Category: Welsh (Cymraeg)

Polyglot Gathering 2016

By Simon

I’m currently at the Polyglot Gathering in Berlin. I arrived here on Wednesday evening and have been speaking and hearing lots of different languages. So far I’ve had conversations in English, French, Welsh, German, Irish and Mandarin, and spoken bits and pieces of Spanish, Italian, Russian, Czech, Portuguese, Toki Pona and Esperanto. I’ve also heard some Finnish, Punjabi, Korean, Japanese, Polish, Slovak, Sardinian, Dutch, Hebrew, Indonesian, Norwegian, Swedish and other languages that I didn’t recognise.

Yesterday I went to talks on Portuguese Creole languages, Greek, language learning and linguistics, how to achieve advanced language competence, and on connections between cartoons and language learning. This morning I’ve been to talks on teaching multiple languages simultaneously, and languages and dialects of Sardinia. All the talks I’ve been to so far have been in English, apart from the Sardinian one, which was in Italian.

I’ve met lots of people I know from previous polyglot events, and lots of new people too. I might try to explore a bit more of Berlin at some point as well.

Kernewek

By Simon

I started learning Cornish yesterday. Mainly because it’s the only Celtic language I haven’t studied yet, and I’m curious about it.

I’m using the course SaySomethingin Cornish, and am finding it very good. I like the way the course is put together – you learn a small number of words and structures in each lesson and learn how to put them together in various ways. You are promoted to practice a lot during the lessons, and to come up with new combinations of the words that you haven’t heard before.

Quite a few of the words are similar to Welsh, but the grammar is different – more like Breton or older forms of Welsh in fact, so to my ears it sounds like I imagine Middle Welsh sounded. A bit like Middle English might sound to speakers of modern English.

At the moment I’m listening to a podcast in Cornish on Radyo An Gernewegva. If I listen carefully I can get the gist of some bits, and can understand other odd words, but it will be a while before I can understand it all.

Multilingual Britain

By Simon

A few weeks ago I was interviewed by Kerstin Cable about the languages of the British Isles for the The Creative Language Learning Podcast, which she makes with Lindsey Dow of Lindsey Does Languages.

The podcast is now online as The Secret Languages of Great Britain.

In the podcast we talk about the indigenous languages used in the UK, such as English, Scots, Welsh, Scottish Gaelic, Manx, Cornish, British Sign Language, Romany and so on. We also mention some of the more recent arrivals, such as Polish, Punjabi and Urdu.

In other news, I’ve decided to go the North American Polyglot Symposium in Montreal in July. I booked my tickets and hotel today, and have started thinking about the talk I’m going to do there. I plan to expand what I discussed in the podcast.

Throats and trees

By Simon

One Scottish Gaelic expression I learnt last week was “Tha craobh air mo sgòrnan” or literally “There’s a tree on my throat”. This is the Gaelic equivalent of “There’s a frog in my throat”, which is used when you are rendered temporarily speechless due to a small amphibian taking up residence in your oesophagus, or when you have a sore throat. Fortunately I don’t have one now, but I did have one just before I went to Scotland.

In Irish you might say:

– tá sceach i mo scornach = there’s a hawthorn / thornbush in my throat
– tá piachán i mo sceadamán = there’s a pain in my throat
– tá ciach orm = there’s a hoarseness on me
– tá slócht orm = there’s a hoarseness, throatiness on me
– tá sceadamán / scornach nimhneach orm = I have a sore throat

Sources: foclóir.ie and Foclóir Gaeilge-Béarla Ó Donaill

In Manx you might say: ta cred orrym = there’s a grunt / cough / roughness / tickle on me [source].

The equivalent is Welsh is Dw i’n gryg/gryglyd/crygu [source] – gryg and gryglyd come from cryg, which means “hoarse, harsh, raucous”, and crygu means “to grow/make hoarse; to stammer” [source].

Are there equivalent idioms in other languages?

Sabhal Mòr Ostaig

By Simon

This week I am doing a course in Scottish Gaelic songs at Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, the Gaelic college on the Isle of Skye. While all the songs I’m learning are in Gaelic, the class it taught mainly in English, so I don’t get to speak much Gaelic in class. Outside class there are plenty of opportunities to speak Gaelic with college staff and other students, who are doing courses in language, fiddle or step dancing.

This is my fifth visit to the college, and each time my Gaelic gets a bit better. I rarely speak it at home, apart from to myself, but do listen to online Gaelic radio and occasionally read things in Gaelic. I tend to mix Irish and Scottish Gaelic a bit as I know a lot more Irish, and if I don’t know how to say something in Scottish Gaelic I try it in Irish. Sometimes it works.

On the way here and in the college I’ve heard and/or spoken quite a few different languages – plenty of English and Gaelic, and also Spanish, Italian, French, Irish, Welsh, Mandarin, Japanese, Russian and German. So this is a good place to practice a variety of languages.

Llongrats!

By Simon

In the comments on an article about Welsh literature I read today, I came across the word llongrats!, which appears to be a Welsh-English hybrid combining the Welsh word llongyfarchiadau and it’s English equivalent, congratulations.

While it’s common for bilingual people to switch languages, often in mid-sentence, this is the first example I’ve seen of a mid-word switch in Welsh/English.

Have you come across anything like this?

Actually, when I come to think about it some words in English do have bilingual roots, particularly those borrowed from Latin and Greek, such as television, from the Greek τῆλε ‎(têle – at a distance, far off/away/from) and from the Latin vīsiō ‎(vision, seeing), via Anglo-Norman and Old French.

Languages in Newcastle

By Simon

Last weekend I went to see a friend in Newcastle, and while we were exploring the place, I was listening out for languages other than English. The only ones I heard were Mandarin and Spanish, and my friend and I spoken mainly in English and Welsh, with a bit of Czech thrown in for variety.

While I was there we saw The Revenant, which includes dialogue in English, French and Arikara, a Caddoan language closely related to Pawnee, and spoken by a handful of people in North Dakota.

I’m sure other languages are spoken in Newcastle, as it’s a relatively large city with a number of universities and plenty of foreign students, but maybe we were in the wrong parts to hear much foreign talk.

I also heard plenty of Geordie, the local dialect, and didn’t get some of the things people said to me first time, so had to ask them to repeat themselves. It differs from standard English in various ways, and if you’re not used to it can sound almost like a different language.

Are there any regional accents / dialects in your country that you have trouble understanding?

Les mots de la semaine

By Simon
français English Cymraeg
le rouge à lèvres lipstick minlliw, lliwydd
le rouge, le rouge à joues rouge powdwr coch, rouge, gruddliw
la suie soot huddygl, parddu
être sur le cas to be on the case
dire qch sur un ton pince-sans-rire to say sth tongue in cheek dwueud rhwybeth â’ch tafod yn eich boch
dwueud rhwybeth â’ch tafod am eich dant
rappeler qch à qn to remind sb of sth atgoffa rhywun o rywbeth
dwyn rhywbeth i gof rhywun
l’Hôtel Matignon residence and offices of French Prime Minister
l’orchestre (m) stalls (in a theatre) seddau blaen
la fosse orchestra pit pwll cerddorfa
le balcon (dress) circle (in a theare) seddau’r cylch
cylch y boneddigion
y cylch cyntaf
la loge box (in a theatre) bocs, côr seddau
le lavabo, la cuvette de lavabo wash basin basn ymolchi
la prunelle sloe eirinen dagu
le gin à la prunelle sloe gin jin eirin
racler les fonds de tiroir to scrape the barrel crafu’r gasgen
le chevalier knight marchog
le cavalier knight (in chess) marchog
le plan d’urgence contingency plan cynllun at raid
cynllun wrth gefn

Flan cupboards

By Simon

A Welsh plygain song I’ve been learning recently with some friends (Carol y Swper) features the word fflangell in the line “Ein Meichiau a’n Meddyg dan fflangell Iddweig”.

We weren’t sure what it meant at first, and guessed that it was some kind of container for a flan or a flan cupboard. A fflan is a flan, and cell means cell or bower, and in compound words can mean a container or building. For example oergell (cold cell) is a fridge, rhewgell (frost/ice cell) is a freezer, and llyfrgell (book cell) is a library.

So we thought the line meant something like “Our arms and doctor under the Jewish flan cupboard.” Hilarity ensued. It actually means “Our Surety and Healer under the Jewish scourge.”

You can hear the whole song at:

We will be singing in a plygain service in Bangor cathedral starting at 7pm on Friday 15th January as Parti Min Menai.

Do you have any examples of mistranslated or misheard song lyrics?