I’ve got the short form of the irregular verbs, mynd, dod, cael and gwneud, and also roedd and bydda.
Anyone tell me what the short form of Baswn is. I believe Baswn i would be 'swn i, but can’t work out the rest…
Thanks for any replies.
Baswn (i) is the subjunctive of bod, as such it doesn’t really have a “short form” (or you could also say that it already is a short form). It is usually spoken as “'swn i”, but that doesn’t make “swn i” a short form.
Short form usually means that instead of using a construction with an auxiliary verb (such as bod or gwneud) you conjugate the verb itself:
Long form: Dw i’n mynd -> Short form Af i.
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‘swn i
‘set ti’
‘sai fo/hi, ‘sai x(enw), sai’r plant/teulu ee
‘sen ni
‘sech chi
‘sen nhw
That’s the pattern as far as I understand it. As Hendrick says, when spoken these are the abbreviations
“Dwi’n mynd” is the long form using the verb bod. “Af i” is the short form of the verb mynd.
It’s the present tense equivalent of long and short forms that you’ve come across with past tense e.g. roeddwn i’n mynd (long form with bod) / es i (short form of mynd).
Thanks Siaron. I understand Dwi’n mynd and Af i. I was just wondering how Dwi’n mynd got to Af i. It’s not as if there are some letters left out of Dw i’n mynd to get to Af i. Does that make sense?
Or do I just have to accept that’s how things are?
If you mean how ‘mynd’ gets to ‘af’, it’s just the way it is with mynd - there’s no ‘stem’ to this one!
Indeed, mynd is probably the most irregular of the irregular verbs - not a m/my/myn/mynd in sight!..
Present tense:
Â/Af i
Ei di
Aiff/Eith e/o/hi
Awn ni
Ewch chi
Ân nhw
Past tense:
Es i
Est ti
Aeth e/o/hi
Aethon ni
Aethoch chi
Aethon nhw
Hi Rob - just think of how you’d get, in English, from “go” to “went”. There are probably explanations for both “go/went” and “mynd/af”: but at the end of the day, as you said “That’s how things are”!
Good luck!
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Excellent point Baruch! 
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Thanks Baruch
Probably best just to accept it as is.
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The way I think of it is that the most commonly-used verbs tend, simply by their use, to get the most mangled over the centuries, just as any over-used tool will become worn and distorted and rough around the edges. So do and go, and get and come and be, because they make up a good proportion of our communication, get the most changed.
Disclaimer - I’m not a linguist, and this could be laughably naive! 
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I noticed yesterday by accident that “Mynd” is thought to come from “Allez”. I’m not sure if that’s anything to do with it.
Also, since “Af I” is being mentioned here, I hope it’s OK if I ask this question here, as it had a mixed response on FB 
Does anyone here use “A fi” for Ai/Af i? (“I will”, not “And me”).
My colleague uses it and i’m fairly sure that Swansea Singer, Sián Richards does as well, although I’m not 100% sure. I might ask her some time.
A fi and Af i can sound identical, so even if someone did say a fi to me meaning I will, I still hear af i.
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Because of that possible ambiguity, I occasionally hear the emphatic form A finnau if it is meant to be “Me too.”
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Well, to be picky (it’s what I do), the subjunctive-origin conditionals are the (broadly) southern byddwn i and (pe) bawn i, while the (broadly) northern baswn i actually is the (defunct) pluperfect, reassigned as a conditional. Crafty gogs, eh?!
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Thanks so much, Siaron and Hendrik. Just to say that Sian Richards herself sent me a really kind reply, (in Welsh) confirming that it was indeed “Af i adref”. how nice of her.
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I hope this isn’t hijacking the thread, but I’m working through Level 3 of the old course, and am tripped up by what sounds like ‘af i yw gweld hi’, while another phrase is ‘af i i weld e’, which is what I would expect. I’m assuming the change is due to gender, but can’t see why that might be so…
The change is in fact because of gender, but it’s not quite clear to see what’s going on, as in speech some things blend together. One important bit is that usually, when the object of a verb is a personal pronoun, then that pronoun is “echoed” before the verb with its corresponding possessive pronoun. For both male and female that is ei, the difference is that the female form triggers asprirate mutation, and the male form triggers soft mutation.
Now ei is pronounced exactly like a single i (not like “ey” or something), which would make it awkward in combination with the preposition or the personal pronoun i, so whenever you’d get an ei following an i, it get’s changed to i’w.
So I am going to see her is Af i i’w gweld hi.
and I am going to see him is Af i i’w weld e.
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Thank you!
A follow-on point:
As far as i remember, the Northern courses (old and new) always use a i and never af i. Is it common in Northern speech?
Thanks…