Question: Orthographic systems of celtic languages

At 4:32 pm +0200 27/9/99, taliesin the storyteller wrote:
>As asked before (Subject: Orthographies), does anyone have a link to, or
>can describe, the orthographies of various celtic languages? For
>instance: as far as I can understand how to pronounce Welsh, in
>"newydd", the <dd> marks the voiced (inter)dental fricative (eth) and
>the <ew> is a diphthong.
Correct - newydd is /'nEwID/ in south Wales.  In north Wales the second
vowel is a short high central vowel.

>Not that Welsh has a weird orthography as
>opposed to, say Irish :)
Welsh orthography is pretty well phonetic - there are a few exceptions.
The Irish & Scots Gaelic orthography is based on different principals; once
one has learnt how to interpret the way palatalization & non-palatalization
works and how to spot the difference between 'aspirated' and non-aspirated
consonanants, the thing becomes a lot more regualar - but you have to
understand the code first.

Breton has two orthographies, neither is related to other Celtic
orthographies; the older IIRC dates back to the 17th cent, the newer is
fairly recent (I think the 1960s) & is a better representation of the
modern language.

Cornish has at least 3 different orthographies, depending upon which
variety of revived Cornish one adheres to.  These are different from either
Welsh or Breton systems and have been influenced by English habits.

Manx also has its own orthography dating back again IIRC to the 17th cent.

I do not know a one link to all these orthographies; but there are links to
each one.  Beware, however, as in all web searches, some sites are more
reliable than others.

Time is in short supply at the moment - but if I get time later this week,
I'll try to elaborate on the above.

Ray.