X-Cc: Multiple recipients of list WELSH-L To: Multiple recipients of list WELSH-L In-Reply-To: <9407221124.AA14343@husc.harvard.edu> A few of the many other vocab. things that vary from North to south are North allan v. S mas "out" N agoriad v. S allwedd "key"; N iau v. S afa "lifer". N nain - taid v. S mamgu - tadcu "grandmother - grandfather". One could go on and on; N llwynog v. S cadno v. deep South canddo "fox". On could go on and on. The more pervasive differences are phonetic. This is what hits you in the face right away. NW has the renowned retracted u-sound. In SW the sound is indistinguishable from that of i, except for a few ancient speakers in the SE who have a sound something like the German u-umlaut in a few words, e.g. du "black". ae and oe and wy become a, o, and w in SW in a number of positions. In old Pembrokeshire they turn the diphthongs, oe and wy into we and consonant w+y, hence we^s "yes, there is". In the same dialect, you get the obscure y replaced by either an i or w sound depending on the word, e.g. mini(dd) "mountain" (oh yes, they tend to drop off final -dd in polysyllables too -- be' sy'n newy'?), as if for compensation y will occasionally get pronounced obscure where elsewhere clear in South Cardiganshire in words like mynd and byth. Then there is the business of the North-west and South-east having -a- in final syllables where the vast middle would have -e-, e.g. Ma'r y ffyla'n rhedag "the horses are running". One could go on and on. JTK