Welsh lessons.

[linguoboy]

:sighs: With this thread returning to haunt me, I suppose I should write a second lesson. Watch this space.

Ah, y grym cywilyddio!

[Turtlehead]

Might as well give this a go given Dewrad put his time and effort into it. My Welsh vocbulary sucks I have to use a dictionary for 50% of what I write in Welsh anyways .

1) Beth ydy Llydaw? Mae Llydaw'n gwlad Geltaidd neu Lladaw yw gwlad Geltaidd.
2) Beth ydy Yann? Mae Yann yn Llydawiad neu Yann yw Llydawiad.
3) Beth ydy ei famiaith? Mae ei famiaith yn Llydaweg neu ei famiaith yw Llydaweg
4) Pryd (when) mae o'n siarad Llydaweg (note that here "mae" is used, not "ydy") Mae fe'n siarad Llydaweg gyda ei gyfeillion.
5) Beth mae Yann yn dysgu? Mae Yann yn dysgu Cymraeg.
6) Beth mae Yann yn ysgrifennu? Mae Yann yn ysgrifennu llythr.
7) Pwy ydy ei ohebydd? Mae Ioan yn ei ohebydd neu Ioan yw ei ohebydd.

Doesn't exist in Welsh. There isn't one. Forget about it, you never needed it anyway. I mean, look at the Russians.

LOL that made me laugh

Exercise 1

Translate the following into Welsh, making use of the vocabulary given below and that you've already learnt:

1) a happy friend - Cyfaill hapus
2) a stupid man - dyn twp
3) a tall Welshman - Cymro tal
4) a small Breton - Llydawiad bychan neu Lydawiad bach
5) an ugly boy - Mab hagr (Mae fe'n swnio fel My bugger )
6) a fat horse - Ceffyl tew

Exercise 2

Translate the following into Welsh, making use of the vocabulary given below and before. All the nouns are feminine. Now, what do you do with adjectives after feminine nouns?

1) a large part - rhan fawr
2) a loving mother - Mam gariadus
3) a pretty girl - Geneth deg (Mwy Cymraeg na phert)
4) a small pub - Tafarn fychan neu Dafarn fach
5) a fat cow - Buwch dew
6) a wooly sheep - Dafad wlanog (Wyt ti'n caru defaid?

[Ceresz]

From the first lesson, please correct:

Wales is a peninsula in the west of Britain. Wales is a celtic country. Ioan is a Welshman. He lives in Wales. He speaks English. He speaks Welsh too. What is Ioan's native language? English is Ioan's native language.How is Ioan learning welsh? Ioan is a member of the Welsh Language Society. He goes to a lesson to learn Welsh. Why is he learning Welsh? Because he is a Welshman!

1)Ydy o'n darllen?
2)Mae o'n cysgu.
3)Mae Ioan yn bwyta.
4)Ydy Rhodri'n chwrnu.
5)Mae Deiniol yn addysgu.
6)Mae Eleri'n gyrru.
7)Ydy Angharad gwrando?
Ydy Pharazon godro?
9)Mae Iorwerth yn malu cachu.

[linguoboy]

From the first lesson, please correct:


7)Ydy Angharad gwrando?
8)Ydy Pharazon godro?

As I told TzirTi, don't forget the linking yn. AFAIK, the only time it gets left out is a focused sentence with the predicate fronted, e.g.:

Gwrando mae Dewrad. "Dewrad is listening."
Teg mae linguoboy. "Linguoboy is cute."

(Beth ti'n deud amdani, Dewrad?)

[Lleu]

Text Questions:

1) Rhan y chweongl Ffrainc ydy hi.
2) Yann ydy Llydawiad.
3) Y Llydaweg ydy ei famiaith o.
4) Er hynny dydy o ddim yn siarad Llydaweg ac eithrio gan ei gyfeillion.
5) Mae Yann yn dysgu Cymraeg trwy llythr.
6) Mae o'n ysgrifennu llythr at Ioan yng Nghymru.
7) Ioan ydy ei ohebydd, ac ei gyfaill.

Exercise 1:

1) cyfaill hapus
2) dyn twp
3) Cymro tal
4) Llydawiad brychan
5) mab hagr
6) ceffyl tew

Exercise 2:

1) rhan fawr
2) mam gariadus
3) geneth deg
4) tafarn frychan
5) buwch dew
6) dafad wlanog

[Dewrad]

From the first lesson, please correct:


7)Ydy Angharad gwrando?
Ydy Pharazon godro?

As I told TzirTi, don't forget the linking yn. AFAIK, the only time it gets left out is a focused sentence with the predicate fronted, e.g.:

Gwrando mae Dewrad. "Dewrad is listening."
Teg mae linguoboy. "Linguoboy is cute."

(Beth ti'n deud amdani, Dewrad?)

I'd say teg ydy linguoboy, rather than using mae. Both are grammatical, however.

[linguoboy]

I'd say teg ydy linguoboy, rather than using mae. Both are grammatical, however.

Is that because teg is a predicate adjective? I assume with other fronted elements (e.g. yfory, yn yr ardd, dim byth, ac ati) you would use mae, yn byddet?

[Dewrad]

I'd say teg ydy linguoboy, rather than using mae. Both are grammatical, however.

Is that because teg is a predicate adjective? I assume with other fronted elements (e.g. yfory, yn yr ardd, dim byth, ac ati) you would use mae, yn byddet?

.

Exactly so- for example "yn yr ardd mae ('na) y ci"- the dog is in the garden but "aaw, ciwt ydy'r ci" aaw, the dog's cute.

[Turtlehead]

From the first lesson, please correct:

Wales is a peninsula in the west of Britain. Wales is a celtic country. Ioan is a Welshman. He lives in Wales. He speaks English. He speaks Welsh too. What is Ioan's native language? English is Ioan's native language.How is Ioan learning welsh? Ioan is a member of the Welsh Language Society. He goes to a lesson to learn Welsh. Why is he learning Welsh? Because he is a Welshman!

1)Ydy o'n darllen?
2)Mae o'n cysgu.
3)Mae Ioan yn bwyta.
4)Ydy Rhodri'n chwrnu.
5)Mae Deiniol yn addysgu.
6)Mae Eleri'n gyrru.
7)Ydy Angharad gwrando?
Ydy Pharazon godro?
9)Mae Iorwerth yn malu cachu.

1)Ydy o'n darllen? Correct
2)Mae o'n cysgu. Correct
3)Mae Ioan yn bwyta. Correct
4)Ydy Rhodri'n chwrnu. Correct if it had a ?
5)Mae Deiniol yn addysgu. Correct
6)Mae Eleri'n gyrru. Correct
7)Ydy Angharad gwrando? Incorrect - Ydy Angharad yn gwrando?
Ydy Pharazon godro? Incorrect - Ydy Pharazon yn godro?
9)Mae Iorwerth yn malu cachu. Correct

7/9 not bad :D

[Turtlehead]

I'd say teg ydy linguoboy, rather than using mae. Both are grammatical, however.

Is that because teg is a predicate adjective? I assume with other fronted elements (e.g. yfory, yn yr ardd, dim byth, ac ati) you would use mae, yn byddet?

.

Exactly so- for example "yn yr ardd mae ('na) y ci"- the dog is in the garden but "aaw, ciwt ydy'r ci" aaw, the dog's cute.

I knew nothing about those type of sentences .

Anyways Dewrad could you explain how to use achos? Do you use an emphatic clause after it?

Dw i'n hapus achos fi sy'n mynd i Brifysgol eleni.

Is the above sentence grammatically correct?

[Ceresz]

Just thought I would share:

dw i
rwyt ti
mae e / mae o
mae hi
dyn ni
dych chi
maen nhw

and... here's a dictionary

Dw i'n serchu Cymraeg!

~Skurai

[Twpsyn Pentref]

I'm not going to do the nifty lesson (sorry, Dewrad), but make an announcement: my since-October-abandoned study of Welsh is about to be revived! Because in my area there's going to be a conversational Welsh course, and I'm going to do it, and I'm ever so excited! So maybe one day I'll be joining the exalted ranks of you fluent Welshophones (well, it was bound to happen someday, but perhaps sooner now). Hurrah!

Anyway, keep up the good work. Move along; nothing to see here.

[Lleu]

Just thought I would share:

dw i
rwyt ti
mae e / mae o
mae hi
dyn ni
dych chi
maen nhw

and... here's a dictionary

Dw i'n serchu Cymraeg!

~Skurai

Diolch yn fawr, Skurai! Dw i'n serchu Cymraeg hefyd!

[Ceresz]

Just thought I would share:

dw i
rwyt ti
mae e / mae o
mae hi
dyn ni
dych chi
maen nhw

and... here's a dictionary

Dw i'n serchu Cymraeg!

~Skurai

Diolch yn fawr, Skurai! Dw i'n serchu Cymraeg hefyd!

No problem (how do you say that in welsh )

[Dewrad]

I'm not going to do the nifty lesson (sorry, Dewrad),

If your command of Welsh hasn't progressed beyond the material I'm presenting here, I would be most disappointed in you!

but make an announcement: my since-October-abandoned study of Welsh is about to be revived! Because in my area there's going to be a conversational Welsh course, and I'm going to do it, and I'm ever so excited! So maybe one day I'll be joining the exalted ranks of you fluent Welshophones (well, it was bound to happen someday, but perhaps sooner now. Hurrah!

Hurrah indeed! On which note, I've also taken up my long-abandoned study of Cornish again- primarily to complement my study of Breton. I've set myself the task of becoming competent in both and thus being able to speak all three Brythonic languages before the year is out!

[linguoboy]

Hope you don't mind some comments on your table, skurai. There's nothing wrong with the forms you listed, but this is one of the areas of greatest dialectal variation. Dewrad, Turtlehead, and I each use a slightly different set.

dw i (Also S. (r)w i.)
rwyt ti (Usually shortened to ti.)
mae e / mae o (S./N.)
mae hi
dyn ni (N. usually dan ni.)
dych chi (N. usually dach chi.)
maen nhw

I'm not trying to make things more complicated than they need to be, but I want everyone to be prepared for what they're going to see on the board. The forms of bod are probably the trickiest part of Welsh--and, of course, they're involved in almost every sentence you make.

[Turtlehead]

Bod is the only verb that conjugates in the present tense.

Here is the past.

Bues i
Buest ti
Buodd hi/e/o
Buoch chi
Buon ni
Buon nhw

For regular verbs it is.

-ais i
-aist ti
-odd hi/o/e
-och chi
-on ni
-och chi

[linguoboy]

Adjectives usually follow what they qualify though there are exceptions, even I don't know them all.

They fall into two types: (1) Those which always precede the noun and (2) those which precede or follow with a difference in meaning.

The first class consists mainly of quanitifiers:
(a) rhyw "some, certain" and all of its derivatives (e.g. amryw "several", cyfryw "such", unrhyw "any").
(b) holl "all", nemor "few", ychydig "few"
(c) aml "frequent", ambell "occasional", llawer "many". What these three have in common is that they can take i between them and the noun, e.g. llawer i blant "lots of children".
(d) cryn "considerable" (Practically confined to few set expressions like cryn dipyn "quite a little".)
(e) y naill "the one" (e.g. yn y naill iaith a'r llall "in the one language or the other" ~ "in either language").
(f) pob "each, every".
(g) pa "which, what" (e.g. pa fodd "how?", from modd "manner, means").
(h) gau "false", prif "chief".
(i) The plural adjectives uchelion "high" and dirgelion "secret".

These all cause soft mutation of the following noun with two exceptions: pob and llawer (when used without i, which is more usual). So fy holl gyfeillion "all my friends" but pob cyfaill "every friend".

Of the second class, only two are really commonly used before the noun: hen "old" and unig "only". After a noun, unig means "lonely". When used after a noun, hen always has the literal meaning of "ancient". Before a noun, it can mean this or it can simply serve to add familiarity, just as in English, e.g. Hen walch! "You old rascal!"

The others are:
cam "unjust" (before) vs. "crooked" (after)
gwir "genuine" (before) vs. "true" (after)
priod "proper" (before) vs. "married" (after)
union "exact" (before) vs. "straight" (after)

Finally, note that in poetry, all the rules go out the window and any adjective can follow or precede depending on the poet's purpose.

[Turtlehead]

Finally, note that in poetry, all the rules go out the window and any adjective can follow or precede depending on the poet's purpose.

Ni sy'n tr?o i'u newid nhw i Gymraeg nid eu gwneud nhw ei chasau hi .

[Ceresz]

Hope you don't mind some comments on your table, skurai. There's nothing wrong with the forms you listed, but this is one of the areas of greatest dialectal variation. Dewrad, Turtlehead, and I each use a slightly different set.

dw i (Also S. (r)w i.)
rwyt ti (Usually shortened to ti.)
mae e / mae o (S./N.)
mae hi
dyn ni (N. usually dan ni.)
dych chi (N. usually dach chi.)
maen nhw

I'm not trying to make things more complicated than they need to be, but I want everyone to be prepared for what they're going to see on the board. The forms of bod are probably the trickiest part of Welsh--and, of course, they're involved in almost every sentence you make.

Yeah, I have heard about that, what a bitch :S
Just a headsup, I wilol tend to use the southern version, since that's the one I learned first, and it's the one I like the most

[Dewrad]

Bod is the only verb that conjugates in the present tense.

No it isn't.

[linguoboy]

Finally, note that in poetry, all the rules go out the window and any adjective can follow or precede depending on the poet's purpose.

Ni sy'n tr?o i'u newid nhw i Gymraeg nid eu gwneud nhw ei chasau hi :D .

Took me a full five minutes to figure out what the hell you were trying to say here. Some pointers:

(1) This is Welsh, not English; tr?o is followed directly by the verb-noun without a preposition.
(2) i + eu contracts to i'w, not *i'u.
(3) newid is "convert" as in "change something into something else". In the sense of "turn to", a better choice would be troi at.
(4) You don't want nid here, you want na.
(5) Take that i you didn't need before and put it after gwneud, i.e. gwneud iddyn nhw "make them [do something]".
(6) Why is the focus on ni? It reads like "It is we who are trying...", as if someone had suggested it might be someone else. If you're going to emphasise something, it would make more sense to choose the contrasted element, i.e. troi nhw at Cymraeg dyn ni'n tr?o "Turning them to Welsh is what we're attempting".

(Mae flin 'da fi am herwgipio d'edau dy, Dewrad!)

[Turtlehead]

Bod is the only verb that conjugates in the present tense.

No it isn't.

What are the other ones? It was meant to be a kind of question because I was unsure myself.

troi nhw at Cymraeg dyn ni'n tr?o "Turning them to Welsh is what we're attempting".

My bad. I so need more Welsh language books especially an idiomatic/colloquial something .

[linguoboy]

My bad. I so need more Welsh language books especially an idiomatic/colloquial something :D .

Get Gareth King's Modern Welsh. It's published by Routledge, so it's easy to find; paperback, so it won't set you back too far; very readable, since he doesn't get more technical than he absolutely has to; and geared toward those learning to speak, so he spends far more time on spoken variation than on Literary Welsh. As he's the author of the Routledge Colloquial Welsh textbook, he's always writing with an English-speaking learner's problems in mind. (One whole chapter is dedicated to common errors made going from English to Welsh.)

Dewrad and I have said it before: Your biggest single problem is carrying around the default assumption that Welsh works like English. Unless you've been explicitly instructed otherwise, you assume that the syntax will be exactly the same. As you can see, it's not a safe assumption.

[Turtlehead]

Dewrad and I have said it before: Your biggest single problem is carrying around the default assumption that Welsh works like English. Unless you've been explicitly instructed otherwise, you assume that the syntax will be exactly the same. As you can see, it's not a safe assumption.

Celtic languages are meant to be the most grammatically different of the European languages that are in the indo-european family. Which celtic language would be the most difficult for an English speaker?