Re: CHAT: silly names
From: | D Tse <exponent@...> |
Date: | Saturday, March 17, 2001, 9:02 |
> >The official name consists of the first 20 letters."
>
> Namely: Llanfairpwllgwyngyll
>
> Yep - that's what it's normally called in Welsh, when it's not shortened
> simply to _Llanfair_. But as there are so very many places called
> _Llanfair_ ("Mary church"), one normally has to add a bit extra.
>
> Llan = church, parish, village (<-- Old Brit. _landa_ ultimately connected
> with Germanic _land_ & French _lande_)
> Mair = Mary. In a compound noun the second noun undergoes 'soft mutation'
> so: llanfair = "Marychurch", "Maryvillage".
>
> pwll = 'pool' or 'pit'. Here it means 'pool'
> gwyn = 'white', and is one of the few adjectives placed before the noun
> rather than after it. Such adjectives always cause the following noun to
> undergo soft mutation.
>
> =========================================
... etc
Can someone tell me if such agglutinations are meant to be common in Welsh?
Imperative
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