiftly as possible and maintaining a perfectly upright posture. There are videos explaining this and other methods on the language study section of the site.

Word of the day – priodol

Today’s word, priodol, means appropriate, proper or suitable in Welsh. I came across it while reading a web page about self-employment and had to look it up as I wasn’t sure what it meant in the context. I knew that the root priod had something to do with marriage, but didn’t know it also meant proper.

Example of usage:

Mae rheolau a gyflwynwyd yn Neddf Cyllid 1994 yn golygu bod angen i chi gadw’r holl gofnodion priodol bellach.
The rules introduced in the 1994 Finance Act mean that you have to keep all the appropriate records now.

There are many more examples in the Llyfrgell Owen Phrasebank.

Related words include:

priod – married, husband, wife, spouse, proper
priodi – to marry
priodas – marriage
priodasol – marital, matrimonial, married, nuptial, conjugal, connubial
priodferch – bride
priodfab – groom
priodol – proper, appropriate, intrinsic, peculiar; respective, apposite
priodoli – to attribute, ascribe, impute
priodoldeb – propriety, appropriateness
priodoledd – attribute, property

Police signing

A number of police officers in Lancashire have been learning sign language (BSL) in order to communicate more effectively with deaf people, according to an article in the Lancashire Evening Telegraph.

The BSL-trained officers use their skills to help people who have been arrested and to gather statements from victims, witnesses and offenders. The Lancashire also has a Deaf Liaison Officer, who promotes training in sign language and deaf awareness, and also provides a emergency text messaging service for those unable to call the emergency services in the usual way due to deafness or speech impediments.

Some of the comments on the article rant about “political correctness gone mad” and the “waste tax payers [sic] money” – no surprise there. They also suggest that deaf people and the police could communicate with each other in writing. Other comments make the case the BSL; that writing is not a satisfactory substitute for speech in these situations, and that deaf people have as much right to receive public services as other tax payers.

A related news item on the BBC News site tells of two police officers in Manchester who are learning BSL as well.