A little Welsh goes a long way.
Here on the Llyn Peninsula Welsh is spoken by over eighty percent of the population. All Welsh speakers are also fluent in English so generally everyone is happy to speak English when so addressed.
Going on holiday clearly does not require the learning of a whole new language. However it can be useful to learn a little of the native tongue. This is especially true of place names.
The towns and villages in Wales can sometimes be challenging to pronounce correctly. This is mostly due to trying to pronounce words as you would using English. But in Welsh several letters and letter combinations are pronounced differently to how they sound in English. Understanding this makes a word or place name that seems unpronounceable at first, quite straight forward.
So here is a little primer to help you along. There are of course masses of online resources available should you wish to delve a little deeper into the language.
LL - The Welsh language does not use the double L in the same way as in English. The sound ‘L’ is always spelt with a single ‘L’ Whenever ‘LL’ is used in Welsh it has a special sound that is not found anywhere in the English language. The simplest option is to pronounce it ‘TH with a soft L at the end’ THL….. While this is not the correct way to pronounce the LL it is close and Welsh speakers will probably be happy you at least gave it a go. To hear ‘LL’ pronounced correctly check this YouTube link.
DD - The DD in Welsh is a soft ‘TH’ as in ‘this’ and ‘theatre’. ‘TH’ when used in Welsh is a harder ‘TH’ sound as in ‘forth’ and ‘mouth’. So when you see Heddlu printed on the side of a police car it is actually pronounced ‘heth-lu’.
FF - This is simply ‘F’ in Welsh and is pronounced just like an English ‘F’.
F - The single ‘F’ is pronounced like a ‘V’ in English. When you see the word ‘araf’ painted on the road, which means ‘slow’ in English it should be pronounced ‘arav’.
C - C is always pronounced ‘K’ never ‘S’.
CH - Is pronounced as the ‘CH’ in the Scottish word ‘loch’ never as in the English word ‘chocolate’.
SI - is the Welsh pronunciation for ‘SH’. So ‘siop’ (shop) is pronounced ‘shop’.
W - If this letter appears where you would expect a vowel then it is to be used as an equivalent for ‘oo’ as in the English word ‘book’ Otherwise it sounds like a regular ‘W’ as is ‘win’
Y - This is a tricky letter as it normally is used as an English ‘I’ as in ‘stick’ However if it comes as the first syllable in a word it changes and sounds like ‘U’ as in ‘cup’.
So here are some local place names.
Our local church is St. Cybi’s - Saint Cubby’s
Our Village is Llangybi - Thlan gubby - Church of St Cybi
The local town is Pwllheli - Poothelly
We are on the Llyn Peninsula - Thlin Peninsular
The next town over is Llanystumdwy - Thlan i stum do ee
There are other differences between the pronunciation in Welsh and English but this should at least help with place name pronunciation.
If you want to take things a little further then we hope this little primer helps.
Let’s start with Wales, itself…
“Cymru” – Wales, our wonderful country. Pronunciation: ‘kumm-ree’.
“Cymraeg” – Welsh, the language. Pronunciation: ‘kumm-ry-g’.
Greetings
“Bore da” – Good morning (pronunciation: ‘bore-ray-dah’)
“Prynhawn da” – Good afternoon (pronunciation: ‘prin-how’n-dah’)
“Nos da” – Good night (pronunciation: ‘Nohs-dah’)
“Helô / Hylô” – Hello (pronunciation: ‘hell-oh / hill-oh’)
“Sut mae?” – How are you? (pronunciation: ‘sit-mi’)
“Da iawn diolch” – Very well, thank you (pronunciation: ‘Da-yow-un-dee-olch’)
Other politnesses and responses
“Os gwelwch yn dda” - Please (pronunciation: ‘Os-gwell-och-un-thar’)
“Diolch ” – Thanks (pronunciation: ‘Dee-olch’)
“Diolch yn fawr” - Thank you very much (pronunciation: Dee-olch-un-vow-er)
“Croeso” – Welcome (pronunciation: ‘Croy-so’)
“Hwyl“ – Bye (pronunciation: ‘Hoy-ul’)
“Ydw“ – Yes (pronunciation: ‘Uh-do’)
“Na“ – No (pronunciation: ‘Nah’)
