As today is St David’s Day (Dydd Gŵyl Dewi), I thought we could have a quiz with a Welsh theme. So, which of the following words is not a Welsh word?
- dympwy
- llywyffrychnebol
- llabwst
- ffwgwslwch
- bywyneiddrwydd
If you can provide a definition of any of them (without peeking in the dictionary), even better.
Dydd Gŵyl Dewi Hapus / Happy St David’s Day!
I fear that this is a trick question and that all the words are Welsh, since I checked Translate and they’ve all been translated into English words. Or I might be going mad.
It’s not a trick question – I definitely made up one of the words.
I’m going to take a stab and guess “ffwgwslwch”. But I’m not going to put any money on it!
Okay I’m going with ffwgwslwch too.
I’ll go with llabwst, although I’m afraid I have no idea of the meaning of any of them! Diligent research has shown that, with ‘multiple-choice’ answers, the correct one is usually the middle one – I’ll be fascinated to discover whether this holds true in this instance.
Well I’d no idea but I also checked with google translate and although all of them were translated, one was not translated into a valid English word – so I’ll go with that one: llabwst (translated as labwst with one l) !
I cheated somewhat by looking up the words but my Collins Gem dictionary had only one of them anyway so it’s anyone’s guess. I shouldn’t admit to having done that (so I won’t say which one I found)!
I know something about Welsh and it all seems like this language … but I prefer llabwst, I find it less Welsh.
I say this observing the word endings.
Just decided to check in Y Geiriadur Mawr which I have had for years but never use and I STILL can’t find which word is not Welsh. It might be “mawr” but not “mawr” enough. I will therefore be very interested in the answer to this week’s quiz!
The answer is llywyffrychnebol
The meanings of the other words are:
I found these words in Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru. None of them are in common use today.
So how come Google Translate gives visual as the English translation for llywyffrychnebol?
That is a mystery – I definitely made up that word. Visual in Welsh is gweledol.
I will now admit to having found llabwst but any of the rest I was not at all able to find in any dictionary!
You do realize that Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru is no more.
It was there yesterday, but seems to have disappeared today. I hope this is temporary, as it’s very useful.