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From: deb5@ellis.uchicago.edu (Daniel von Brighoff)
Subject: Re: The @ sign: help
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References: <3mru6k$6ba@news.cloud9.net> <D7JppM.Aqs@bbc.co.uk> <3onvps$me7@ikarus.rz.tu-clausthal.de> <D8Ctyu.C94@bbc.co.uk>
Date: Wed, 10 May 1995 21:53:43 GMT
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In article <D8Ctyu.C94@bbc.co.uk>, Alan Roberts <alanr@rd.bbc.co.uk> wrote:

[much deleted]
>In detail, the name can be broken down into individual words, as in the
>portmanteau words of German. Unfortunately, my Welsh is too shaky to
>rely on, so I have resorted to an old Welsh/English dictionary for the
>following (dictionary entries in braces):

My comments are from memory, but I've deciphered this before, so I doubt 
I'll make any egregious errors (famous last words...).

One thing to remember when breaking apart Welsh compounds is that
lenition (i.e. soft mutation) of morpheme-initial consonants commonly 
occurs.  Take trobwll, for instance, formed from tro "turn" and pwll
"pool."  Llantysilio is also written Llandysilio, just as the church
of Mary (Mair) is Llanfair.

>Llan	Church	(church/village, n)
>fair	Mary

Lenited form of Mair "Mary"

>pwll	hollow	(pit/pool/pond, n)
>gwyn	white	(white/blessed, a)
>gyll	hazel	(no dictionary entry)

Try under `collen.'  (The -en is a singulative ending in Welsh,
so `cyll' actually means "hazels"; note the lenition again.

>goger		(no dictionary find)

This one gives me trouble:  `ger' from earlier `cer' means "by"
or "near", but I don't know what that `go' is doing there.

>y	the	(the, a)
>chwyrn	rapid	(rapid, a)
>trobwll	whirlpool	(whirlpool, n)
>llan	church	church,village, n)
>tysilio	Tysilio
>gogogoch	(no dictionary find)

g + ogof + coch

g       ?
ogof    "cave"
coch    "red"

`f' is a weak consonant in Welsh and tends to drop out (cf. tre, tref
"town" and dwfr, d^wr "water").  The third `g' is the product of leni-
tion.  Where does the first `g' in this sequence come from?  My best
guess is that it's epenthetic, to keep the two `o's from running to-
gether.

>That's the best I can do.

Ditto.

Da


-- 
	 Daniel "Da" von Brighoff    /\          Dilettanten
	(deb5@midway.uchicago.edu)  /__\         erhebt Euch
				   /____\      gegen die Kunst!
