You have had this confirmed! Thank you, I’ve learnt something new here!
Might be of interest to you as a place to start-
plenty of languages have mutations occurring both within words and at word boundaries, to some degree or other. In fact, you would probably be hard pressed to find a language which didn’t!
“Im Birmingham”, “doncha know”, “didja really?” etc.
Might also be of interest in the same way-
It’s a matter of frequency and how they are regarded. In Welsh, as you know,some of them have become fossilized, remaining after the endings changed, and taken on a life of their own, so many are not purely down to ease of pronunciation. That’s the real difference, I would say.
English (they just don’t bother to write it down)…
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English. Although not as often as in Welsh, and usually within the word rather than at the beginning.
Roof, rooves. Hoof, hooves
House, houses.
I now can’t think of a single other example, but I’m sure they are out there.
I’ve also heard it said, by those that know more than I do, that the use of mutation in Welsh is much older than the writing of the mutation. I think we need poetry to tell us how things sounded rather than just how things were written.
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Often at the beginning and ends of words in English too!
“Im Birmingham” instead of “In Birmingham”, “Did joo really” instead of “Did you really” etc.
Things like “cadz” as the plural of “cad”, whereas “cats” as the plural of cat could be regarded as one in a way, too.
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Yup, you are right there.
I can feel a whole nother discussion thread emerging regarding the definition of “word” in terms of morphology, lexicology, written vs. spoken, and so on… another time perhaps
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I can’t see this, to be honest. Such changes - at the beginning and end of words - exist in many languages. I don’t think Welsh treats such phrases as a single word phonetically differently to other languages. The difference is more that the changes have been fossilized, as it were, and taken on a life of their own!
Aye, no problem with saying they occur anywhere within a string of sounds, but beginning and ends of words were brought up, and works for me!
True though.
I know. Hence my mention of comparing it to other languages. What are you referring to?
Not sure he did.
But what are you referring to? My use of the word “word” in an answer in response to someone else using it?
I know. What are you referring to? You do realise I used the word “word” as an answer to somebody else’s post do you?
edit - I used the word as I’m not going to try and make somebody else look small by needlessly and pointlessly arguing with their use of language in a simple answer to a simple point.
I did only use the word “word” as a response to someone else’s post (saying mutations tended not to occur at the start of words in English) - I wasn’t going to start arguing the minutiae of such things, rather just giving a hopefully useful response to a post.
Fully understand - and it made me think of how I myself don’t normally think much about the vague nature of words - without wanting to start a whole discussion about it 
On second thoughts… Michael Tomasello…
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Oh, long pointless discussions about such things between consenting adults can be interesting to weirdos such as us, as you well know!
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@margaretnock and @aran I thought I may get this answer. I suppose I didn’t count English because it’s less formalised (the -fe to -ves aside). As @owainlurch says we semantically shift sounds but we’d never write them (unless we’re Benjamin Zephaniah but that’s poetic).
Diolch, bawb! Dach chi 'di bod yn ddiddorol unwaith eto!
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A while back I realised I mutate when it feels right. Oh dear, that makes me sound like a bacterium - i’m sure you know what I mean. This often means I soften or aspirate when there is no reason.
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