Can Irish understand Welsh? | Celtic Languages Comparison

[@Mister69K]

I'd like to participate in a language challenge with Celtic Languages. I'm a fluent speaker of Breton.

[@angharadhafod]

I'd be up for that!

[@claudioristagno6460]

Volenteer to Norbert, it would be fun to see that.

[@unm0vedm0ver]

Breton and Cornish !

[@ApachePieman]

Bump, this would be really cool to see how similar brythonic languages are

[@le_synthesis2585]

Did you learn it from parents or at school? Modern literary Breton is very different from the natural dialects. And most of its speakers have a very strong French accent, since French is their native language.

[@haeleth7218]

As an English native who also speaks German and Norwegian, I can confirm I understood none of this.

[@morvil73]

And why should you?

[@Bjowolf2]

@@morvil73 It's a joke 😂

[@Gudha_Ismintis]

@@morvil73 yes calm down paddy c*nt

[@neilsaunders6009]

@@Bjowolf2 Yes, but it's a potentially confusing one. The point is, English is a Germanic language, not a Celtic one. I have had to explain to people from Continental Europe on more than one occasion that the Celtic languages are no more closely related to English than something like Slovenian is; such people are often under the utterly mistaken impression that the Celtic languages are simply dialects (or Creoles) of English. (On the other hand, Scots, derived from the Anglian spoken in that part of Northumbria that was absorbed into the Scottish lowlands, *can* be considered as a dialect of English.)

[@Bjowolf2]

@@neilsaunders6009 Yes, basic Danish ( from North Germanic / Old Norse ) is a lot closer to English than these Celtic languages - often at the word for very similar basic word level making whole basic sentences in Danish just look like some weird sort of older, but quite understandable Pseudo English 😉 D Skal vi [ve] gå [go] ud igen [ee-gain] nu [noo*] for finde min [meen] broder [bro(u)ð-er !], så [sO] (at) han kan hjælpe [yel-pe] os [us] (med at) bære alle dine [deen-e] ting over til det [de'] nye [ne(w)-e] hus [hoos]? E Shall we go out again now (for) to find my brother, so that he can help us (with to) carry / bear all your (thine) things over to the new house?

[@RSCeltic]

You need to do a Breton and Cornish version of this!

[@isoldatraducoes]

I Imagine it's extremely hard find someone who can speak'em.

[@RSCeltic]

@@isoldatraducoes there are lots of people if you are looking in the right places

[@Mercure250]

With Scottish Gaelic too

[@Mercure250]

@@isoldatraducoes I don't think Breton would be that hard considering it has a good number of speakers (more than 200k native speakers, more than 350k total). It's the third most spoken Celtic language after Irish and Welsh, and second in terms of number of native speakers (Irish mostly gets its numbers from L2 speakers). If they were able to find someone who speaks an obscure dialect of North Frisian, they can definitely find someone who speaks Breton lol

[@isoldatraducoes]

@@Mercure250 thanks for sharing your knowledge. What bothers me is why they are called Celts when the Romans and Greeks called them by other names or even they called themselves by other designations. Celts weren't the people from Central and West Europe in Iron Age?

[@a1b3do]

Near zero mutual intelligibility really shows just how long history stretches back.

[@entwistlefromthewho]

TL;DR - No, there is no mutual intelligibility between Welsh and Irish. They have cognates, yes but that's it.

[@KristianHerdi]

Shout out for our Celtic brothers from Serbia! Lot of towns and villages here in Serbia and neighboring countries can trace their origin to the times when Celts used to live here in Balkans. There is a great amount of words in modern day Serbian that have same meaning like their counterparts in old Gaelic, also there is a great book named "Red and White: parallels between Serbian and Celtic" where this is discussed in great length written by one of the most famous linguists, a PhD of anglistics and paleolinguists, here in Serbia.

[@Nobody-uu1uy]

Hey, do you have the name of the author of the book? I'd love to read it but I was not able to find it anywhere.

[@robertmcdonnell3117]

Thanks for having me Norbert, it was great fun! :)

[@angharadhafod]

It was indeed ☺️ and nice to meet you Robert.

[@andrewbollard5701]

Hi Robert, I helped Norbert finisht the Irish subtitles and translation to English. Nílm Gaeilgeoir aguis ní mo Gaeilge liofa, ní tacaím ach an cainéal Ecolinguist agus chabhraigh mé le Norbert nuair a bhí sé i bponc agus ní raibh sé ábalta Gaeilgoir a bhfaighte chun fotheidil a chríochnaithe. Thanks so much to you and Angharad for kickstarting the Celtic languages on Ecolinguist! I had suggested it to Norbert months ago, but I wasn't actually sure if he had been able to find Celtic language speakers to participate in challenges. I was delighted to hear that an Irish-Welsh challenge was nearly ready to publish. Hopefully this is just the first of many more Celtic language challenges!

[@robertmcdonnell3117]

Hey, @@andrewbollard5701 ! GRMA for that! yes looking forward to seeing more on Celtic languages!

[@isaacm6312]

Hi Robert, It was very interesting to me to hear your pronunciation of your last name, as I am a McConnell from the USA. I have heard or read that the "McConnell" variety of this lineage is the most true pronunciation to the original Scottish Gaelic pronunciation of Mac Dhòmhnaill back in the 1700s. But you do pronounce the hard D sound in your name, which was curious to me in a gaelic language. Perhaps there is some truth to what I've been told and there is some modernity in your pronunciation, or there are many different ways to say this very common last name. I'd be interested to hear your take on this. Or from any other modern Gaelic speaker...

[@FifthCat5]

I’m impressed. I speak Irish (from school, I’m not from the Gaeltacht). I can recognize cognate words in Welsh if I see them written but I couldn’t follow Angharad’s fluent spoken Welsh. I’d love to hear a Munster Irish - Scots Gaelic comparison sometime!

[@nb-yi1yf]

I thought it was cool too. I've even noticed some differences between my Ulster Irish (Donegal Gaeltacht) and the rest of the countrys', not just in pronunciation but in spelling as well. I've always been interested in seeing how far we can be understood by the other Celtic languages (bar Gàidhlig because we all know how that would go lol).

[@FifthCat5]

@@nb-yi1yf I love Donegal Irish! Used to spend summers in Gweedore to take the edge off my Dublin Irish and I would always come back entranced by the beauty and poetry of the language, not to mention the powerful singing and music that goes in in your part of the country. Great memories altogether.

[@koolade76]

She isn't fluent and her pronunciations are well off.

[@galinor7]

Her vowel pronunciation was very Angle and her speech was stacatto. She didn't sound very fluent to me. I'm a b1 Welsh student and I speak like her.

[@brianboru7684]

@@galinor7 The Irish lad doesn't seem to be a native speaker either.

[@bjaarki]

I already know what the outcome will be since Welsh is a Brythonic language BUT would love to see an Gaelige vs Gaidhlig comparison :))

[@RealCanuckian]

I speak some Gaeilge but grew up in Nova Scota. I can manage with the Gaidhlig speakers of Nova Scotia.

[@petertrevorah7388]

Or, indeed, Welsh and Cornish. They supposedly share 75% of their basic vocabulary but, as a Cornish speaker, I find Breton a lot more accessible.

[@bjaarki]

@@petertrevorah7388 my thoughts exactly would love to see a Welsh vs. Cornish challenge. Glad to see Gaelic languages in general getting (worldwide) coverage though, the more attention the better.

[@kierankelly2616]

And Manx too!

[@robertmcdonnell3117]

@@RealCanuckian Nova Scotians still speak a little Gaeilge?! That's amazing

[@kapuzinergruft]

From a German point of view... its nice to hear that Welsh and Gaelic made it to the 21 rst century though having suffered a lot by cultural oppression. Over here small pockets of the sorbian language survived in the eastern parts near poland.

[@zidokthepriest]

I live in Brazil and here in the south some german settlements maneged to keep their Pommerland traditions and dialect, which I heard it's extinct in Europe

[@WalkingCWild]

@@zidokthepriest aye there’s a welsh speaking community in Argentina too

[@eioclementi1355]

Welsh is a growing language..it becomes easier to understand when you read it, I know some English people pick it up quite fast.

[@WalesTheTrueBritons]

@P C you know what plays into that oppression? You saying the “British” government oppressed them, which the act is correct, but the terminology isn’t. The Term Briton, or British was a Roman term for the native people of a Britain. Their descendants are known in English as Welsh. So you are effectively calling the people who persecuted the British…British. The founders of England were anglo Saxon Germanics. So effectively the Welsh are the Native and Cultural British, Whereas the English are Only geographically British as their Country is located on the island of Britain. The Cymric people of Wales are THEE British.

[@WalesTheTrueBritons]

@P C think of it like this - if I carved out a portion of Japan as my own, and my descendants eventually took over the entire island, would it be acceptable for My descendants to call themselves Japanese and force the Cultural and Native Japanese something Else? This would surely get compounded if I say, banned their language. Which in turn forced the actual Japanese to call themselves by a term I created for them. Would they eventually forget they were ever Japanese as the Welsh have down with their Britishness? It’s literally cultural Genocide.

[@Polyglot02]

Please do one with Cornish, Breton and Welsh all together! That would be absolutely AWESOME!

[@Mister69K]

Agree!

[@morvil73]

My a or clappya Kernôwek, ha da via genam junya en assay a’n par na. E via spladn cawas cowsoryon a Gernôwek Cres keffres hag a Gernôwek Diwedhes Dasserhys.

[@kkuwura]

This was a very hard challenge for both of them since Brythonic languages and Goidelic languages were divergent even around the Roman times and were quite isolated from one another, especially Welsh and Irish. A lot of the sound changes happened very long time ago and they are so drastic that the only common threads are probably the later Latin and English borrowings

[@robertmcdonnell3117]

That was my reasoning for using words of latin origin!

[@kkuwura]

@@robertmcdonnell3117 oh, that's great. Capall/ceffyl was also a good choice because those are actually, as you might know, words that descended from Proto-Celtic *kaballos, even though they might seem to be a Latin borrowing. Both Latin caballus and Proto-Celtic *kaballos have uncertain etymologies and ultimately seem to be Wanderworts cuz they are found in many other cultures and languages in a very similar form. In addition to that, reconstructions of Proto-Celtic and Proto-Italic seem so close to each other that there is a hypothesis that those two also share a common ancestor. All in all, glad we got to have a Celtic representation in these mutual intelligibility challenges, so thanks for participating :)

[@elimalinsky7069]

I thought a challenge between an Irish and Scottish Gaelic speaker would be more interesting. The two languages aren't mutually intelligible contrary to popular belief, but close enough to more easily guess what is being said by the other. Irish and Welsh are really far apart.

[@cadian101st]

They diverged possibly before the city of Rome was even formed according to some linguistic theories

[@brother1ray]

@@elimalinsky7069 Well, that's not fair, as the whole Gaelic speaking World is really a "Dialect Continuum", rather than a boundary thing. The 'Irish' gaelic of East Ulster, (of which we have recordings!), is close to IDENTICAL to the Scots Gaidhlig of Argyll, just 11 miles away across the North Channel, and the native Donegal Gaelic will be understood by many, if not most Gaidhlig speakers from Western Isles! Munster irish?? A different world, I grant you!

[@omniglot]

Cool video. I understand both of them as I speak Welsh and Irish. There are plenty of words that are cognate between the Celtic languages, but differences in pronunciation and spelling often disguise them. For example, the Irish duine (person, man, human) is related to the Welsh dyn (person, man, human), and féar (grass, hay) is related to the Welsh gwair (grass, hay) - not to be confused with fear (man, husband), which is cognate with gŵr (husband, man) in Welsh. You can find out more on my Celtiadur blog.

[@angharadhafod]

This is my feeling too. It's difficult to get a handle on spoken Irish, but give me a single word - especially written, and quite often I'll have a clue about it. Especially if I know the context of that word.

[@ulsterbenny495]

Go-deas! Cad é mar a fhoghlaim thú an Ghaeilge? An cainteor dúchas Gaeilge thú?

[@Richard1A2B]

Interesting example of progression between the Gaelic F and the Welsh G.

[@lauraschilling5088]

As an American who is learning Welsh, I had not one clue what he was saying, but I could stumble through about half of what Angharad said with help from the written stuff at the top. Surprising, as it is entirely self learned on Duolingo. Diolch!

[@ycylchgames]

Bendigedig! Da iawn bach!

[@Maugrim76]

Swedish here. Visited Cymru in 2019 and absolutely loved it. Have dabbled a bit with the Welsh language in the past and did understand a few words here (not the entire context though). It would be cool to compare Welsh to Breton or Kernwek (Cornish) - I think they are closer related.

[@arthur_p_dent]

or Irish to Scottish Gaelic - in case this hasn't been done before.

[@ayangdidi5524]

Breton (Brezhoneg) , Welsh (Kembraeg), Cornish (Kernewek) belong to the Brithonic branch of keltic languages. Kernewek is almost dead. Many words are similar in Breton and Welsh : Ti (house), Mor (sea), Aber (Fjord), Avel (wind) a.s.o. there can be some difference in writing. Kembraeg is in a much more good situation than Breton; compulsory at school, 2 TV , Radio a.s.o because British government is much more Liberal than the Jacobin French government. The French Constitution doesn't allow other official language than French. Breton locuters have to fight daily for making their language to survive. Actually there is about 250.000 breton speakers. Many Breton and Welsh towns are twinned: Nantes , Caerdiff a.s.o.. Welsh national sport is Rugby. Breton national sport are soccer ,cyclism and yachting. Bretons wanted to set up a national Rugby team participating in interceltic contest: French government banned this.

[@Mister69K]

You're right, Breton, Welsh and Cornish are closely related. Intercomprehension is "kind of" possible between these languages. Breton is closer to Cornish though.

[@yannschonfeld5847]

Since you apparently enlist LV2 speakers, I would be up to go as a "brezhoneger" Breton speaker. My Breton was understood by my parents generation and I learnt it in very rural areas with people whose mother tongue was Breton and older people still who spoke no French. This was in the late '70's and on. I spent 35 years in Le Trégor. (Bro Dreger).

[@Ecolinguist]

You're welcome to sign up in the form linked in the description. This way I'll be able to contact you about it.

[@antonironstag5085]

As an Irishman, spent many years working in Wales and grew to love the Welsh people. They're similar to us but so different too. They have that celtic vigor and I'm happy they're able to maintain their own language even though the spelling made my head melt 😅

[@zachchen9564]

I’m learning Irish and I can understand some of what this man is saying. In Asia, learning Irish is not very popular, and nobody around me is learning Irish. Tbh, I don’t know why I started learning Irish

I did the same with Breton when I was a teenager 😅

[@robertmcdonnell3117]

\well done for learning Irish in Asia, that must not be easy!

[@zachchen9564]

@@nomadhomeschool Go raibh maith agat, a chara. Is aoibhinn liom an Ghaeilge.

[@zachchen9564]

@@robertmcdonnell3117 yeah, it’s not easy. I don’t have much money to find a online tutor, no language environment, so I need to learn by myself. But thankfully, there are many resources on Google, and there are many instagram pages

[@jackhanson1274]

​@@zachchen9564 are you in the Celtic language Discords? Might be nice for you to have folk to speak to!

[@alisonridout]

This was fantastic for me as a Welsh person and I actually got the Irish word that Angharad didn't get so I'm proud of myself 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

[@angharadhafod]

You saw it written first, I didn't 🙂

[@alisonridout]

@@angharadhafod yes I suppose so but I am a linguist and worked it out. Ps dw'in byw yng Nghaerffili 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

[@McConnachy]

Im a Scot and could understand quite a lot of the Irish, but very little of the Welsh

[@silverkitty2503]

Oh wow I am irish i find welsh the hardest out of manx and scots gadhlig to understand too...we call it gaelige na halban :)

[@McConnachy]

@@silverkitty2503 Thanks, we call it Gaidhealach na th Albanach, or Irish is Gaidhlig na h Eireann, collectively Cannan nan Gaidheal, language of the Gaels

[@internetual7350]

Tá sé sin an-suimúil ar fad! An raibh a lán comhrá agat le cainteoirí ón Éirinn?

[@lostcarpark]

I had a friend from Kerry in the south-west of Ireland who was dating a girl from the Scottish islands. They really struggled to understand each other's accents in English, but could communicate quite easily in Irsih/Scottish gaelic. I think you'll find people will really struggle to understand each other across the goedellic/bretonic languages, but between languages within the groups it will be almost too easy.

[@cigh7445]

That's gas. My own experience now would be that basic understanding and communication between native Irish (i.e. Gaeltacht speakers) and Scottish Gaelic speakers would be handy enough, but for any conversation beyond the basics they'd have to switch to English

[@oisinlarkin6885]

I've heard from Ulster Irish speakers that they find the difference very small once they got used to the accent. They said it was easier to understand for them than Munster Irish

[@niemandkeiner8057]

It'd be such a damn shame if these beautiful languages disappeared. Please don't let it happen.

[@MZ-jn1xh]

I think they're wonderful! It's what makes you unique and distinct.

[@duibhiruimaolmmhauid9039]

As an Irish person who has lived and worked in Wales...no..our languages are very different.

[@virgola2126]

It would be interresting to invite someone who speaks Breton and see how much Welsh they understand.

[@markjones127]

The languages are very similar, take one to ten for example, this is Breton: unan, daou, trir, pevar, pemp, c'hwec'h, seizh, eizh, nav, dek, and in Welsh: un, dau, tri, pedwar, pump, chwech, saith, wyth, naw, deg.

[@Mediaflashmob]

These languages are quite different from each other, it's like comparing Russian and Lithuanian.

[@helvete_ingres4717]

if it were Irish vs. Scottish, it would be like Russian vs. Ukrainian. But Welsh is weird even among the Celtic languages

[@Mediaflashmob]

@@helvete_ingres4717 yes, I agree.

[@michaelcaffery5038]

Or old and modern English. I could guess a few words or phrases but that is it.

[@Not-Ap]

​@@helvete_ingres4717Wales was formerly multiple Britonic Celtic tribes scrunched together into one small corner of the island of what was formerly their own land. So as a result of this and being influenced by the Roman's for half a century along with centuries of Anglo-Saxon/Norman influence it got warped into what it is now. Pack all the slavic tribes into one tiny pensuilia for thousand years them have be subjugated by idk something like the golden horde and later the ottomans both brutaly trying wipe out the culture and you'll get something just as strange.

[@010arschloch]

Agreed but especially that makes this conversation so challenging

[@jonahrichardson3000]

Love to see that you are showcasing Celtic languages on Ecolinguist! I find it fascinating how far Brythonic and Goidelic languages have diverged given the shared heritage and the geographical proximity. I have some Welsh and have dabbled in Scots Gaelic and know a little Irish mostly from songs really. Like others here I'd love to see an Irish vs Scots Gaelic challenge. There's a show on BBC Alba and TG4 called Port were folk musicians Julie Fowlis and Muireann nic Amhlaoibh showcase traditional artists. They appear to understand one another quite well but I always wondered how much of it was down to exposure to each other's language and how the show was edited. Amazing work as ever Norbert! Diolch yn fawr iawn

[@robmcrob2091]

Julia Fowlis can speak Irish. The difference between Gaeilic and Irish is not huge tho. Depends a lot on the dialect but maybe like what an English speaker would experience listening to really broad Scottish dialect.

[@SusanaXpeace2u]

I would be surprised. I am Irish and I heard a scottish boy being interviewed once on bbc scotland, in Scots gaelic and to my AMAZEMENT I understood. It seemed really similar to Irish.

[@Un4rceable]

When Angharad mentioned that Welsh puts y at the beginning and when she said ys as es it reminds me of what many Spanish speakers with Spanish as their first language do here in the U.S when they also say the word school or many words that start with S. They tend to add the letter E at the beginning so words such as school becomes eschool, stop becomes estop, study becomes estudy. Etc.

[@rembo96]

Like in French also: "école" (they also dropped the "s", if I understand correctly). I think it derives from French.

[@yannschonfeld5847]

Yes, and Breton traditionally should sound like Welsh with a West Country accent. NOT a French one.

[@lionelgrenelle]

@@rembo96 Bonjour ! Yes, like in école, espèce, épice, épée, échapper, étudier, etc. (all coming from Latin or Germanic words starting with s + consonant) But this is for the "natural" evolution, because we also have in French words starting with s + consonnant, that our scholars grabbed right away from Latin or ancient Greek : spectacle, spécieux, spécial, strié, stade, etc. and "hispanohablantes" would pronounce it with a "e". I'm a French language Teacher with lots of experience with Spanish speakers 😃

[@peterwilson5567]

Welsh vs Breton … that would be interesting. Back in the 60s I had a teacher born in Wales who told us that the Welsh fishermen could easily understand the Breton fishermen they encountered

[@yannschonfeld5847]

@@peterwilson5567 That could only be possible if the Breton fishermen already knew some Welsh. Cornish and Breton is another matter.. They are both West Brythonic languages. Yes, Welsh and Breton have similar vocabularies in " concrete" words; Ti, ki, dont - dod, mont - mynd etc. But easily intercomprehensible. I think not. That being said, it wouldn't be hard to learn the others language. Lke Spanish vs. French.

[@squashvids1032]

Native Spanish speaker here, and I got 'eaglais' (= iglesia) via the French 'église'. Proof of the French influence in Ireland? Great video.

[@jakkritphanomchit]

Latin influence

[@KevOSMusic]

Can I just say a big thank you to both Robert and Angharad. Great representatives of using the living languages.

[@yannschonfeld5847]

I understood the squirrel in Welsh as it sounds rougly like the Breton gwiñver. Skol/school in Breton. Skolveur university. I would caution against enlisting people who are not native speakers in Breton. Their Breton is completely "bookish" and not sounding like any traditional Breton. (BTW, apparently either Welsh Gwiwer or gwiñver come from * gweth (tree) and gwŷr* (menfolk) to make this word) These people all pretty well give the impression that Breton is like French where in fact sounds like Welsh spoken by a West Country person or even an English speaker from North America. I learnt Breton on farms near Lannion over 40 years ago and shortly thereafter married into the first family whose parents were native speakers of Breton and had very heavy accents in French. It might be interesting to call upon Cornsih speakers despite the fact that is a "revived" language but at least it sounds, relatively closer to that phonology despite being spoken by a native English far closer to what Cornish probably sounded like than French speakers passing their 2nd language off as real Breton. As mentioned here below, between Gaelic and Welsh, there are thousands of years of separate evolution. Stiil, an interesting test all the same. It illustrates the differences. As mentioned as well, Keltic cognates would have been preferable. Mersi dec'h. `

[@damionkeeling3103]

Yes, I heard a recording of an older native speaker once and he sounded more 'British' unlike modern learned speakers who have an obvious French accent. While I understood nothing of what he said my impression is that his accent sounded familiar to me as a native English speaker.

[@ftumschk]

According to Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru (University of Wales Dictionary), "gwiwer" is borrowed from Latin "viverrus" (pronunced "wiwerus"), so presumably Breton "gwiñver" is a later variant on this.

[@yannschonfeld5847]

@@ftumschk Interesting. For such basic creatures despite the heavy borrowing from Latin in Brythonic languages during Roman Britain, such borrowings were frequent during the Roman presence in Britain. Mersi dec'h.

[@ftumschk]

@@yannschonfeld5847 Diolch yn fawr :)

[@danielvanr.8681]

It would also have been interesting to put a Scottish Gaelic (Gaidhlig) and Irish Gaelic (Gaeilge) next to each other, as those lingos are even more closely related. Some, in fact, jokingly say that in order to translate between the twain, all you really have to do is flip the diacritic 45 degrees (i.e. from Irish acute accent to Scottish grave accent - eg. Ir. _Fáilte go hÉireann_ to Scot. _Fàilte gu h-Alba_ . 😆

[@yannschonfeld5847]

Yes, would make much more sense.

[@DIETRICHCICCONE]

Scottish Gaelic sounds very like the Irish Gaelic spoken in Ulster (northern Ireland). A fluent Irish Gaelic speaker would understand most of what they're saying ☀️

[@pol5928]

@@DIETRICHCICCONE it is similar but don’t expect perfect mutual intelligibility without having prior knowledge of how Gàidhlig works because it’s difficult

[@Subjagator]

@@pol5928 I would say a fluent speaker of one would be able to pick up the other very easily. At worst I would say it would sound to them like someone learning a foreign language, mostly correct but a bit broken in places and not knowing the correct word for everything. They could probably communicate easily enough though.

[@pol5928]

@@Subjagator that is true but they also have completely different words at times as well or words that wouldn’t be as common to use in Gaeilge anymore like the word Madadh for example in Gàidhlig is Cù (dog) which can be understood but just isn’t often used in Gaeilge, I’m thinking more of myself in a first encounter situation it would take me a few conversations to wrap my head around everything

[@Gorillarevolta]

As has been mentioned, Welsh and Irish are on separate branches of the Celtic languages. Welsh / Cornish / Breton and Irish / Gaidhlig / Manx would be cool comparisons to see

[@علي-ش7ث8ب]

*In Arabic the word for a church is قليّس (Al kulais) which is similar to 'eaglais' ,it's also the same in Greek and Latin.*

[@damionkeeling3103]

It's from the Greek word ecclesia which was originally the assembly of citizens to discuss law.

[@Arissef]

@@damionkeeling3103 Indeed, ekklesia - "calling out".

[@Xerrand]

Without even watching the video(Don't worry I will watch, I love your channel) I already know the answer is no. They're both "Celtic languages" but they are hugely different. However, Scottish and Irish speakers can understand each other.

[@adalbertosilva6185]

I'm Brazilian of Portuguese descent. My Celtic ancestors were forced to learn Latin during the conquest of the Iberian Peninsula by the Roman Empire. And, for historical reasons, I would love to speak a Celtic language! The Lusitanian and Gallaecian languages have not left many traces over time. 🇵🇹🇮🇪🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

[@Ogeroigres]

They left their phonologies in Portuguese :)

[@Richard1A2B]

The words Lança, cerveja, and cavalo are all celtic words in modern Portuguese. You would have heard them use 'capall" in Irish and "ceffyl" in Welsh for cavalo.

[@helenswan705]

What an interesting idea. Even to my English ears, these languages sound VERY different. I have read the various comments about divergence of the languages. Great to hear these parts of 'our' linguistic history.

[@BusyAndySings]

This was fascinating. As a Welsh person and learner I'm glad I could follow most of the Welsh and I was pleasantly surprised that I could pick out a few words here and there in Irish. Gwych!

[@jakubpodolak4104]

There's just something special about the Irish language, it seems really interesting and unique.

[@cd55896]

So unique that I learned it all through my schooling and I am nowhere near fluent despite having 14 years of lessons in school. Now, 10 years later, I regret not paying as much attention in school. It really is a beautiful language, and I am proud to know even just a little bit of it. If I have children or nieces/nephews it will encourage me to take the language more seriously! The British took our land and our culture, and it would be a shame if we lose our language as well!

[@david-hogarty]

​@@cd55896 I think the failure to gain fluency wasn't yours so much as the system's. We are built to learn languages, we just need to create the context for people to learn, and we adults can learn as well. I think it's easy to forget that it often took us 5-7 years to get to basic reading and writing in our native languages, with constant opportunities for interaction. If we give ourselves patience, and find ways to encourage community use of the language, everyone can learn, young and old. Má úsáidimid ár nGaeilge briste, beidh sí cliste go luath.

[@unm0vedm0ver]

It's interesting that Welsh tends to place a vowel before an "S" that is followed by a consonant, something that happens in Western Romance languages. Spanish, Portuguese, and some French words have this tendency as well, as does Basque. All languages with heavy Celtic influence. Celtic substrates in the case of the Western Romance languages, and Celtic contact in the case of Basque, which has a very large Celtic vocabulary.

[@lothariobazaroff3333]

It's usually Y or E, for instance "ysbyty" (hospital), "ysgrifennu" (to write), "ysmygu" (to smoke), "esbonio" (to explain), "esgob" (bishop).

[@unm0vedm0ver]

@@lothariobazaroff3333 I and E in the case of Basque and Romance. They seem to be the "go-to" supporting vowels across the board

[@jboss1073]

That is called anaptyxis and is a feature of all Celtic speakers, which then becomes a feature of their languages, even if they now speak Romance, as in the case of western Romance languages.

[@unm0vedm0ver]

@@jboss1073 do the Goidelic languages do this? I haven't noticed any examples in Irish and Gaelic

[@jboss1073]

@@unm0vedm0ver Yes, it happens in Goidelic languages too. For example, Scottish Gaelic "tarbh" is pronounced "tarav", the second "a" being result of anaptyxis. It also arises to split impossible consonant clusters, but it is never orthographically marked which is why you never "see" it written - you must hear it to "see" it.

[@stealthbum34]

I’m fluent Welsh born and raised in the North. I understood nothing 😅 however I did the same with a Cornish video and could follow their conversations reasonably well. Worth noting about this video is that this lady is using a more southern form of Welsh, many of the words and how they structure sentences is different from the Welsh of the North- in the Anglesey and Llyn Peninsula areas.

[@RSR-DF27]

What beautiful and rare languages. I didn't know these Celtic languages.

[@elhaf4101]

Very interesting watching this as a native welsh speaker! would love to be a part of a comparison with a fellow brythonic language such as cornish or breton! such an interesting concept that i've heavily studied for years!

[@ApachePieman]

Agreed, it'd be sick to have a welsh, cornish and breton speaker all in one video together

[@Polyglot02]

@@ApachePieman YES OMG I would LOOOVE this!!!

[@caramelldansen2204]

Love to see these Celtic languages! :)

[@andurk]

Norwegian here. Didnt understand a single word, however, truly fascinating dialogue! Watched the whole thing 🤩

[@brianlewis5692]

Wow - they are too distant, I think. The words selected for comparison were not even shared Celtic vocabulary but were borrowings from other languages. And she has some knowledge of Irish (obviously); the look of complete horror on Robert's face when she's speaking Welsh is so telling. Mutual Intelligibility: 0,00 🤣

[@damionkeeling3103]

Like English and Dutch maybe.

[@Polyglot02]

@@damionkeeling3103 No, way further than that I'm afraid. English and Dutch are a lot closer linguistically, I'd say. I speak some Welsh myself and find Irish to be very different, even though they share many grammatical and lexical similarities.

[@ernstraedecker6174]

@@damionkeeling3103 Eerlijk gezegd snap ik niet waarom Engelsen geen Nederlands begrijpen. Wij Nederlanders begrijpen namelijk wel Engels...

[@brianlewis5692]

@@damionkeeling3103 English and Dutch are mutually intelligible to some degree. It'd be more like English and Icelandic.

[@brianlewis5692]

@@ernstraedecker6174 Velen van ons wel, maar Amerikanen kennen het Nederlands helemaal niet 😒😒😒

[@matthewbelike]

Yay! Next, Scottish Gaelic too please!😁

[@carlinberg]

I love how during the first word she says she didn't understand anything, but still guessed right because the actual word was similar 😂

[@marcosreynoso3901]

I'd like to see one comparing Wales Welsh and Patagonian Welsh (Cymraeg y Wladfa) the one that is spoken (less, unfortunately) in some villages of Chubut, in Southern Argentina. I'd like to see if the speakers understand each other as I think Patagonian Welsh has been influenced a lot from Rioplatense Spanish.

[@alckinoy]

Norbert, this comparison is very interesting. Doing other Celtic languages should be your main goal, thank you very much ;)

[@Quisique]

No! That can't be... Welsh: gwiwer (squirrel) in Polish: wiewiór(-ka). It's so ridiculously similar! 🙂

[@skitotrachia3361]

Serbian veverica (say: wewereetsa

[@terremoto6663]

"squirrel" also sound very similar. But nothing like iora

[@GeliosGarik]

sounds very similar to the Belarusian _вавёрка_ , pronounced like _vavjórka_

[@lothariobazaroff3333]

Great video. I'm happy to notice that I understood many words in Welsh, which shouldn't be strange since I'm learning that language. :)

[@jh5401]

I'VE BEEN WAITING SO LONG FOR MORE CELTIC LANGUAGE VIDEOS YESS

[@MartinAhlman]

I only speak Swedish, and I love this! I even understood some of it (some = very little, but still!) I would love to hear more of this, and that's why I love this channel.

[@ernstraedecker6174]

As I understand it, both Swedish "bro" (?) and Gaelic "breá" are pronounced the same way and seem to mean: ok, fine.

[@Bjowolf2]

@@ernstraedecker6174 You mean "bra" [ c. brrA(w) ] - we also have this word in Danish, which is closely related to Swedish, but we rarely use it these days 😉 S Det är [airr] / var [vArr] en bra ( / god ) dag [dA(w)g] D Det er [air] / var en god [goð] dag [daygh] E That is ("are") / was a good day

[@shaunsteele6926]

they probably picked up some words when you guys ransacked them 1,000 years ago

[@Bjowolf2]

@@shaunsteele6926 Well, yes - but it went much deeper than that, since many Vikings settled in England and intermarried with the Anglo-Saxons during the latter half of this period - especially in Northern & Eastern England ( Danelaw region ), and as a result of that these two related languages ( Old English & Old Norse ) merged along the lines of the lowest common denominator and created a much simplified and completely restructured analytical "English" - compared to the highly inflected, "synthetic" and complex Old English - , which would transition into Early Middle English in just a few generations - an almost incomprehensible language to speakers of OE just 100 - 150 years earlier. Check out Langfocus' brilliant video "Viking Influence on the English Language" and Melvyn Bragg's great TV series "The adventure of English" ( especially episodes 1 & 2 ( of 8 ) in this context. Even today you will find a lot of deep similarities between English & "Scandinavian" ( 3 very similar languages all descended from ON ) - both between their basic vocabularies and also between their grammatical strcuctures ( i.e. simplified along similar lines - like parallel worlds so to speak ).

[@mango2005]

At 5 minutes in, I see "bach" for "small" in Welsh, which sounds a bit like Irish "beag" which has same meaning. Also about 7 minutes in, I think that written down, the Irish and Welsh words for "grey" are cognates but the pronunciation is completely different and Irish doesn't have the letter "y" as far I am know. Overall though, the pronunciations are often very different but sometimes they are similar.

[@connyapfelbaum4498]

Please more about celtic languages..... Greetings from Germany

[@hashcosmos2181]

SUPER COOOOOOOL! We've been waiting for this 😁

[@Dipovinnana]

This is the exact video I’ve been waiting for from Ecolinguist! 😮

[@thinkpolish]

I recognised the word 'eaglais' for 'church' because I lived in Dublin for a while and on Dublin buses there are spoken (and written) notifications of different bus stops in both English and Irish Gaelic. There were a few stops that included the word 'church', such as Rathfarnham Church, Good Shepherd Church, or Churchtown Road and all of them had this word translated as 'eaglais'. I also remember my confusion at the pronunciation rules, as I had imagined ''eaglais'' would sound something like 'eagles' but instead it was more like 'uglyish' 🤣🤣

[@Bjowolf2]

"eglastic" in English is related, I would guess. 🤔

[@MairlonFromBrazil86]

I did read "eagles" when the word was shown on my phone's screen LOL 😂😂

[@Basyka]

Important to notice that there are at least three words for 'church' in Irish: 'cill' for the traditional Irish (catholic) church, 'eaglais' for the protestant church and 'seipeal' for the chapel. I wonder if there are several words in Welsh for churches.

[@Nehauon]

In spanish, we say “Iglesia” It might be of celtic origin

[@Nehauon]

Capall from irish sounds like Caballo to me, word for horse

[@rufuspearce9378]

I live in West Wales and am a Welsh speaker. I'd love to take part in something like this

[@danik.5545]

Although Irish and Welsh are both Celtic languages ​​they are not closely related and they are from different groups. Wales is from the Brittonic group and Irish is Gaelic, along with Scottish. Unintelligible languages

[@alanguages]

Three languages from the Goidelic group: Modern Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx. That would be awesome. I only have Irish language courses.

[@bwenjones670]

This was quite fun to watch. Angharad is very smart. Chwara teg!

[@robinsteiner1676]

I love this because as an American and the bibliophile (book lover) I am, I'm learning both of these languages. Let's see if Duolingo has helped. Lol 😂

[@fbkintanar]

I studied a bit of Welsh via Say Something in Welsh, and it is coming back. However, I found the Irish completely incomprehensible, except for Latin cognates. A lot of fun, tho.

[@mytube001]

I suspect that the Welsh "y-" before s-words is the same mechanism as in Spanish "Espania" (Spain), "Estocolmo" (Stockholm), "estudiante" (student), as well as in some other languages.

[@BlinkyLass]

España is different since it's derived from Hispania, so that's actually an example of it going the other way in other languages, including Late Latin where it was Spania.

[@mytube001]

@@BlinkyLass Good point!

Same mechanism, yes

[@ftumschk]

Correct, and here are some more Welsh examples where you might be able to work out the original Latin "s-words": ysgrifen (writing), ysbryd (spirit), ystrwythur (structure).

[@yesid17]

wild!! on the one hand i understood almost nothing, as a bilingual native of English and Spanish, on the other hand, I have studied Irish and Welsh on Duolingo more than almost any other language they offer-and I understood a surprising amount! Thank you for this video, as always, keep up the great work!

[@SzczeryPoliglota]

Great guests - both with linguistic intelligence, they spoke slowly and clearly, giving a real opportunity to understand what's spoken.

[@DawnDavidson]

Fascinating! I know no Celtic languages beyond a tiny smattering of Scots Gaelic words picked up from listening to all the Outlander novels (and being of some Scots descent myself) 😂 But this was quite fascinating to watch! It was clear how they were related in some sounds and in some spellings. Also I lived learning “squirrel”! (My online handle in many places is dawndsquirrel) 😉

[@internetual7350]

B'fhéidir tá do chuir Gaeilann na hAlban a foghlaim, is teanga álann í agus tá mo chroí léi mar is Gael as Éirinn mé. (Maybe you should learn Scottish Gaelic, she is a beautiful langauge and my heart is with her because I am a Gael from Ireland.)

[@PerksJ]

Do Irish, Manx and Scottish Gàidhlig! As well as Breton, Cornish and welsh!

[@jcortese3300]

I admit, I clicked on this title because I was like, "Uh, no." :-) I've been a Welsh learner for years, and Angharad was clear as a bell -- I got absolutely nothing whatsoever from Irish. It was completely opaque. Sometimes I feel like there must have been a great storm before the Romans arrived that flooded Wales and washed all the vowels out to sea ... and they all washed up across the Irish sea on the shores of Ireland.

[@CrisSelene]

It was very interesting. I would love to see more Celtic languages explored.

[@FFM0594]

Irish is Gaelic, not Celtic.

[@010arschloch]

@@FFM0594 insular celtic language

[@alckinoy]

@@FFM0594 It's in Celtic branch, what's your point?

[@FFM0594]

@@alckinoy And English is in the Indo-European branch. Have you ever claimed to speak Indo-European?

[@alckinoy]

@@FFM0594 Never was I claimed. But the language of one family can be divided into some others, depending on the relation of those. Don't you consider Gaelic as one of the Indo-European?

[@leonidych]

Interesting! I can see Russian cognates for some words: (1) ir. capal - w. ceffyl - rus. кобыла (kobyla) (2) w. gwiwer - ir. ira - rus. веверица (veveritsa) (3) ir. eaglais - w. eglwys - gr. εκκλησία [rus. церковь (tserkov') comes allegedly from goth. kirikô where it came from gr. κυριακον δώμα, Lord's House] (4) w. prifysgol - ir. ollscoil - rus. высшая школа (vysshaya shkola) - all coming from gr. σχολείο

[@languagelearningismyhobby1624]

There are many similarities between Russian and Welsh )). For example Ti=ты Tri=три Coron=корона Pask=пасха Melin=мельница Iaith=язык Mor=море

[@leonidych]

@@languagelearningismyhobby1624 I know, but my interest is to get to know whether it is due to common roots as in case of 'tri' or loaning as in case of 'pask'. What about 'laith' - it does not look like 'язык'?

[@languagelearningismyhobby1624]

I thought ‘iaith’ and язык are a little similar because iaith starts with ‘ia’ and язык with я, which is the same pronounciation. Also, I don’t know if this is true, but I think the Celts come from central Europe or Scandinavia, and maybe they had some eastern european influence. I tried researching on quora but nothing came up. Do you speak Russian and Welsh?

[@leonidych]

@@languagelearningismyhobby1624 Old Irish for 'land' (but not 'language') is 'íath', so it may be not too far from 'language', I guess. Speaking Russian and learning Gaidhlig (Scottish Gaelic). Some linguists say that Celtic influence can be traced down easily by glottal 'g': if you hear it in some areas, here is where an original residence - and influence - of Celts may be.

[@languagelearningismyhobby1624]

That’s interesting. Living in Wales, the glottal ‘g’ is just normal here. Also, this is quite fascinating, but in Welsh we have mutations (treiglo), where the word changes depending on the subject. For example the word ‘cath’ (cat) changes to ‘fy nghath’ when indicating possession. This reminds me a little of the genetive case in Russian.

[@pedrocosta2860]

It would be interesting to see Scotish Gaelic and Irish Gaelic in next video of Celtic languages.

[@rumenok]

the next video Basque fluent speaker vs nobody challenge (or should i say monologue)

[@johnorsomeone4609]

So interesting. What fascinates me about Irish (and maybe Welsh) is how a proto-Indo European language evolved into a ‘verb first’ language. The entire structure is different and it seems like such a vast difference from the SVO languages that it’s incomprehensible how this could have happened, even over hundreds or thousands of years. I’ve had a few people throw guesses at me but none of them sound plausible.

[@ernstraedecker6174]

Yes. Irish is pretty strict VSO, which is unusual for Indo-European languages, but seen quite a lot outside of Europe. Sometimes, in kinds of short sentences, modern Greek switches to VSO. E.g. one would say "gurise o pateras" (daddy is back / father has returned; pateras being father and gurizw to return) and not "o pateras gurise", which would be an unfinished phrase. Instead you should say something like "o pateras gurise sto spiti" (daddy is back home).

[@le_synthesis2585]

Why a heavy substrate influence of a non-IE labguage is an implausible guess?

@@le_synthesis2585 Maybe

Same with Breton : widely "verb first", but it depends on what one wants to emphasize.

[@johnorsomeone4609]

@@le_synthesis2585 maybe- but influence from where? Basque? Hungarian? There aren’t many languages in Europe which *aren’t* descended from proto-indo-european. It’s possible; I just don’t understand where the influence would have come from. Besides, Basque isn’t a verb first language, it’s SOV. Hungarian is also not a verb first language. That leaves very few options.

[@cd55896]

I love seeing our language (Gaeilge) being represented! This challenge was so much fun to play along with! I'd love to see Irish/Welsh/Scottish vs Norwegian/Swedish, as we are descended from vikings from Scandanavia! A lot of our sounds are similar. Lovely to see the Gaelic languages being kept alive! :)

[@erichamilton3373]

The elephant in the room is English: they sound like English

[@oceantree5000]

A bit of a quixotic exercise, as Irish and Welsh are sufficiently distant to be more or less entirely mutually unintelligible, especially if one has zero exposure to one of the languages. Comparing the three Gaelics (Irish, Acottish Gaelic, Manx) or the three Brythonics (Welsh, Cornish, Breton) would be far more productive. Still fantastic to see the Celtic languages represented!

[@ethem8284]

would love to see a comparison between Welsh and Manx! loved this video sm!

Mmmm... Manx is Gaelic, so it should be better to have Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx, don't you think ?

[@goattm2]

I can tell you that they are completely different languages. Just like Welsh is to Scottish and Irish Gaelic. I speak Welsh and heard the Manx language and didn't have a clue what they were talking about.

@@goattm2 I think you're right. Manx is Gaelic, not Brythonic (so very different from Welsh)

[@ruralsquirrel5158]

"gwiwer" almost seems like it could be the origin of the English word for it, "squirrel". However, I looked up the etymology of squirrel online, and it comes from Greek via Latin via Old French (skiouros-scuriolus-escurueil). This seems to be a strange coincidence of similar sounding words with different roots.

[@lothariobazaroff3333]

And the word "penguin" probably comes from Welsh 'pen' (head) and 'gwyn' (white).

[@peteymax]

I guessed Gabhar which is goat

[@ftumschk]

Indeed - "gwiwer" comes from the Latin "viverrus", probably pronounced "wiwerus", which is practically identical to the most commonly-used Welsh form "wiwer". "Squirrel" seems ultimately to have derived from the Greek words σκιά (skia = shade/shadow) and οὐρά (oura = tail).

[@clarehidalgo]

Kinda like how English Hello and German Hallo aren't closely related despite looking so similar. Hallo comes from the same root as the English word hail (as in I hailed a taxi) instead

[@peteymax]

@@clarehidalgo Hello in English is a very new’ish word to the language. It’s only about 150 years old. It comes directly from hail it’s predecessor just like in German. Hail comes indirectly from the word health or healthy as in the way Saludos in Spanish or Sláinte in Irish (Slàinte in Gàidhlig) mean health, but can also mean a greeting or even cheers.

[@jonatanezequielrodriguez1714]

Church / eglwys / eaglais -Spanish: iglesia -French: église -Portuguese: igreja -Italian: chiesa -Catalan: església -Romenian: biserică

[@david-hogarty]

níos mó teangacha Ceilteacha, le do thoil! go raibh maith agaibh!

[@gwailouh01]

I enjoyed this one very much but think it would also be interesting to do comparisons based on the Goidelic languages - Irish, Gaelic (Scots Gaelic) and Manx and then one based on the Brittonic languages (Welsh, Cornish and Breton) similar to this format but the three languages from each branch in the same video. Thank you for these most interesting videos.

[@markadams738]

In Cornwall there is a place called the Lizard. I believe it means high place . The ard piece means in high. In Irish Ardh means high too

[@ftumschk]

"Liz ard" = "high court", in fact - court as in "mansion/palace", not "law court" :) The equivalent in Welsh would be "Llys Hardd".

[@markadams738]

@@ftumschk Thanks. There's also a cove nearby called Poldhu. The Pol is pool and Dhu means Dark or Black. Dublin means the same well the Du means dark as i understand it.

[@michaelbuckley8986]

@@markadams738Nearly there the Irish for Dublin is Dubhlinn which means blackpool.👍

[@JP-hr7ch]

@@markadams738 Correct, the Welsh name for Dublin is Dulyn, which translates as black lake, but actually means deep water lake. Old Irish=dobhar, Proto-Celtic=dubros.

[@markadams738]

@@JP-hr7ch 👍

[@jpat_]

Another dream come true :) ❤

[@Phi1618033]

I've always wondered if Irish and Scots Gaelic are mutually intelligible, considering they only diverged a few hundred years ago. Can you do that next?

[@RealCanuckian]

They aren't that far apart. The division is mostly a political one. Historically there was a lot of back and forth between the Gaels of Ireland and Scotland well into the 18th century. What hurt it was the penal laws of the English and the Highland Clearences that virtually destroyed Gaelic culture in Scotland

[@caramelldansen2204]

@@RealCanuckian England try not to destroy foreign cultures challenge

[@johnmackenzie4703]

@@RealCanuckian The Davidian Revolution in Scotland also played an earlier role in its demise in Scotland. The Scottish King David I was essentially an Anglophile. He invited many Anglo-Norman nobles to become landed in Scotland so as to replicate the English way of government, and established the Burgh system which encouraged immigration from chiefly England and the Low Countries of mainland Europe. These Burghs were essentially trade hub towns where the lingua franca was a form of English.

[@karlesia]

As a Polish speaker I understand thumbnail A tak serio Norbert to śledzę cie od jakiegoś czasu i uwielbiam twoje filmy. Zdecydowanie najlepszy kontent na yt. Z niecierpliwością wyczekuje następnego odcinka o językach słowiańskich.

[@Bjowolf2]

Easy for you to say 😂 Greetings from Denmark 😉

[@WGGplant]

something that interests me about welsh words that are borrowed from english (and visa versa), is that their spelling represents how english speakers' de-aspirate certain consonants when they come after a voiceless fricatives like 's'. sk turns into sg sp turns into sb and so on. its a pattern that most english speakers probably don't realize they do, and some actively deny it. but the welsh spelling highlights it very well. it makes me wonder if that's something we adopted from the welsh when anglos took over the British isle. bc dutch and german both fully aspirates through those consonants, if im not mistaken. then again we may have just stopped aspirating those consonants bc the way we held our mouth changed, and it became too much effort to do so after certain sounds.

[@erichamilton3373]

Yes. The Celtic Brit languages and English have been clearly influencing each other for a lomg time...which makes them sound similar. I've had Latin Americans who know very little English think Gaelic is English due to the sound.

[@redfishswimming]

Irish and much older than that lad and have more Irish vocabulary. I got straight away prifysgol is a cognate for ollscoil due to the description. I think after a few days of listening and reading welsh I could pick up a lot of topics, and learn it a lot faster than other languages such as Icelandic. The way its spoken sounds very different, but in writing, its easy to pick out the subject. Lovely participants and episode.

[@frzferdinand72]

Yeah, I can see where Tolkien got his inspiration for Sindarin.

[@jahanas22]

I've studied both a little but was able to figure out all the words.

[@Szylek]

I don't know if I'm right, but I think between Scottish Gaelic (Goidelic language as Irish) and Welsh there is more mutual intelligibility than between Irish and Welsh is. I've realised that due to the fact that Pictish was most likely a Celtic and Brythonnic language as Welsh. Also Pictish significantly influenced Scottish Gaelic so that's why I think it is right that.

[@jackkellam3987]

Possibly marginally more, but two main sub groups of celtic languages are Scottish and Irish gaelic on one hand, and then Welsh, Cornish and Breton on the other! As Welsh speaker I can pick up the odd bit of vocabulary when written down from Irish, but hardly anything spoken, whereas Cornish/Breton, you can work out the odd sentence here and there in spoken language!

[@angharadhafod]

Ben Llywelyn agrees with you (see some of his KZbin videos). I hadn't spotted this connection myself, but it does make some sense, for the reasons you say.

[@internetual7350]

@@jackkellam3987 Don't forget Manx!

[@tacfoley4443]

I find it quite funny that although our Irish speaker uses, as far as I can judge, not a single word of English, the Welsh-speaking lady uses a LOT of recognisably English words.

[@iamtombh]

Dw'i wedi mynd i'r Prifysgol Llanbedr Pont Steffan! I went to Lampeter University! (One of the examples she gave)

[@isoney]

I stopped learning Welsh when I was 14 and I’ve only just started Irish this yearat 40. I knew horse, guessed fox instead of squirrel because of the red, got church because it sounds similar to Welsh and he mention Sundays, and I knew university. I think because I don’t speak the languages it was easier to pick out things I did know. It’s a nice reminder to keep learning and I’m remembering more than I thought.

[@CeticWales]

Welsh and Cornish would be interesting.

[@PyckledNyk]

Having attained my understanding of Irish from online sources, I understood about 70% of what the Irish guy said, and I understood nothing the Welsh woman said.

[@katarinask139]

I wanted to go to sleep and you stopped me right away🤣 I was asking for this one

[@sarambatos]

Gwiwer in serbian is veverica. Meaning is squirrel.

[@mihanich]

Why Welsh is more vivid when it's closer to England than Ireland (historical oppressors)?

[@masonharvath-gerrans832]

They became Protestant, whilst the Irish generally remained Catholic.

[@damionkeeling3103]

Being close means that the language is a great way to distinguish your identity. Irish is an independent country so doesn't need it's old language to distinguish its native population from the larger English speaking British anymore. The number of Irish speakers has declined a lot since independence 100 years ago.

[@masonharvath-gerrans832]

@@damionkeeling3103 that’s bunk. Anglicisation is one of the great evils that Ireland is working to reverse.