Welsh Journals

In fact, Fluellen also makes v into and into ch, but seldom if ever unvoices initial g. In the Civil War Tracts, we have Crate for great, and Pritish for British, and many such instances, the consonants thus treated being mostly g and b. This seems to be the indiscriminate use of what was, in certain combinations, a characteristic of the Welsh pronunciation of English. That Welshmen, in speaking English, ever hardened these consonants in any and every position is not probable, although, even yet, Welsh-speaking children, in acquiring English, show a tendency to unvoice final d after n, as, for instance, in thousant. The one example of the unqualified hardening of an initial g in an English loan-word-crand from grand-is not sufficient of itself to prove that great was ever pronounced creat, and may, besides, otherwise be accounted for. But neither Shakespere nor the authors of the Civil War Satires hardened their consonants without cause, and the cause was not merely a desire to ridicule. In Welsh, formerly, at any rate, two g's coming together produced a k sound, and two d's similarly situated became hardened into t. As pointed out in a recent controversy con- cerning the form of the line Y Ddraig goch ddyry kychwyn, the MSS. teem with examples of this rule, the second g or d often being written k and t. — rhad turn, (rhad Duw), oed tydd (oed dydd), Draig koch (Draig goch), and gwraig koeth (gwraig goeth), to give only a few instances. In districts where the influence of English is least felt, and where the best Welsh is spoken, this rule still persists. In the Hiraethog country, the inhabitants pronounce Hafod Dafydd as if it were written Hafot Tafydd, and by them grug gwyn would be pronounced gruk kwyn. That formerly this peculiarity would reproduce itself in the English spoken by Welshmen, there can be no doubt whatever. In fact, the unvoiced consonant is still preserved in some English borrowals, as, for instance, in bat tog (bad dog), heard in Carnarvonshire. Englishmen could not have failed to observe this peculiarity, and it is only natural that in seeking to reproduce the sound, they should have exagger- ated or tended indiscriminately to introduce it. Hence,