Survival of the Welsh Language Essay

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Introduction 32. Part I 33. Part II 54. Part III 75.

Part IV 86. Part V 97. Part VI 108. Part VII 129. Part VIII 1410. Part IX 1511. Cambrian linguistic communication guide 1812. List of used beginnings 21IntroductionIt is the 8th admiration of Wales that is the most fantastic of them all, the endurance of the Welsh linguistic communication in the face of about impossible odds.

Sometime in the 7th century, a Welsh Bishop heard an Englishman ‘s voice on the bank of the River Severn and was filled with premonition at the sound.. He recorded his unsettling experience therefore: “ For the kinsman of yonder strange-tongued adult male whose voice I heard across the river. . . will obtain ownership of this topographic point, and it will be theirs, and they will keep it in ownership. ”The bishop was incorrect.

More than 12 centuries have passed since the unusual lingua of the Saxon was heard on the boundary lines of Wales, centuries during which the antediluvian lingua of the Bishop and his fellow Britons had every chance to go nonextant and yet which has pig-headedly refused to decease. The endurance of the native linguistic communication is genuinely one of the great admirations of Wales, to be appreciated and marvelled at far more than any physical characteristic or semisynthetic object, and far more than the alleged seven admirations of Wales.It is a something of a daze when visitants travel from England west into Wales, for, about without warning, he may happen himself in countries where non merely the idioms become inexplicable, but where even the linguistic communication itself has changed. The wayside marks “ Croeso I Gymru ” ( accompanied by the ruddy firedrake, the ancient badge of Wales ) let it be known that one is now come ining a new district, inhabited by a different people, for the interlingual rendition is “ Welcome to Wales ” written in one of the oldest surviving slangs in Europe. For amusement with the linguistic communication, after acquiring used to names such as Pontcysyllte, Pen y Mynydd, or Glynceiriog, one can take a small roundabout way off the chief path through Anglesey to Ireland and see the small town with its much-photographed mark denoting the now-closed railroad station:LlanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwrndrobwyllllantisiliogogogochTo account for the disconnected lingual alteration from English into Welsh, one must travel far, far back into history.Part IIt was about 1000 BC that the Celtic linguistic communications arrived in Britain, likely introduced by little groups of migrators who became culturally dominant in their new fatherlands, and whose civilization formed portion of a great incorporate Celtic “ imperium ” embracing many different peoples all over Northern Europe. The Greeks called these people, with their organized civilization and developed societal construction Keltoi, the Romans called them Celtai.

In malice of the fact that they were possibly the most powerful people in much of Europe in 300 BC, with lands stretching from Anatolia in the East to Ireland in the West, the Celts were unable to forestall inter tribal warfare ; their entire deficiency of political integrity, despite their ferocity in conflict, finally led to their licking and subjection by the much-better disciplined ground forcess of Rome. The Gaelic linguistic communications on Continental Europe finally gave manner to those stemming from Latin.The Celts had been in Britain a long clip before the first Roman invasion of the British Isles under Julius Caesar in 55 BC which did non take to any important business. The Roman commanding officer, and subsequently Emperor, had some interesting, if biased remarks refering the native dwellers.

“ All the Britons, ” he wrote, & # 8220 ; paint themselves with woad, which gives their tegument a blue colour and makes them look really awful in conflict ” ( De Bello Gallico ) . It was non until a hundred old ages subsequently, following an expedition ordered by the Emperor Claudius, that a lasting Roman colony of the grain-rich eastern districts of Britain begun in earnest.From their bases in what is now Kent, the Roman armies began a long, backbreaking and parlous series of conflicts with the native Celtic folk, foremost winning, following vanquished, but as on the Continent, superior military subject and leading, along with a carefully organized system of garrisons connected by consecutive roads, led to the victory of Roman weaponries. In the western peninsular, in what is now Wales, the Romans were awestruck by their first sight of the Druids ( the spiritual leaders and instructors of the British ) . The historian Tacitus described them as being “ ranged in order, with their custodies uplifted, raising the Gods and pouring Forth atrocious maledictions ” ( Annales )The panic was merely ephemeral ; Roman weaponries easy defeated the native tribesmen, and it was non long before a great figure of big, comfortable Villas were established all over Britain, but particularly in the Southeast and Southwest. Despite lickings in pitched conflicts, the people of cragged Wales and Scotland were non as easy settled ; their scattered colonies remained “ the frontier ” — lands where military forts were strategically placed to guard the Northern and Western appendages of the Empire. The ferocious opposition of the folks in Cambria meant that two out of the three Roman hosts in Britain were stationed on the Welsh boundary lines.

Two impressive Roman munitions remain to be seen in Wales: Isca Silurium ( Caerleon ) with its all right amphitheater, in Monmouthshire ; and Segontium, ( Caernarfon ) , in Gwynedd.In Britain, at least for a few hundred old ages after the Roman triumphs on mainland Europe, the Celts held on to much of their imposts and particularly to their typical linguistic communication, which has miraculously survived until today asCambrian. The linguistic communication of most of Britain was derived from a subdivision of Celtic known as Brittanic: it subsequently gave rise to Welsh, Cornish and Breton ( these differ from the Celtic linguistic communications derived from Goidelic ; viz. , Irish, Scots, and Manx Gaelic ) . Attach toing these linguistic communications were the Gaelic faiths, peculiarly that of the Druids, the defenders of traditions and acquisition.Though the Celtic lingua survived as the medium of mundane address, Latin being used chiefly administrative intents, many loan words entered the native vocabulary, and these are still found in contemporary Welsh, though many of these have entered at assorted times since the terminal of the Roman business. Today ‘s visitants to Wales who know some Latin are surprised to happen 100s of topographic point names incorporating Pont ( span ) , while ffenest ( window ) , pysgod ( fish ) , milltir ( stat mi ) , melys ( sweet or honey ) cyllell ( knife ) , ceffyl ( Equus caballus ) , perygl ( danger ) , eglwys ( church ) , pared ( wall or divider ) , tarw ( bull ) and many others attest to Roman or Latin influence.

When the metropolis of Rome fell to the occupying Goths under Alaric, Roman Britain, which had experienced 100s of old ages of comparative peace and prosperity, was left to its ain defense mechanisms under its local Romano-British leaders, one of whom may hold been a tribal captain named Arthur. It rapidly crumbled under the onslaught of Germanic folks ( normally jointly referred to as Anglo-saxons ) themselves under onslaught from folk to the E and want to settle in the sparsely populated, but agriculturally rich lands across the narrow channel that separated them.More than two hundred old ages of contending between the native Celts, every bit brave as of all time but relatively disorganised, and the ever-increasing Numberss of Germanic tribesmen finally resulted in Britain screening itself out into three distinguishable countries: the Britonic West, the Teutonic East, and the Gaelic North. It was these countries that subsequently came to be identified as Wales, England, and Scotland, all with their very separate cultural and lingual features ( Ireland, of class, remained Gaelic: many of its peoples migrated to Scotland, taking their linguistic communication with them to replace the native Pictish ) .From the momentous twelvemonth 616, the day of the month of their licking at the custodies of the Saxons in the Battle of Chester, the Welsh people in Wales were on their ain.

Separated from their fellow Kelts in Cornwall and Cumbria, those who lived in the western peninsular bit by bit began to believe of themselves as a distinguishable state in malice of the many different challenger lands that developed within their boundary lines such as Morgannwg, Powys, Brycheinion, Dyfed and Gwynedd. It is besides from this period that we can talk of the Welsh linguistic communication, as distinguishable from the older Brythonic.In a verse form dated 633, the word Cymry appears, mentioning to the state ; and it was non excessively long before the Britishers came to be known as the Cymry, by which term they are known today. At this point, we should indicate out that the word Welsh ( from Wealas ) is a ulterior word used by the Saxon encroachers of the British Isles possibly to denote people they considered “ foreign ” or at least to denote people who had been Romanized. It originally had signified a Germanic neighbour, but finally came to be used for those people who spoke a different linguistic communication.The Welsh people themselves still prefer to name themselves Cymry, their state Cymru, and their linguistic communication Cymraeg. It is besides from this clip that the Celtic word Llan appears, meaning a church colony and normally followed by the name of a saint, as in Llandewi ( St.

David ) or Llangurig ( St. Curig ) , but sometimes by the name of a adherent of Christ, such as Llanbedr ( St. Peter ) or even a holy personage such as Llanfair ( St. Mary ) .

Part IIIt is in Wales, possibly, that today ‘s cultural separation of the British Isles remains strongest, surely linguistically, and for that, we must look to the mid eighth Century, when a long ditch was constructed, flanking a high earthen bulwark that divided the Celts of the West from the Saxons to the East and which, even today, marks the boundary between those who consider themselves Welsh from those who consider themselves English. The boundary, known as “ Offa ‘s Dyke, ” in memory of its builder Offa, the male monarch of Mercia ( the center land ) runs from the nor’-east of Wales to the sou’-east seashore, a distance of 149 stat mis.English-speaking peoples began to traverse Offa ‘s Dyke in significant Numberss when colonies were created by Edward 1st in his aspiration to unify the whole of the island of Britain under his kingship. After a period of military conquering, the English male monarch forced Welsh prince Llywelyn ap Gruffudd to give up most of his lands, maintaining merely Gwynedd west of the River Conwy.Edward so followed up his successes by constructing English fastnesss around the margin of what remained of Llewelyn ‘s ownerships, and strong, easy defended palaces were erected at Flint, Rhuddlan, Aberystwyth, and Builth. , garrisoned by big withdrawals of English immigrants and soldiers. Some of these towns have remained pig-headedly English of all time since. Urban colony, in any instance, was wholly foreign to the Celtic manner of life.

In 1294, the Statute of Rhuddlan confirmed Edward ‘s programs sing the government of Wales. The legislative act created the counties of Anglesey, Caernarfon, and Merioneth, to be governed by the Justice of North Wales ; Flint, to be placed under the Justice of Chester ; and the counties of Carmarthen and Cardigan were left under the Justice of South Wales.In the twelvemonth 1300, the state of affairs seemed for good established, when “ King Edward of England made Lord Edward his boy [ born at Caernarfon Castle ] , Prince of Wales and Count of Chester, ” and of all time since that day of the month these rubrics have been automatically conferred upon the first-born boy of the English sovereign. The Cambrian people were non consulted in the affair, although an evidently colored entry in Historia Anglicana for the twelvemonth 1300 reads:In this twelvemonth King Edward of England made Lord Edward, his boy and inheritor, Prince of Wales and Count of Chester.

When the Welsh heard this, they were overjoyed, believing him their lawful maestro, for he was born in their lands.Following his successes in Wales, signified by the Statute of Rhuddlan, sometimes referred to as The Statute of Wales, Edward embarked on yet another monolithic castle-building plan, making such world-heritage sites of today as Caernarfon, Conwy, Harlech, and Beaumaris in add-on to the earlier non so-well known ( or well-visited ) constructions at Flint and Rhuddlan. Below their immense, prohibiting palace walls, extra English boroughs were created, and English bargainers were invited to settle, frequently to the exclusion of the native Welsh, who must hold looked on in awe and desperation from their alone hills at the site of so much edifice activity. Their ascendants must hold felt the same sense of discouragement as they watched the Roman encroachers build their to a great extent defended garrisons in strategic points on their lands.The Welsh were forbidden to populate such “ boroughs ” or to transport weaponries within their boundaries ( even today, there are Torahs staying on the legislative act books of Chester, a boundary line town, that proscribe the activities of the Welsh within the metropolis walls ) .

With the aid of the designer Master James of St. George, and with what must hold seemed like illimitable resources in work force and stuffs, Edward showed his finding to put a chokehold on the Welsh. Occasional rebellions were easy crushed ; it was non until the decease of Edward III and the reaching of Owain Glyndwr ( Shakespeare ‘s Owen Glendower ) , that the people of Wales felt confident plenty to dispute their English masters.Owain Glyndwr was Lord of Glyndyfrdwy ( the Valley of the Dee ) .

He seized his chance in 1400 after being crowned Prince of Wales by a little group of protagonists and withstanding Henry IV ‘s many efforts to free him. The ancient words of Geraldus Cambrensis could hold served to animate his followings:The English battle for power ; the Welsh for autonomy ; the one to secure addition, the other to avoid loss. The English pensionaries for money ; the Welsh nationalists for their stateThe comet that appeared in 1402 was seen by the Welsh as a mark of their extroverted rescue from bondage every bit good as one that proclaimed the visual aspect of Owain. His magnetic personality electrified and galvanized the people of Wales, beef uping their ground forcess and animating their assurance.

Even the conditions was favourable.The Welsh leader ‘s early successes released the long-suppressed feelings of 1000s of Welshmans who thirstily flocked to his support from all parts of England and the Continent. Before long, it seemed as if the long-awaited dream of independency was fast going a world: three royal expeditions against Glyndwr failed: he held Harlech and Aberystwyth, had extended his influence every bit far as Glamorgan and Gwent, was having support from Ireland and Scotland ; and had formed an confederation with France. Following his acknowledgment by the taking Welsh bishops, he summoned a parliament at Machynlleth, in mid-Wales, where he was crowned as Prince of Wales.

It did n’t look excessively ambitious for Owain to believe that with suited Alliess, he could assist convey about the deposition of the English male monarch ; therefore he entered into a three-party confederation with the Earl of Northumberland and Henry Mortimer ( who married Owain ‘s girl Caitrin ) to split up England and Wales between them. After all, Henry IV ‘s Crown was seen by many Englishmans as holding been falsely obtained, and they welcomed armed rebellion against their swayer. Hoping that The Welsh Church be made wholly independent from Canterbury, and that assignments to benefices in Wales be given merely to those who could talk Welsh, Glyndwr was ready to implement his wish to put up two universities in Wales to develop native civil retainers and reverends.Then the dream died.Part IIIOwain ‘s parliament was the really last to run into on Welsh dirt ; the last juncture that the Welsh people had the power of moving independently of English regulation. From such a promising beginning to a national rebellion came a dissatisfactory decision, even more disconcerting because of the velocity at which Welsh hopes crumbled with the failure of the Tripartite Indenture. Henry Percy ( Hotspur ) was killed at the Battle of Shrewsbury, and the increasing daring and military accomplishments of Henry ‘s boy, the English prince of Wales and subsequently Henry V, began to turn the tide against Glyndwr.

Like so many of his predecessors, Glyndwr was betrayed at place. It is non excessively soothing for Welsh people of today to read that one of the staunchest Alliess of the English male monarch and enemy of Glyndwr was a adult male of Brecon, Dafydd Gam ( subsequently killed at Agincourt, contending for the English ) .A 6th expedition into Wales undertaken by Prince Henry retook much of the land captured by Owain, including many strategic palaces. The boroughs with their big populations of “ colonists, ” had remained exhaustively English in any instance, and by the terminal of 1409, the Welsh rebellion had dwindled down to a series of guerrilla foraies led by the cryptic figure of Owain, whose married woman and two girls had been captured at Harlech and taken to London as captives. Owain himself went into the mountains, going an criminal.

He may hold suffered an early decease. for nil is known of him either by the Welsh or the English. He merely vanished from sight. Harmonizing to an anon. author in 1415, ” Very many say that he [ Owain Glyndwr ] died ; the visionaries say that he did non ” ( Annals of Owain Glyndwr ) . There has been much guess as to his destiny and much guesswork as to where he ended his concluding yearss and was laid to rest.There is an look coined in the 19th century that describes a Welshman who pretends to hold forgotten his Welsh or who affects the loss of his national individuality in order to win in English society or who wishes to be thought good of among his friends.

Such a adult male is known as Dic Sion Dafydd, ( a term used in a satirical nineteenth century verse form ) . The term was unknown In 15th century Wales, but, owing to the rough penal statute law imposed upon them, following the stillborn rebellion, it became necessary for many Welshmans to petition Parliament to be “ made English ” so that they could bask privileges restricted to Englishmen. These included the right to purchase and keep land harmonizing to English jurisprudence.Such requests may hold been unsavory to the loyal Welsh, but for the ambitious and socially nomadic aristocracy quickly emerging in Wales and on the Marches, they were a necessary measure for any opportunity of promotion. In the military.

At the same clip, Welsh soldier of fortunes, no longer contending under Glyndwr for an independent Wales, were extremely sought after by the new male monarch Henry V for his runs in France. The accomplishments of the Welsh bowmans in such conflicts as Crecy and Agincourt is legendary.Such illustrations of commitment to their commanding officer, the English crowned head, went a long manner in chase awaying any latent ideas of independency and helped paved the manner for the overpowering Welsh commitment to the House of tudors ( themselves of Welsh descent ) and to general acquiescence to the Acts of Union. The twelvemonth 1536 produced no great injury for the Welsh ; all the ingredients for its credence had been put in topographic point long earlier.The alleged Act of Union of that twelvemonth, and its corrected version of 1543 seemed inevitable. More than one historiographer has pointed out that brotherhood with England had truly been achieved by the Statute of Rhuddlan in 1284.

Those historiographers who praise the Acts province that the Welsh people had now achieved full equality before the jurisprudence with their English opposite numbers. It opened chances for single promotion in all walks of life, and Welshmen flocked to London to take full advantage of their opportunities.The existent intent was to integrate, eventually and for all clip, the princedom of Wales into the land of England.

A major portion of this determination was to get rid of any legal differentiation between the people on either side of the new boundary line. From henceforth, English jurisprudence would be the lone jurisprudence recognized by the tribunals of Wales. In add-on, for the placing of the disposal of Wales in the custodies of the Welsh aristocracy, it was necessary to make a Welsh opinion category non merely fluent in English, but who would utilize it in all legal and civil affairs.Therefore necessarily, the Welsh opinion category would be divorced from the linguistic communication of their state ; as pointed out earlier, their eyes were focused on what London or other big metropoliss of England had to offer, non upon what remained as crumbs to be scavenged in Wales itself, without a authorities of its ain, without a capital metropolis, and without even a town big plenty to pull an timeserving urban in-between category, and saddled with a linguistic communication described by Parliament as “ nil like nor harmonic to the natural female parent lingua used within this kingdom. ”From 1536 on, English was to be the lone linguistic communication of the tribunals of Wales, and those utilizing the Welsh linguistic communication were non to have public office in the districts of the male monarch.Part IVIt was the reaching of the Welsh Bible, nevertheless, that brought the linguistic communication back to a respected place.In 1588, the interlingual rendition of the whole Bible itself, the flood tide of the whole motion, made Welsh the linguistic communication of public worship and therefore much more than a by and large despised peasant lingua.

Possibly it is to this that much of the contemporary strength of the Welsh linguistic communication is owed, compared to Irish ( which did non acquire its ain Bible until 1690 ) and Scots Gaelic ( which had to wait until 1801 ) .The Welsh Bible, a brilliant accomplishment, was completed after eight old ages by William Morgan and a group of fellow bookmans. In 1620 Dr John Davies of Mallwyd and Richard Parry, Bishop of St. Asaph, produced a alteration of William Morgan ‘s Bible. Most of the about one 1000 copies of.the earlier book had been lost or worn out, and this revised and corrected edition is the version that infinite coevalss of Welsh people have been exhaustively immersed of all time since, it has been every bit much a portion of their lives as the Authorized Version has been to the English-speaking peoples or Luther ‘s Bible to the Germans.

In 1630, the Welsh Bible, in a smaller version ( Y Beibl Bach ) , was introduced into places in Wales and as the lone book low-cost to many households, became the one book from which the bulk of the people could larn to read and compose. Other, hapless households, unable to afford the Bible, were able to portion its contents in meetings held at the places of neighbours or in their churches or chapels. Subsequently on, infinite coevalss of kids were taught its contents in Sunday School. It is in this manner, hence, that we can state the Welsh Bible “ saved ” the linguistic communication from possible extinction.It has been touch and travel all the manner since, nevertheless, with determined attempts coming from both sides of Offa ‘s Dyke to stomp out the linguistic communication for of all time. Yet every clip the funeral bells have tolled, the linguistic communication has miraculously revived itself.

For the continued endurance of the linguistic communication, nevertheless, there had to be a basis laid in the field of general instruction among the multitudes. There were still excessively many people in Wales who could non read or compose. As so frequently in Welsh history, aid came from outside the state itself.In 1674, a charitable organisation, the Welsh Trust, was set up in London by Thomas Gouge to set up English schools in Wales and to print books “ in Welsh.

” Over 500 books were printed in 1718 and 1721 at Trefhedyn and Carmarthen severally. Many of these were interlingual renditions of popular English plants, Protestant tracts that bucked up private worship and supplications, but along with the six major editions of the Bible that appeared during the same period, they had the unannounced consequence of guaranting the endurance of the linguistic communication in an age where many bookmans were foretelling its rapid death. Of equal importance were the inexpensive catechisms and supplication books.highly prized by rural households who read them ( along with the Beibl Cymraegd ) in household groups during the long, dark winter darks.So successful were pedagogues, helpers and itinerant instructors that possibly every bit many as one tierce or more of the population of Wales could read their Bibles by the clip of Griffith Jones ‘ decease in 1761. Jones had realized that prophesying entirely was deficient to guarantee his people ‘s redemption: they needed to read the Bibles for themselves. Though non intended by such as Jones ( the curate of Llanddowror and hence non a Nonconformist curate ) , his Hagiographas created a significant Welsh reading public primed and ready to have the entreaty of the ever-growing Methodist churchs, whose ability in such sermonizers as Hywel Harris was matched by their fluency in the dais, and who evidently filled a great demand among the multitudes.

One influential convert was Thomas Charles who joined in 1784, and who set up the successful Sunday School motion in North Wales that had such a profound and permanent influence on the linguistic communication and civilization of that part. Another sermonizer of great influence was Daniel Rowland, who had converted in 1737 after hearing a discourse by Griffith Jones. With Hywel Harris, he assumed the leading of the Methodist Revival. Rowland ‘s enthusiasm along with that of his co-workers, attracted 1000s of converts, and though their initial purpose was to work within the model of the established church, resistance from their Bishops, all of whom had small existent involvement in Wales and knew nil of its linguistic communication and civilization, led eventually to the split of 1811 when an independent brotherhood was founded.This was the Calvinistic Methodist Church ( today known as the Presbyterian Church of Wales ) . Supplying the exhilaration and ardor that the established church had been missing for so long, it did much to pave the manner for the rapid growing of the other non-conformist religious orders such as the Baptists and Independents.

The motion besides was responsible for bring forthing two names that are outstanding in the cultural history of Wales: William Williams and Ann Griffiths ( dealt with at length in my History of Wales ) .Part VThe consequence of the coming of heavy industry to south Wales in the nineteenth century could non hold been foreseen, particularly its double consequence on the linguistic communication and societal life of the country. First, with so many Welsh talkers traveling into the country in hunt of occupations, conveying their linguistic communication ( and their chapels ) with them, a Cambrian civilization survived in many Fieldss of vale activity.

Such a heavy toll came to so many countries of the southern vale. In the counties of Glamorgan and Monmouth, the long, verdant vales rapidly filled up with mills, Millss, coal mines, Fe smelting plants ( and subsequently, steel plants ) , roads, railroads, canals, and above all, people. Houses began to distribute along the narrow hillsides, make fulling every available infinite upon which a house could be set, little houses, crammed together in row after row, street after street, town after town all strung together on the vale floor. Houses separated merely jerkily by the food market shop, the somber, Grey chapel, or the public house.

Above them all loomed the blackened hillsides and the scoria tons of waste coal or industrial garbage. And all this brought about by the find of coal.In the southern vale, an Anglo-Welsh character came into being ; one that came to rule the political, societal and literary life of Wales, and it was here besides that a new and peculiar sort of Welshness was forged, symbolized by the cloth-capped, heavy imbibing, strike-prone, English-speaking, rugby overzealous of the Valleys.

.To such a character, and to a certain extent, to the bulk of the three big urban countries of Cardiff, Swansea and Newport, the people of the West and North, the Bible-toting, chapel-going, teetotal, penurious, and above all Welsh-speaking were wholly foreign existences who might hold come from another planet. The reverberations are felt strongly today as merely one in five of the dwellers of Wales use Welsh as a linguistic communication of mundane personal businesss.In other countries, the Welsh linguistic communication had been in diminution for over 100 old ages. In Flintshire, so near to the big urban countries of Merseyside and Cheshire there had long been calculated efforts to stomp out the Welsh linguistic communication.Other countries did non endure the loss of the linguistic communication.Some of the letters published in The Cambrian in the mid nineteenth Century show an attitude of many Englishmen towards the Welsh linguistic communication that has persisted until today.

In one of them, the author was amused by the proposal to hold the infant Prince of Wales ( eldest boy of Queen Victoria ) , instructed in the Welsh linguistic communication. He wrote that the prince, by seeking to articulate the Welsh “ ll ” or “ ch ” would be perceived as holding convulsive fondnesss of the bronchial tubing “ that would take to quinsy or some awful disease of the lungs and jugulum and would dismay everyone. ”Part VIBy the center of the nineteenth century, Victoria ‘s positions however, the tide was running to a great extent against Welsh. In 1842, a Royal Commission, looking into the province of instruction in Wales, noted that some Welsh male childs employed at mines in Breconshire were larning to read English at Sunday School, but that they could talk merely Welsh. This was unbearable to the commissioners.It was demanded in Parliament that an enquiry be conducted into the agencies afforded to the laboring categories of Wales to get a cognition of the English lingua. The study of the Commissioners of Inquiry for South Wales in 1844 lamented the fact that “ The people ‘s ignorance of the English linguistic communication practically prevents the working of the Torahs and establishments and impedes the disposal of justness. ” It did n’t look to happen to the commissioners that it was their ain ignorance of the linguistic communication that was blockading justness!The study led to another Royal Commission, conducted in 1847, which wasto hold a permanent consequence on the cultural and political life of Wales.

The study, in three volumes bound in bluish screens, has become known as Brad y Llyfrau Gleision ( The Perfidy of the Blue Books, for the three immature and inexperient attorneies who conducted the study had no apprehension of the Welsh linguistic communication, nor, it seems, did they understand non-conformity in spiritual affairs.Bright, intelligent and well-read Welsh-speaking kids were unable to understand the inquiries put to them in English, and the surveyors stubbornly assumed that this was due to their ignorance. Their study lamented what they considered to be the sad province of instruction in Wales, the too-few schools, their distressing status, the unqualified instructors, the deficiency of supplies and suited English texts, and the irregular attending of the kids. All these were attributed, along with uncleanness, indolence, ignorance, superstitious notion, promiscuousness and immorality: to Nonconformity, but in peculiar to the Welsh linguistic communication.

One consequence, of class, of the publication of such “ facts ” led to so many of its talkers being made to experience ashamed and abashed. The effects of the contention therefore stirred up has lasted up until today ; it surely did much ot bolster the place of those who agreed with much of the study and who saw the linguistic communication as the biggest drawback to the people of Wales. One drastic redress, the infliction of English-only Board Schools did much to further has ten the diminution of Welsh over a great portion of the state. In these schools, as in Flintshire a half century earlier, the “ Welsh Not ” regulation was imposed with terrible punishments for talking Welsh, including the erosion of a wooden board, the old “ Welsh ball ” around one ‘s cervix.In Caernarfon, Gwynedd, an country still preponderantly Welsh-speaking in the 1990 ‘s, there is a high school named after Sir Hugh Owen, a innovator in instruction in Wales. Owen ‘s hardworking attempts to procure a university for Wales led to a committee to advance the thought in 1854, the university itself to be established through voluntary parts.

Owen ‘s supplications to the authorities for fiscal aid were ignored, and it was public subscription that brought to fruition the old dream of Owain Glyndwr. In 1872 Aberystwyth University opened its doors to 26 pupils in a really impressive edifice on the seafront designed as a hotel, but which was fortuitously vacant at the clip. For the first few old ages of its being, the college depended greatly on voluntary parts from the Nonconformist chapels, but it attracted many who would come to hold profound influence on the civilization of their state. In so many countries it provided the foundations that led to the national resurgence of Wales in the late 1890 ‘s.The work of Owen M.

Edwards, in a period of linguistic communication diminution, was important in this Renaissance. A indigen of Llanuwchllyn on the shores of Llyn Tegid ( Bala Lake ) , Oxford University lector and subsequently Chief inspector of Schools of the newly-created Welsh Board of Education, Edwards did much to popularise the usage of Welsh as an mundane linguistic communication. Alarmed by the diminution in the linguistic communication, he published a great figure of Welsh books and magazines, with peculiar involvement in plants for kids. In 1898 he founded Urdd y Delyn, a precursor of Urdd Gobaith Cymru, the largest young person organisation in Wales and one that still conducts its activities through the medium of Welsh.Despite the success of organisations such as Urdd, one job has remained for the endurance of Welsh of all time since the Acts of Union in the in-between 1500 ‘s.

The Welsh linguistic communication has considered to be a great hinderance to one ‘s feeling of Britishness. Even before the First World War, when British soldiers from all parts of the land marched off under the Union Jack to contend the Afrikaners in South Africa, the feeling took clasp that “ … side by side with the honorable part which the Welsh could do to the British Empire, the Welsh linguistic communication could be considered an irrelevancy… ”This thought was implanted even more steadfastly in the Welsh head by the purpose of the leaders of the Welsh-speaking community to demo that the distinctive features of Cambrian civilization were non a menace to the integrity and repose of the land of Britain.

When thoughts of a separate authorities for the Welsh people began to take clasp in the late nineteenth century, one time once more, the thought of a British national individuality found itself overpowering the strictly local, stray, and all excessively frequently ridiculed, aspirations of those who wished for a Welsh nationhood.In chiefly English-speaking South Wales in peculiar, feelings on the affair were aggressively expressed. At a important meeting in Newport, Monmouthshire, in January 1898 it was steadfastly stated ( by Robert Byrd ) that there were 1000s of true Liberals who would ne’er subject “ to the domination of Welsh thoughts. ” With few exclusions, this seems to sum up the attitude of most Welsh politicians of the following one hundred old ages. There were excessively many in Wales whose close ties with English involvements made the thought of place regulation repugnant and one to be fought against at all costs.Welsh-speaking Lloyd George, future Prime Minister, who was howled down at the meeting, questioned if the mass of the Welsh state was willing to be dominated by a alliance of English capitalists who had made their lucks in Wales. Yet even his motivations were held with intuition as being wholly self-serving. And, as a fluent Welsh talker, he was mistrusted by many in the audience who looked with intuition upon those who could talk a linguistic communication that they could non.

In 1881, the Aberdare Commission ‘s study showed that commissariats for intermediate and higher instruction in Wales lagged behind those in the other parts of Britain ; it suggested that there should be two new Welsh universities, Cardiff and Bangor. It was found, nevertheless, that there was a deficiency of adequately trained pupils for these new colleges and therefore, in 1899 the Welsh Intermediate Act came into being that gave the new county councils the power to raise a levy ( to be matched by the Government ) for the proviso of secondary schools.In 1896 came the Central Welsh Board to supervise these schools.The consequence was that 1000s of Welsh kids from all degrees of society were able to go on their instruction at a secondary degree. Another consequence, nevertheless, was the continued diminution of the position accorded the Welsh linguistic communication, for the new secondary schools were exhaustively English, merely really few even trouble oneselfing to offer Welsh lessons. An educated category of Welsh people was therefore created that fostered the cultural traditions of their state in the linguistic communication of England.

Part VIIIn the interim, in an age where wireless and films began to play of import functions in the regular mundane life of the people of Wales, the linguistic communication continued its hasty diminution. North Wales got its intelligence from and followed the events in Liverpool ; South Wales was more trussed to occurrences in Bristol or even London. Linkss between the two countries of Wales were practically non-existent ; roads and tracks went West to East, non North to South, and the flow of thoughts and linguistic communication went in the same waies. Any sense of a national Welsh individuality was vanishing quickly along with the linguistic communication.In an effort to halt the putrefaction, a new party came into being in 1925, Plaid Genedlaethol Cymru ( The National Party of Wales ) that was ferociously devoted to strictly Cambrian causes such as saving of the linguistic communication and civilization. In 1926, Saunders Lewis took over the presidential term, but the party received really small general support and, in some countries of Wales, was the object of ridicule.

It was to take 40 old ages before Plaid Cymru was taken earnestly and gained its first place in Parliament. Much had been go oning until so to further gnaw Welsh as a common linguistic communication and the thought of the Welsh as a common, united people worthy of their ain authorities as portion of a greater Britain.The positions of Henderson and Lewis, as inventive and advanced as they were, did non appeal to the bulk of the Welsh people ‘ at the clip, those who thought the politician and the poet were those of a really little minority so.

In the interim, the procedure of Anglicization continued unabated ; more people populating in Wales considered themselves Anglo-Welsh than Welsh. Much of the incrimination ( or for some, the congratulations ) , can be placed on the educational system that, even before the beginning of the Second World War was geared to bring forthing loyal Britishers.When World War ll eventually arrived, there was much more unanimity of support throughout Britain than there had been for the First World War. And there was less trauma inflicted upon the people of Wales, for this was a campaign against Fascism and Nazism and Hitler that about everyone could subscribe to. It was besides a battle to continue the Empire.

The heavy bombardment meant a big hegira of kids from the targeted larger English metropoliss into the more rural countries. In Wales, 1000s of refugees learned Welsh, but in many countries their English linguistic communication overwhelmed the local speech.or tipped the graduated tables against its endurance.To counter the lingual menace to the Welsh civilization at Aberystwyth, a private Welsh-medium school was established.

by Ifan Bachelor of Arts Owen Edwards, the boy of the celebrated pedagogue. Apart from this small school, nevertheless, it was n’t until Llanelli Welsh School began in 1947 that the thought of learning kids through the medium of Welsh began to take clasp in earnest. Other schools followed, so that by 1970, even Cardiff had its Ysgol Dewi Sant ( St. David ‘s School ) one of the largest primary schools in Wales, learning through the medium of Welsh. The addition in the Welsh primary schools was accompanied by a demand for a Welsh secondary instruction, and the first such schools opened in Flintshire, Ysgol Gyfun Glan Clwyd and Ysgol Maes Garmon in countries in which the great bulk of the parents were monolingual English.

The success of these schools were followed by Ysgol Rhydfelen in Glamorganshire in 1962 and by many others by the 1980 ‘s.It may hold taken a long piece, and for many, it might hold been excessively late, but the alteration in the attitude of the Welsh people toward their linguistic communication has been dramatic since 1962. Not merely that, but great paces have been made in converting immigrants to Cymrus that their kids would non endure the loss of their English linguistic communication if they were to be taught through the medium of Welsh, and that a bilingual instruction may good be superior to one that confines them to a individual linguistic communication. Many a non-Welsh speech production parent is now dying to indicate with pride at the accomplishment of their kids in the Welsh linguistic communication. It is no longer stylish in Wales to mention to the linguistic communication as “ death, ” and the activities of the Eisteddfod as “ the boots of a deceasing state, ” sentiments the writer heard at Swansea in 1964.

What caused the sea-change?One topographic point we can get down to look for the reply is the media, particularly public wireless. Get downing in 1922, the BBC broadcasts in Wales were thirstily awaited. Its voice, nevertheless, was one that gave prestigiousness and authorization to its positions, the voice of a public-school-educated upper-class Englishman. In add-on, the bulk of broadcasts led a bulk of British people to believe that a BBC speech pattern was non merely desirable, but was the right one, and that their ain speech pattern, idiom, or in the instance of much of Wales, their linguistic communication, was inferior. It was Radio Eireann, the voice of the Irish Republic, that broadcast the lone regular Welsh linguistic communication stuff, get downing in 1927.

At clip, and for a long period subsequently, unbelievable as it now seems, the caput of the BBC station in Cardiff ignored protests from fans of the Welsh linguistic communication who wished to hear Welsh linguistic communication plans. There were so about one million talkers of Welsh. But aided by such attitudes of those in authorization, a rapid diminution was about to get down.

This was non inevitable. Possibly the linguistic communication would hold even advanced, given sufficient air clip in the late 1920 ‘s and early 30 ‘s. The job was that most Cambrian hearers enjoyed their English linguistic communication plans ; it was merely the few who realized that their enjoyment was coming at the disbursal of their cherished, native lingua.Part VIIIOne who did take notice, and one who provided the 2nd topographic point to look for the reply was Ifan ab Owen Edwards, whose male parent Owen M. Edwards had founded Urdd y Delyn in 1898. The boy, in his bend, established the most influential of all young person motions in Wales, Urdd Gobaith Cymru in 1922 ; the motion has involved infinite 1000s of Welsh male childs and misss of all time since, carry oning their cantonments, athleticss activities, singing festivals, eisteddfodau, etc. all through the medium of Welsh and turn outing that the linguistic communication was non one that should be confined to an older, chapel-going, puritanical coevals. Continued protests against the policies of the BBC, unable and in most instances unwilling to provide to the new, younger coevals finally led to the BBC studio at Bangor airing Welsh linguistic communication plans.

In 1935, and in July of 1937 the Welsh Region of the BBC eventually began to air on a separate wavelength. Radio Cymru, nevertheless, had to wait until 1977.Another polar figure in the battle for endurance of the Welsh linguistic communication, and one who made good usage of the power of the wireless broadcast was the poet and playwright Saunders Lewis. Like Ifan ab Owen Edwards, Lewis was greatly concerned that, unless something was done, and done rapidly, the Welsh linguistic communication as a life entity would vanish before the terminal of the century. Lewis, a major Welsh poet and playwright, by and large considered as the greatest literary figure in the Welsh linguistic communication of this century, was born in Cheshire into a Welsh household ; he subsequently became a lector at the freshly established University College, Swansea.

Heavily influenced by events in Ireland and the battle for national individuality in that state that took topographic point in the political domain, he was one of the laminitiss of Plaid Cymru in 1925 at the Pwllheli National Eisteddfod, going its president in 1926.Lewis envisioned a new function for the people of Wales that would transform their place as a member of the British Empire into one in which they could see themselves as one of the states that helped found European civilisation. As he viewed it:What so is our patriotism? … To contend non for Welsh independency but for the civilisation of Wales. To claim for Wales non independence but freedom. ( Egwyddorion Cenedlaetholdeb, 1926 )Ten old ages subsequently, with two comrades, D.

J. Williams and Lewis Valentine, Lewis intentionally set a fire at Penyberth in the Llyn Peninsular, North Wales, a site that the military wished to utilize for building of a bombing school. The three so turned themselves in to the governments and were punctually indicted and summoned to look in tribunal. The failure of the tribunal to hold on a finding of fact at Caernarfon, a town sympathetic to their cause, meant the remotion of their test to London, where they were each sentenced to nine months imprisonment. Lewis was dismissed from his learning station at Swansea even before the reaching of the guilty finding of fact at the Old Bailey.Leading Welsh historiographers agree that The fire at Penyberth should be regarded as a cause celebre in the battle for Welsh individuality ; it surely had its impact on Welsh thought, an impact that was non entirely dampened by the oncoming of Word War ll which once more focused the people of Britain on their shared individuality in the face of an enemy that threatened their endurance as a state.

The pacifism of Lewis was an insult to many, even within Plaid Cymru who saw the demand to get the better of as overruling any other concern.Part IXThe betterments in the route system meant that many countries in Wales were easy to acquire to. Their beauty and repose became an resistless magnet to 1000s ready to retire from the sordidness and overcrowding of the large industrial metropoliss of northern and in-between England. Welsh communities, particularly along the North Wales seashore, found themselves inundated with a inundation of fledglings who were either excessively old to larn the linguistic communication or could n’t be bothered.

Many of the younger twosomes had no thought that Wales had a linguistic communication of its ain, or when they did happen out were inexorable that their kids be educated through the medium of English. Far more important was the fact that it was far excessively easy to acquire by absolutely good in Wales without cognizing a word of its linguistic communication.The whole north Wales seashore, known as “ the Welsh Riviera ” became foremost a weekend resort area for, and so an extension of, Merseyside. The mid-Wales seashore, likewise was transformed by a immense inflow of people from the Midlands. LIverpool speech patterns were more common in Llandudno than Welsh ; Birmingham speech patterns common in Borth, or even Aberystwyth.

The writer vividly remembers sing a saloon in Bangor where every client but one could talk Welsh, but all of whom used English to postpone to a monolingual Englishman ( who had been in the country 40 old ages without larning a individual word of Welsh ) . The same state of affairs was found throughout much of North Wales.The consequence of such monolithic invasions, frequently by retired persons, surely by those with small inducement to larn Welsh was drastic.

From about a million Welsh talkers in 1931, the figure fell to merely over 500,000 in less than 50 years.despite the big addition in population. Strongholds of the linguistic communication and its attendant civilization were crumpling fast, and it seemed that nil could be done to stem the tide. In 1957 occurred an event that exemplified the state of affairs: the Liverpool Corporation got the green light from Parliament to submerge a vale in Meirionydd ( Merionethshire ) called Tryweryn, which housed a strong and vivacious Welsh-speaking community.

The remotion of the people of Tryweryn to do manner for a beginning of H2O for an English metropolis convinced many in Wales that the state was on its manner to extinction. The endurance of the Welsh linguistic communication seemed irreversibly doomed, and no-one seemed to care.Then something happened ; person seemed to care after all. At Pontarddulais in 1962, at the summer school of Plaid Cymru, a new motion began. Chiefly affecting a younger active post-war Welsh coevals, many of them college pupils, the Cymdeithas year Iaith Gymraeg ( Welsh Language Society ) decided to take affairs in their ain custodies to seek to hold the diminution of the linguistic communication by coercing the manus of the authorities. Jesuss to many, villains and trouble makers to others, frustrated members of the Society had been galvanized into action by a talk given on the BBC by Saunders Lewis in February, 1962.

In his talk, entitled Tynged year Iaith ( Fate of the linguistic communication ) Lewis asked his hearers to do it impossible for local or cardinal authorities concern to be conducted without the usage of the Welsh linguistic communication. This was the lone manner, he felt, to guarantee its endurance. Plaid Cymru could non assist, as it was a political party, so the streamer was taken up by Cymdeithas year Iaith Gymraeg. At narrow Trefechan Bridge, Aberystwyth in February, 1963, members of the society sat down in the route and stopped all traffic seeking to acquire into town over the span, or seeking to go forth town on the same path.Undeterred by prison sentences for upseting the peace and for their subsequent devastation of authorities belongings ( largely route marks ) , and led by such militants as Fred Fransis, and folk-singer Dafydd Iwan, the society began a serious run. In the face of much ill will from passivist locals and prosecution from the governments, Cymdeithas pressed for the right to utilize Welsh on all authorities paperss, from Post Office forms to telecasting licences, from driving licences to revenue enhancement signifiers. In peculiar, the society engaged in furtive dark clip activities, taking English-only mark stations and directional instructions from the main roads or plastering them with green pigment.

All over Wales, in early forenoon, automobilists were faced with the green pigment and daubed mottos that cryptically had appeared overnight. It became frustrating and expensive for local governments and the Ministry of Transport to maintain replacing route marks.Finally, in 1963, faced with an ever-growing run, increased constabulary and tribunal costs, devastation of authorities belongings, and the blatant demands for action by an progressively angry and defeated national motion, the cardinal authorities decided to set up a commission to look at the legal position of Welsh.

Its study, issued two old ages subsequently, recommended that the linguistic communication be given “ equal cogency ” with English, a diluted version of which was placed into the Welsh Language Act of 1967.There came about a new feeling in the land. The immature people of Wales were replying the call of Saunders Lewis ; the older coevals began to reconsider their passivity.

Dafydd Iwan and many of his coevalss inaugurated a whole new motion in popular Welsh music, interpreting English and American dads into Welsh, or composing stirring new wordss and music or protest. The popularity of plaintive, sepulchral anthem Sung by male voice choirs found a rival, the loud, heavy beat and rebellious music of new sets. Groups such as Ar Log and Plethyn rediscovered ancient Welsh common people music and brought it up to day of the month. The National Eisteddfod entered into the spirit, each twelvemonth raising a Roc Pavilion, where such groups could pull the younger audiences.

Wales began to eventually agitate off the shrouds dramatis personae by the Methodist Revival of over a century before.Since the 1960 ‘s, in the writer ‘s place of birth Flint and in other towns in Clwyd, attempts to re-introduce the Welsh linguistic communication in the schools have been heartily welcomed by many of the townspeople, and a whole new coevals of kids who can talk, read and compose Welsh may assist guarantee the hereafter of the linguistic communication ( and finally, of Plaid Cymru ) in such to a great extent anglicized countries. Other countries, such as the Cardiff part and the Valleys have already experienced some growing in the Numberss of those able to talk Welsh.

Factors for this addition include the rise of a Welsh bureaucratism ; farther enlargement of the Welsh-oriented mass media ; the continued activities of Cymdeithas year Iaith Gymraeg, with its entreaty to the immature coevals ; and the effects of the Welsh Language Act of 1967. Possibly most of import is the elusive alteration in attitude towards the linguistic communication brought approximately by the advantages that can be gained by its talkers in both societal and economic Fieldss. Of important importance in winning the Black Marias and heads of the non-Welsh talkers who have immature kids has been Mudiad Ysgolion Meithrin ( the Welsh Nursery School Movement ) founded in 1971.In the anglicized countries of Wales, we may yet once more read such sentiments as that given by Sir Walter Scott, in a missive to his boy, dated December, 1820:You hear the Welsh talk much about you, and if you can pick it up without interfering with more of import labor, it will be deserving whileIn the late 1990 ‘s, as we shall see, one of the more of import labours of many of the Welsh people has been to go on the battle to continue their linguistic communication, and with it, much of the civilization upon which it depends. To continue this linguistic communication, the antediluvian, brilliant lingua of the British people for so many, many centuries, will be so, a labour of love to do up for so much yesteryear hurting.Addendum 1Welsh Language Guide Welsh Language GuideThe linguistic communication of Wales, more decently called Cymraeg in penchant to Welsh ( A Germanic word denoting “ alien ” ) , belongs to a subdivision of Celtic, an Indo-germanic linguistic communication.

The Welsh themselves are posterities of the Galatians, to whom Paul wrote his celebrated missive. Their linguistic communication is a distant cousin to Irish and Scots Gaelic and a close brother to Breton. Welsh is still used by about half a million people within Wales and perchance another few hundred thousand in England and other countries overseas. In most to a great extent populated countries of Wales, such as the Southeast ( incorporating the big urban centres of Cardiff, Newport and Swansea ) , the normal linguistic communication of mundane life is English, but there are other countries, notably in the Western and Northern parts, ( Gwynedd and Dyfed peculiarly ) where the Welsh linguistic communication remains strong and extremely seeable. The Welsh word for their state is Cymru ( Kumree ) , the land of the Comrades ; the people are known as Cymry ( Kumree ) and the linguistic communication as Cymraeg ( Kumrige ) . Regional differences in spoken Welsh do non do talkers in one country unintelligible to those in another ( as is so frequently claimed ) , standard Welsh is understood by Welsh talkers everyplace. Despite its formidable visual aspect to the naive, Welsh is a linguistic communication whose spelling is wholly regular and phonic, so that one time you know the regulations, you can larn to read it and articulate it without excessively much trouble. For immature kids larning to read, Welsh provides far fewer troubles than does English, as the latter ‘s many incompatibilities in spelling are non found in Welsh, in which all letters are pronounced.

THE WELSH ALPHABET: ( 28 letters )A, B, C, Ch, D, Dd, E, F, Ff, G, Ng, H, I, L Ll, M, N, O, P, Ph, R, Rh, S, T, Th, U, W, Y( Note that Welsh does non possess the letters J, K, Q, V, X or Z, though you will frequently come across “ adoptions ” from English, such as John, Jones, Jam and Jiwbil ( Jubilee ) ; Wrexham ( Wrecsam ) ; Zw ( Zoo ) .THE Vowel: ( A, E, I, U, O, W, Y )Aas in adult male. Cambrian words: am, Ac Pronounced the same as in English )Tocopherolas in stake or reverberation. Cambrian words: gest ( guest ) ; enaid ( enide )Ias in pin or queen.

Cambrian words: Ni ( nee ) ; myocardial infarction ( me ) ; lili ( lily ) ; min ( meen )Uracilas in pocket bread: Cambrian words: ganu ( ganee ) ; copper ( cardinal ) ; Cymru ( Kumree ) ; tu ( tee ) ; un ( een )Oxygenas in batch or moe. Cambrian words: o’r ( 0re ) ; Don ( Don ) ; Department of Defense ( dode ) ; British shilling ( bobe )Tungstenas in Zoo or coach. Cambrian words: cirque ( koom ) , bws ( coach ) ; yw ( you ) ; galw ( galoo )Yttriumhas two distinguishable sounds: the concluding sound in happy or the vowel sound in sweet cicely Welsh words: Y ( uh ) ; Yr ( ur ) ; yn ( un ) ; Fry ( vree ) ; byd ( beed ) All the vowels can be lengthened by the add-on of a circumflex ( & # 228 ; ) , known in Welsh as “ to bach ” ( small roof ) . Cambrian words: T & # 228 ; Ns ( taan ) , fifty & # 228 ; Ns ( laan )THE Diphthong:Ae, Aiand<