Thanks that’s really interesting. My brain loves stuff like this with no apparent practical use. I find not worrying about it leaves me with a little voice yelling “but why!”. Nice to know I’m not alone.
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Some fascinating stuff, there, @RichardBuck - diolch! I’d wondered about the origin of ‘sydd’ and ‘sef’ - so thanks for clearing that up for me!
I’d definitely like to get into studying the history of the language - any books you’d recommend?
I don’t know of any, I’m afraid, other than the fairly scholarly A Grammar of Middle Welsh (D Simon Evans, Dublin Institute of Advanced Studies, 1976). I don’t know if you’re after something of that kind, or something a bit more popular/less forbidding – in English you’ve got plenty of choice from the likes of, say, David Crystal, who can do the respectable academic thing with quite a nice, light touch, but I have no idea if there’s anything comparable written in English about Welsh – I’d be a bit surprised if there is, TBH.
I find having a comparative view of a language suits my desire to make neat patterns, and also sometimes helps me practically to acquire/retain vocabulary when I’ve got more ‘hooks’ to hang it on, so to speak. So when I was finding Middle Welsh a bit of a random incomprehensible minefield I thought I’d look at some history of even earlier stages of the language – after all, I’d done some Latin and Greek, and read lots about Primitive Germanic, so how bad could it be? So I borrowed Lewis and Pedersen from an academic library. Bad mistake. As in, seriously, unless you already have good Old Irish (including Ogham) don’t even go there. (A smattering of Gaulish would help, too.) But it’s frustrating, because it does leave Celtic languages seemingly out on this weird limb of their own, when they’re ultimately, originally not that dissimilar to Latin and Germanic.
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Thanks @RichardBuck. A Grammar of Middle Welsh sounds right up my street. I did my degree in linguistics (albeit quite a long time ago now…) so I’m quite comfortable with that kind of thing. I do have a book called An Introduction to the Celtic Languages (by Paul Russell, I think), which is a good read but not massively detailed (necessarily, as it attempts to cover all the Celtic languages).
The other one you mention sounds intriguing but having seen the prices it’s going for, I might give that one a miss for the time being!
I get what you mean about knowing something of the history of the language, and how it relates to others, can help with vocab acquisition and understanding patterns. Then again, my history of language-learning is characterised by abject failure when it comes to speaking/communicating, so maybe it doesn’t help me that much ultimately! Still, I find it fascinating.
Thanks for the recommendations.
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You might find some of the old books available online in the Internet Archive collection interesting. Here is a link to the search results when I put in ‘Welsh Grammar’ as an example.
https://archive.org/details/texts?and[]=welsh+grammar&sin=
I would not normally suggest learners try looking at these as, being written so long ago, they are rather heavy going and the language has evolved considerably anyway, but since you two are obviously ‘into-this-sort-of-thing’, perhaps you’ll enjoy browsing! 
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Thank you, @siaronjames!
Oh my god, that’s possibly the best internet page I’ve ever seen!
Diolch yn fawr iawn iawn i ti! 
P
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yup, that site’s a little goldmine isn’t it!
It is! I’m looking at ‘An Introduction to Early Welsh’ by John Strachan et al and every page I’m going, “Ah, that’s why it’s like that!”
I fear I’m not going to get much work done today…
Thank you again!
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You’ve got me browsing that now – I was on a Welsh Grammar Comparative and Historical bender
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Yowza!! Funny how my simple original question has spawned all these wonderful extended discussions and resources.
Don’t know how many times I can say diolch yn fawr, ond… diolch yn fawr!! 
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You’ll find that happens quite a lot on this forum, that’s why we love people to ask - no question is too small! 
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I’d better stop saying “ac” efyd then - it just sounds so right. I’ll have my ears peeled on this one in the future.
I think it’s fascinating. I need to know these sorts of things. I’m not very good at the “just accept it” philosophy (sorry @aran!). Looking up why I’ve previously learnt “Ro’n i’n” and why Iestyn says “O’n i’n” is what brought me here, and your comment about “Something a lot of self-tuition/grammar books don’t seem to acknowledge” was helpful, as the Welsh I’ve learnt elsewhere does not seem to take into account colloquial usage, something that first became apparent when I was introduced to “ti’n siarad” for “you’re speaking” when I’d always known it as “Rwyt ti’n siarad”… not how people actually talk!
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talking to someone in their sixties from near Brynaman recently, who was very colloquial and heard lot’s of the Ro’n i, ryn ni, even a rwy’n fflin for I’m sorry, which might make the text-books whince (i.e. not ma’n fflin 'da fi) and even confuse a few Gogs, so these forms with the “R” in may be a very tiny bit different to dw’i, or just ti’n or whatever else, but very common and no less colloquial. I heard someone in the archives on Radio Cymru from the 70s, who’s probably now passed away, talking about the bombing of Swansea and tending to say rydw i. I think all of the possible variations are out there and many more besides and almost every speaker seems to be a little bit different.
I’ve gone full circle since starting learning and now don’t feel any of them are particularly learner/formal or colloquial.
Er gwaetha pawb a phopeth
Ryn ni yma o hyd
I suppose really it’s more that I’m finding out from SSIW that Welsh is a lot more free and easy than I’d been led to believe from other Welsh learning resources.
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and im learning the same. It was the best thing i could have done discovering SSIW and I think starting colloquial, whatever dialect or variation is much more useful than the other more traditional way around.
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A few weeks ago, I heard Mari Grug off the television say “sori 'da fi” 
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A good friend of mine mentioned that he likes speaking Welsh but unfortunately had been brought up to speak Cwmtawe Welsh. I said that’s great, Ill just copy you👌
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