The Evolution of Welsh in 22 Words

Welsh, a Celtic language of Wales in the UK, can trace its history back over six and a half thousand years to the Proto-Indo-European language of modern-day Russia and Ukraine. This video traces that history, tracking the various changes between each stage of the language's past.
Check out more language histories here: • Evolution of Languages...
Or see more about the Welsh language: • Welsh

[@YuutaShinjou113]

It's peculiar to witness Proto-Celtic being somehow like Greek and Latin in sound even if it's entirely its own thing. Today's Celtic languages diverged so distantly from Proto-Celtic, I can't describe this shift in changes.

[@LexisLang]

Yeah, it's wild how different they are. In theory, there's not much separating them, but it is very extensive. When I first started learning Welsh, I was shocked how little I could recognise. I'm far too used to Germanic and Romance languages. I can figure out more now though, having done this video and understanding the relations a little better. :)

[@llwyfen]

italo-celtic theory

[@rafeverao4105]

I was baffled, absolutely dumbfounded at how immediately recogniseable the words became when stepping into Proto-Celtic (some of the PIE forms were recogniseable, but only in the vaguest sense). Having read how words evolved from PIE into their modern forms thousands of times in a handful of languages, I thought I'd get used to this, but seeing it with my own language - it's truly astounding. Thank you for this video, it is actually pretty jaw-dropping.

[@LexisLang]

You're very welcome. Thank you so much for watching! Are you a native Welsh speaker? If so, I hope my pronunciation wasn't too bad! It certainly is very interesting to see how the words develop and change over time - particularly when you know the endpoint. Glad you enjoyed the video! :D

[@MP-hz6iz]

As a (second language) Welsh speaker I was struck by this too! The step into proto-Brythonic was jaw dropping too, almost all of the words were entirely recognisable!

[@MP-hz6iz]

@@LexisLang I'm not a native speaker, but your pronunciation of the modern Welsh is excellent imo.

[@LexisLang]

@@MP-hz6iz Thank you! :D

[@MyNames_55]

Just found this video and realized how beautiful Welsh sounds. I wish I had heard it earlier. Plus the video itself was very interesting! I absolutely love the /θ/ and /r/ with /w/ so Welsh sounds absolutely beautiful and interesting! Thank you for such a great video, greetings from Ukraine!

[@LexisLang]

Дякую! It is a very lovely language! Glad you enjoyed the video! Thank you for watching! :D

[@martinomasolo8833]

So "cooked" came to mean "hot"! Cool! Very cool and nice pronounciation

[@LexisLang]

Yes! That one is nice! It means "poeth" is also related to the "cotta" in "panna cotta" and the "-cuit" in "biscuit", which is cool. The semantic development does make a lot of sense of course (cooked food > hot food etc.), but cool nonetheless. Hope you enjoyed the video! :D

[@JohnSmith-of2gu]

The Proto-Celtic does have quite the resemblance to Latin. Then things shoot off into the woods with Proto-Brythonic. What was going on in that island to make things shift so much?

[@LexisLang]

Isolation and like a thousand years. And to be fair, there aren't that many big changes. Just that those that do exist changed the language very systematically and extensively.

[@TrueNativeScot]

time

[@mrsubramanian-hy9xb]

A great video. I wanted to educate myself further on Celtic languages in an entertaining way and this was nothing short of perfection.

[@LexisLang]

Aw, thank you so much! I've put a lot of work into it, so I'm glad it's paid off. I think I've refined the format a lot since the first of these videos I did and hopefully they'll just continue to get better from here! Thank you for watching! :D

[@mrsubramanian-hy9xb]

@@LexisLang I've just gotten into your channel and you've definitely earned yourself a subscriber. After going back and watching some of your older videos, I really can see that you've refined your style of content, with this latest video of yours really well executed.

[@LexisLang]

Thank you! I genuinely really appreciate that! Good to know I'm not just lecturing into the void. :D

[@carloshoraciorovira6923]

Very good video.I've been interested in the evolution of the languages, and I found that you explain it very well. Greetings from Argentina!

[@LexisLang]

Muchas gracias! I'm glad I've been able to help fulfill your interests! And Argentina - that first word on the list is nicely fitting! ;D

[@carloshoraciorovira6923]

@@LexisLang Yes, indeed!

[@pierreabbat6157]

¿Estás por acaso yn Y Wladfa?

[@carloshoraciorovira6923]

@@pierreabbat6157 No, vivo en Rosario, bastante lejos de la Patagonia. Pero me interesa todo lo que sea Linguistica. Sí debo decir que conocí hace años a un señor que era de la colonia galesa de Chubut que vivía en Rosario. Se llamaba Juan Davis.

[@br2485]

Cool! It was interesting seeing some words become closer to Irish and then diverge again after brythonic! Such as Proto-Celtic /dubros/ meaning "dark/water". The Goidelic branch went with the "dark" part where /duv/ means "black" in modern irish, while obviously the Brythonic branch went with the "water" meaning. So cool!

[@LexisLang]

Irish "dubh" is actually from PC *dubus, the source of Welsh "du" (as seen in the section on the soft mutation). This is related, though not identical to, *dubros, which gave the Irish "dobhar". I get what you mean, though. Seeing it approach something you know and then diverge again is very cool. :D

[@TheDoctorGD]

It would be better if you went 1 word at a time so we could more clearly see the changes. Its really hard to see the changes with all of them at once.

[@LexisLang]

I absolutely get what you mean, but I think doing it like that would kind of kill the bigger picture a little. I may do a video in future going through individual words, but for a video like this, I want to maintain the flow and give the audience a perspective of each stage of the language as a whole. If you are interested in individual words, it is hard, but it should still be possible to skip around a bit. Even if I did do individual words, it'd be rather disjointed anyway, as I'd still need to discuss changes throughout. Hope that explains my thought processes a little bit. Thanks for watching anyway and thank you so much for your feedback! :D

[@johnmendoza2165]

Great video! . . . . . (For anyone wanting to make a joke about how the video is actually longer than 22 words, I counted 1001 words total throughout the video)

[@LexisLang]

Don't encourage them lol. Every video like this I get people mentioning that. I've also just word-counted my script and you're completely right - 1001 words on the dot! I'm glad you enjoyed the video! Thank you for watching! :)

[@johnmendoza2165]

@@LexisLang My bad dude XD

[@Pellwolok]

Good video. I suggest you to add an approximate timeline when these changes happened. For example as I see the biggest changes happened when proto-celtic becams proto-brythonic.

[@LexisLang]

These things are often quite hard to date. However, in researching this video, I used chapter 5 of "the Celtic languages" by David Willis and edited by Martin Ball and Nicole Müller. It's available on Google Books in part and also references a number of other works. That provides some rough dating of the Brythonic to Middle Welsh stages, which was rather useful. I believe they were drawing from a work by Kenneth Jackson, although I couldn't get hold of that. Glad you enjoyed though! :)

[@Pellwolok]

@@LexisLang Of course i do not say to add an exact date, because it's impossible, but an approximate interval maybe. Keep up the good job anyway! 👌

[@LexisLang]

@@Pellwolok Of course. Thank you! :)

impressive video, very accurate

[@LexisLang]

Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed!

[@eduardo-bx4hw]

great video pls do evolution of english🙏

[@LexisLang]

English is absolutely on my list. Might do one or two other branches or families before I get to it, but I certainly will at some point! :)

[@pierreabbat6157]

Wiktionary says seven is *septḿ̥, not *séptm̥. This makes no difference in Welsh, which lost the PIE accent, but does make a difference in Greek (where it's επτά).

[@LexisLang]

Ooh, good spot there! That is indeed a mistake on my part; I should have checked. There's always something I get wrong! :D

[@David-b9q7j]

Very interesting. It seems very difficult to find an etymological dictionary of Cymraeg or any Keltic language. Looking at Gaulish I can see the Indoeuropean "look" to it. But when I look at modern Irish it looks completely strange. Is there an etymological dictionary of any Keltic language? Diolch y chi.

[@LexisLang]

Yeah, there's not loads, but there are afew bits. The Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru (www.Geiriadur.ac.uk) gives a brief etymology and examples back to Old Welsh. There have also been a number of published etymological dictionaries, such as Alexander Falileyev's or Phillipe Potel-Belner's, though I haven't read these two, so can't comment on their quality. There's also Omniglot's Celtiadur which provides Celtic cognates, or Wiktionary, which is user-written (so be careful), but generally not too bad and often cites its sources. There should also be a lot for Irish and the Gaelic languages, but I'm not so familiar there, so you'll need to try looking yourself. If these aren't what you're after, try googling "Welsh etymological dictionary" - quite a lot comes up and I may have missed something. :)

[@WelshAmericanChannel]

Hello from the Welsh American Channel. We Welsh Americans are very proud of our heritage and our language. Cymru am byth!

[@LexisLang]

I wasn't aware there were many Welsh speakers in the States (aside from recent emmigrants). I assume that's where you mean, rather than yr Wladfa? Anyway, glad you enjoyed the video! :)

[@le_synthesis2585]

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="361">6:01</a> adjectives must correspond nouns in gender, as in Latin, Russian and other archaic IE languages. Cattus albus, catta alba; белый кот, белая кошка; kattos dubus, katta duba

[@LexisLang]

Absolutely they must. However, the regular masculine ending in Proto-Celtic was -os. -Us is a different ending and it's actually irregular, having the same form across both genders. Originally, I had them agreeing, because obviously they should, but I checked and it's actually an irregular one. Thanks for noticing though! :)

[@pattap2826]

Could you also do this with french please

[@LexisLang]

I'd love to! It's on my list and o I'll get to it at some point. :D

[@randomguy-tg7ok]

Word lists: PIE: <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="142">2:22</a> Proto-Celtic: <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="223">3:43</a> Proto-Brythonic: <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="369">6:09</a> Old Welsh: <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="432">7:12</a> Middle Welsh: <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="516">8:36</a> Modern Welsh: <a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="568">9:28</a> You seem to pronounce Old/Middle Welsh "heid" as "heidd". Is that just due to a different spelling convention in older Welsh?

[@LexisLang]

Yes, absolutely. If you check Proto-Brythonic and Modern Welsh, they both have a "dd" sound. Same with all steps in between. Old and Middle Welsh are attested languages, so I used their spelling conventions, which hadn't been standardised yet and didn't represent the full breadth of the phonology. Same as how /d/ is often written and /ɬ/ is written . Modern conventions just hadn't arisen yet. Great question though and good timestamping! :)

[@theofficeroliviersamson4498]

HE’S BACK!!!

[@LexisLang]

Yes! Exam season is over now, so I can get back to it again! Shame I've missed a few months, but I'm ready for the next regardless. :)

[@theofficeroliviersamson4498]

@@LexisLangI just want to say, I think when there is a ring below the r, that indicates that it is unvoiced. Also I made a video “Origin of (gen alpha) slang”, and it’s very popular, I got to almost 5k!

[@LexisLang]

@@theofficeroliviersamson4498 Yeah, so in regular IPA, an underring indicates voicelessness. However, conventional PIE notation uses the distinct convention that it instead represents a syllabic sonorant. It's really important to know that distinction, especially here, where it means different things at different stages of the language's history. It is maybe something I should have noted and I was going to add it to my list of conventions, but for some reason I didn't in the end. :)

[@wouterd6725]

Why is it that PIE, Proto-Celtic and Proto-Brythonic took so much longer to develop than old, middle and modern Welsh? Is it just because we’ve documented it better?

[@LexisLang]

The various stages of Welsh are more discrete periods that we have record of. We define them by major sound shifts or historical events. The various proto-languages are, by definition, the last common ancestors of other languages too. PIE, PC and PB weren't technically single units - Early PC speakers may not have understood Late PC speakers - their languages would have been as different as the various Welsh periods, it's just that our reasons for classifying them one way or another change depending on whether or not they are attested. So yeah, hope I've got my point across in this ramble. Essentially, all stages of the language form a spectrum - there are no sharp cut-offs, so we define them differently. The proto-languages aren't even necessarily single languages, again it just comes down to definitions. :)

[@wouterd6725]

@@LexisLang makes sense, thanks!

[@mihanich]

Are there monolingual Welsh speakers? Please tell me there are

[@LexisLang]

Not that I'm aware of. I've met a few people who are far more confident in Welsh than English, but despite Wales' excellent policies on the language, I think it'd be hard to get by without even the littlest English. :)

[@jacobparry177]

Roedd hyn yn wych. Dwi'n chwarae o gwmpas hefo'r Frythoneg a'r Hen Gymraeg bob hyn a hyn, a fydd y fideo 'ma yn adnodd bach da

[@LexisLang]

Diolch! Dw i'n hapus fod di'n ei licio! Dydy fy Nghymraeg i ddim yn dda iawn, ond mae dysgu'r hanes iaith y dw i'n dysgu yn helpu fi i ddysgu'r iaith. Dwi'n gobeithio fod hyn yn ddefnyddiol - i mi ac i di! Diolch am wylio! :)

[@illusionwaterII]

Do evolution of gigachad Pannonian Rusyn language or any other Slavic language. Love from Ruski Kerestur

[@LexisLang]

The documentation around Rusyn may not be the best, but I'd love to look at some other Slavic language(s). I don't know a great deal about them, but I'd love to learn! Thank you for watching! :)

[@user-wc1ey7qi6t]

Пожалуйста, сделай видео, где праиндоевропейский язык эволюционирует в русский.

[@LexisLang]

Russian (or another Slavic language) is definitely on my list for the future. I'm a little scared of the pronunciation, but I could try! :)

[@user-wc1ey7qi6t]

@@LexisLang Тебе легко дастся произношение. Международный фонетический алфавит и видео с произношением нужной фонемы тебе помогут.

[@VidTDM_XD]

Can you please do one of these for Hindi?

[@LexisLang]

I could certainly try. I think Hindi's phonetics might challenge me a bit - you heard my murmered stops (PIE *bʱ, *dʱ, *gʱ are Hindi भ, ध, घ). It would be a fun one, though and I'd love to try. :)

[@VidTDM_XD]

@@LexisLang as a native speaker i dont get how these are hard but i cant pronounce the "th" sound in the in english i pronounce it as dʱ

[@entwistlefromthewho]

PIE [ɡʷ] > Photo-Celtic [b] which is shared by Irish. PIE [ɡʷʰ] > Brythonic [gw] and so Welsh [gw]. PIE [ɡʷ] > PC [b] > Br. [b] > W. [b] PIE [ɡʷʰ] > PC [ɡʷ] > Br. [gw] > W. [gw] PIE [kʷ] > PC [kʷ] > Br. [p] > W. [p]

[@LexisLang]

Yep! Is this a correction, because I'm pretty sure I got all that right in the video? :)

[@kornsuwin]

based and trebuchet-pilled

[@LexisLang]

I feel like this is a meme I'm not in on - I've heard a friend say something very similar. Hope you enjoyed the video nevertheless! :D

[@kornsuwin]

@@LexisLang it's just the font you use, that's all

[@LexisLang]

Ah, of course! Good eye there! All my early stuff was done in trebuchet and it still hangs on in places. :)

[@SionTJobbins]

Diddorol iawn ac ynganiad da iawn o'r Gymraeg. 👍🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿

[@LexisLang]

Diolch yn fawr! Dw i'n hapus iawn fod di'n ei hoffi a bod fy ynganiad yn iawn. :D (Gobeithio bod fy Nghymraeg i'n dda 'ma)

[@SionTJobbins]

Ydy, mae'n dda iawn! ​@@LexisLang

[@Corben-pq4nc]

Can you do the evolution of Russian?

[@LexisLang]

That would indeed be interesting! I'd love to do a Slavic language at some point. I was considering doing Polish as my next one, since I'm a tad more familiar with it and I trust myself to pronounce the words a little more. But Russian does make sense as one to do too and it'd be great to do and learn about. :D

[@JohnSmith-of2gu]

@@LexisLang Nah do a West Slavic language. I want to see you try doing the alveolar fricative trill. :P

[@Corben-pq4nc]

⁠@@LexisLangYea, I was gonna say Polish but it’s a lil hard to pronounce

[@Corben-pq4nc]

@@LexisLangAlso, are the words random? Because if they are, could you add 8?

[@LexisLang]

@@Corben-pq4nc Personally, I find Polish a little easier. With Russian, I get too bogged down in palatalisations. Polish is also a language I've encountered more, so would probably be easier for me to imitate. What do you mean "could I add 8"? You mean like adding the word for "eight" to the list or adding eight more words? If you want a little discussion on how I choose the words I do, check out where I've talked about it in a comment before here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gIfae4psmamGbac&lc=Ugw0QFVBISdbP3nOI8t4AaABAg.A1kIUaunk2gA1kPmhhNuAE

[@bunnytwo]

The “I’m _____! Of course I _____” Meme But I am Actually Welsh I’m Welsh, of course I can say Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndobwllllantysiliogogogoch I’m welsh, of course I know like 1000 places beginning with aber- I’m welsh, of course I randomly switch to speaking Welsh. I’m welsh, of course i have beef with dumb kids from Ireland and Scotland.

[@LexisLang]

Cymreig dw i, wrth gwrs dw i'n...

[@christianstainazfischer]

Do Faroese pleassssssse 🙏🙏🙏🙏

[@LexisLang]

Faroese is a very cool language. If ever I do a North Germanic language in this series, that might be a good shout! :)

[@machun9793]

is #_C a c program command ?

[@LexisLang]

No, it's a sound change environment. It means "word initially before a consonant". # is a word boundary, _ is the position of the change and C is a variable for any consonant. It's standard notation for this sort of thing - there's a list of conventions and variables at the start of the video. :)

[@machun9793]

@@LexisLang btw what does the term "word boundary" means ?

[@LexisLang]

@@machun9793 Sorry, it's just where a word starts or ends. Literally the boundary between two words. I know this can all be a bit confusing; I should like to do a video on it at some point. :)

[@machun9793]

@@LexisLang thanks, because I didn't study linguistic in university so I don't know these at all

[@LexisLang]

@@machun9793 No, that's fine. These videos are for all. Most people watching probably haven't had any formal teaching. Keep asking questions if you need to. Curiosity is what drives learning (and of course informs me what I need to elaborate on). :)

[@d4n737]

Ah, Welsh. The language where a word has 10 letters, and only two are pronounced like you'd expect... As opposed to french where a word has 10 letters and only two are pronounced

[@LexisLang]

Absolutely! The Welsh spelling system is actually rather regular and it does make sense why the letters are used how they are when you look at it in isolation with a historical perspective, but when you try to compare it to other languages, it does look quite strange. Technically the same goes for French, but that one's also quite hilarious. :D

[@scottabernethy100]

In terms of of the alphabet and orthographic, apart from "y" who can be a bit of a crazy guy all Welsh letters are only pronounced one way, the same as with Spanish and many Slavic languages. So if you learn the Welsh alphabet, you can pronounce any Welsh word, no matter how long it is and if you have no idea what it means. I grew up in North Wales completely bilingually and I learned to read Welsh years before I mastered English. @LexisLang, are you Welsh, your Southern pronunciation is perfect.

[@aureltoniniimperatorecomun4029]

Italian?

[@LexisLang]

Whoops! Fixed that! Thank you! :D

[@user-iv3gd2lu9i]

Rydw i yn garu yr iaith cymraeg! Cymru am byth cymraeg yn byw!

[@LexisLang]

Dw i'n hapus fod di'n ei hoffi a dw i'n gobeithio fod di wedi mwynhau'r fideo! :)

[@user-iv3gd2lu9i]

@@LexisLang Ydw, wrth gwrs....

[@theofficeroliviersamson4498]

fun fact: hudred in english is the equivalent to Welsh cantamrawdd this is probably not a word in welsh but it is made from cant "hundred" and amrawdd "unrefined" this is because of proto Germanic hundaradą, *hundą "hundred", and *radō "row, line series" from P.I.E. *ḱm̥tóm *h₂reh₁dʰ or *ḱm̥tómh₂reh₁dʰ (:

[@LexisLang]

The Welsh word for "a hundred" is "cant". If you're trying to create a perfect cognate here where it isn't, I'm not sure why you get "amrawdd" rather than the expected "rawdd". If you took the PIE sources of both parts of the English word, the result would be "cantrawdd". Also worth noting that the elements compounded in Proto-Germanic, not Proto-Indo-European. There was no such PIE word **ḱm̥tómh₂r̥h₁dʰéh₂. You are getting better at using SCs, though - you were almost there. :)

[@theofficeroliviersamson4498]

@@LexisLang what are SCs? Anyways I use wiktionary as a source and it shows amrawdd as a descendant of *h₂roh₁dʰ-éye-ti, a version of PIE *h₂reh₁dʰ. there wasn't a page for amrawdd, so I couldn't check the etymology, same thing with rawdd. Even if, the Proto-Germanic rado comes from *h₂r̥h₁dʰ-éh₂, which doesn't seem to have a Welsh or even Celtic descendant