Re: New Brithenig words, part Deux.

 Padraic Brown <pbrown@...> wrote :

> Remember that Brithenig _isn't_ styled after Welsh. Welsh doesn't
> exist *there* at all. The sound changes that happened *here* in
> Welsh are assumed to be operant *there* on Brithenig. [At least,
> as far as I understand "styled after"!]
Brithenig seems a bit of an odd creature now I look at it more closely. It
has some very un-Welsh features, like the change of /k, g/ to /tS, dZ/
before front vowels. There's a slight palatalisation of /k, g/ in N. Wales
but you have to go to Pays de Vannes (Bro Gwenned) before you find
affricates developing; and it lacks some common Brittonic developments
such as /a:/ >> /O:/ and /i:/ >> /i/ but /i/ >> /I/ (i.e quality becoming
the distinctive feature rather than length). On the other hand it has
some features only found in Welsh (not in Cornish or Breton) like the
unvoicing of non-lenited /l/ and /r/; the spelling of [D] as <dd> and
[v] as <f> (a relatively recent Welsh development); gwers << versus with
the meaning "lesson"; gwallt "head of hair" with an /a/ which is a Welsh
irregularity, C, B and Irish all having /o/; "bring" and "take" translated
as gweair cum and gweddir cum exactly paralleling Welsh do^d a^ and mynd a^.
Brithenig seems not to have the Welsh change of -nt- >> -nh- or -nn- but
you have plant - children, plenhin - child, whereas W. has plant - plentyn,
so here you're more W. than the Welsh. Here BTW you've used -in to make
a singular from a collective. Also with glaserfin "blade of grass",
I assume glaserf is a collective "grass" << glasto-herba lit. "green grass"
(as opposed to hay) paralleling W. glas-wellt

All in all, Latin loans in Welsh look pretty much like the equivalent words
in Brithenig, and British loans in Brithenig come through looking like the
equivalent Welsh words, thus :
gwidr/gwydr; gwin/gwin; gwirdd/gwyrdd; Llyn/Llun; gefell/gefell;
glas/glas; gnad/gnawd; grei/gre; gwag/gwag; gwan/gwan; gweil/gwyl /gu:Il/;
Gwener/Gwener ...

That's what I meant by "styled on Welsh".

BTW how did you come up with _gworuin_ (common people etc.) where WCB have
gwerin from something like /wari:na:/

Possibly Brithenig has two phonemes /i/ and /I/ both written <i>?

Keith

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