I just remembered I had opened this for the purpose, so let’s use it!
Challenge 6 South, min 23:02 Yes, I had a glass or two of wine and then I went home - Do, gwes i gwydred neu ddau o win, ac wedyn es i getre
Is it written correctly or missing something?
I can’t find “then” in the vocabulary list, I found this on a dictionary but then…
in Challenge 9, min 28:03, the famous… If you don’t make me a cup of coffee right now, then I will never love anyone ever again, I hear Os na wnei di disgled o goffi i fi yn syth, yna fydda’i byth yn caru neb byth eto
Is this correct? What’s the difference between wedyn and yna?
almost written correctly - gartref is the word for home here.
Wedyn is ‘then’ in the sense of ‘afterwards’, so in the first sentence, you could say “and afterwards I went home” and it would still make sense. However, ‘afterwards’ wouldn’t make sense instead of ‘yna’ in the second sentence, so that’s why it’s a ‘yna = then’ not a ‘wedyn = then’ in that one.
Officially, yes, but in the south we often write “gytre” as that’s how we say it
“felly” wouldn’t sound right there … I think because of the “os” at the beginning. “yna” seems to go better as a ‘pair’ with “os”, whereas “felly” sounds better if you’ve just made a statement before it, e.g. “dw i ddim yn hoffi coffi, felly dw i ddim yn moyn ei yfed e.”
In challenge 14 and its vocabulary list there is:
left = fy gadael (as in get left behind)
Later, in challenge 23 (min 13:40):
I don't mind if they left with each other = os gadewon nhw
And then (around min 25:45):
He would be angry whenever you left
In Welsh I hear something like: ta pryd ti’n gadael (Cat) ta pryd i ti’n gadael (Iestyn)
And finally in challenge 24 (min 28:24): Whoever left mud here ta pwy wnaeth adael mwd yma
They seem to have four different structures - the first with gadael and fy (not fi), then another one with ti (not dy). And I don’t know what’s “_won” and the last with a past tense and a mutation?!
I’m completely lost!
Edit (after other posts reminding me): oops, it was fy ngadael.
Yes! Thanks, now I’m one step forward towards understanding the whole thing.
Just sort of talking to myself now, to summarize this set of left:
the first has no exact translation, so I’ll just take it and remember as is.
the third is a regular present, where English uses past tense instead (like we were talking these days with a few other forumists in a thread about said/thought etc…)
the second and fourth are just two different forms of past tense. I just hadn’t met the third person plural yet so I’ll just have to get used to it.
While I think most of the wnaeth I’ve met were followed by letters that do not mutate (like h and e) so I hadn’t realized.
However I know I’ve heard/seen wnaeth parchu and wnaeth tynnu in lyrics.
Am I missing something, or could it just be that sometimes people don’t do mutations when they speak or sing?
…well…cael fy ngadael ar ôl…means ‘get/ have my leaving behind’ so it does have a translation (ie it is not one of those bizarre things you just have to remember).
Personally, I think of it like this all the time, as it works just as well for the other person forms but of course it’s one of those translations that needs ‘tidying up’ when expressing it in English - to a form of words you would actually use.
So ‘fy ngadael’ in the vocab list is the thing that is a little confusing as it means ‘my leaving’ - not just leaving - I think trying to list a translation for that phrase is tough!
Yes, you’re right, I think! Oh well, you’ve also reminded me I got it wrong in my post…awww…and I even normally get this mutation right, because there happened to be so many in the first songs I listened, and it sounded kinda slightly weird and complicated (ng,ngh,mh…!) so it kinda stuck.
However seeing the fy is what got me to expect dy when I’d meet a 2nd person/singular and got me confused when it was a ti instead - but in fact it was because it was a different kind of left (like Siaron explained).
As for this…
You mean that get/ have my leaving behind actually means something in English?
I was thinking about the English version whilst I was walking the dog…
There is a way of saying this in English which is a very close match - it is ‘old fashioned’ however - I think that is the best way to describe it(?) - its the sort of thing my parents would have said…
“I’m going to run across the grass so that I don’t get (or find) myself left behind!”
I’m not even sure whether what we say now isn’t an abbreviation of this…dropping the ‘person’…
…but I’m not a linguist…and I’m past the long grass and into the car park by now…so I’ll just get my coat.
Yes, there was a bit of a movement amongst English teachers, who tried to get us to use “my” instead of “me”. Stuff like “did you notice my leaving the classroom”. If the teacher wasn’t listening we’d just use “me” of course. I think that it has largely been discredited now, as part of an attempted Latinisation of English (I think in the early 20th century). Apart from the odd case when it might help, such as “my writing”, I vote to ignore it in English as we have enough trouble learning the finer points of Welsh grammar
Yes but it’s the tense that’s important. In English “She has such a kind heart it’s the least I could do” would still be talking about something you’ve done. So Welsh is a bit more consistent in this instance because “Mae gyda hi galon mor garedig dyna oedd y lleiaf allwn i’w 'neud” sticks to the past tense.
However, if you were to say “I’ll do the washing up. She has such a kind heart it’s the least I could do.” I guess that changes the tense so it’d be “Mi wna i’r llestri. Mae gyda hi galon mor garedig dyna’r lleiaf allwn i’w neud”. So I’m pretty sure you’d drop the “yw” because it’s in the “dyna”. I don’t think you’d ever say “dyna yw”…
