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CYNNWYS Y TUDALEN HWN:

STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
EVANDER W. EVANS, M.A.
ARCHAEOLOGIA CAMBRENSIS. 1873.

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Archaeologia Cambrensis - The Journal of 
the Cambrian Archaeological Association. 
VOL. IV. FOURTH SERIES. 1873.
 
xxx130 
 
STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
BY EVANDER W. EVANS, M.A., 
PROFESSOR IN CORNELL UNIVERSITY, ITHACA, NEW YORK.
 
No. II.
 
Since writing my former paper under the above title, I 
have had opportunity to use Skene's Four Ancient 
Books of Wales, the latest edition of the oldest extant 
MSS. of the old Welsh poets, to wit: the Black Book 
of Carmarthen (Carm.), referred to the twelfth century; 
the Book of Aneurin (B. An.), referred to the 
thirteenth; the Book of Taliesin (B. Tal.), referred 
to the begimiing of the fourteenth; and the poetical 
part of the Red Book of Hergest (Herg.), "compiled 
at different times in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries." 
These tests, though disfigured in the edition 
by numerous errors of typography, in general show less 
corruption of original forms than the Myvyrian texts, 
which are, in many cases, printed from later transcripts. 
The above MSS. contain a few poems belonging to 
the early middle period (say the twelfth and thirteenth 
centuries), and a few also which, from internal evidence, 
may be adjudged to the almost blank eleventh century, 
the era of transition from old to middle Welsh. But 
the greater part are undoubtedly of old Welsh origin: 
indeed, there are strong reasons, in some aspects ably 
presented by Skene, for believing that some of those 
associated with the names of Aneurin, Taliesin, and 
Llywarch Hen, are really based on originals of the sixth 
and seventh centuries. The translations in Skene, prepared 
by the Eev. D. Silvan Evans and the Rev. R. 
Williams, add much that is important to our knowledge 
 
xxx140 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
of these venerable remains. Yet they are avowedly 
tentative and conjectural in many parts: nor, indeed, 
in the present stage of the study of early Welsh, is it 
possible that it should be otherwise. It would be unjust 
to the learned translators to take their rendering 
of every passage as the expression of their final judgment 
of its meaning. The elucidation of these ancient 
and obscure texts (a work which they and others have 
so ably begun), it will require the best efforts of a whole 
generation of scholars to complete. 
 
In the extracts that follow I preserve the spelling of 
the editions; but freely deviate from them in punctuation 
and the use of capital letters, and sometimes also 
in the separation of words and the division of verse into 
lines. 
 
XI. That species of initial-change which consists in 
the "provection of the mediae" has been pointed out by 
Zeuss and others in Armoric and Cornish, but not in 
Welsh; yet in the oldest Welsh documents we may 
observe many instances of it. It takes place after strong 
consonants, notably s and th, ending the preceding 
words. It is, therefore, due to the assimilating tendency. 
Thus, in the Black Book of Carmarthen (51): 
 
Neus tuc Manauid 
Eis tull o Trywruid? 
 
Did not Manawyd bring 
Perforated shields from Tribroit? 
 
Here tuc is a mutation of duc, brought. Other examples 
in the Black Book are, ys truc (21) for ys druc, "est malum," 
and ac nis tirmycco (36) for ac nis diriuycco, 
"neque eum despiciat." 
 
So also in the oldest copy of the Laws: peth peccan (120, bis) 
for peth beccan, a small matter; guedy es tadkano (148) 
for guedy es dadkano, after he shall have 
stated them; kyfreith penfic march (266), the law of 
borrowing a horse; penfic being a mutation of benfic 
(beneficium), modern benthyg, a loan; etc. 
 
Codex B of Brut Gruffudd ab Arthur has, repeatedly, 
 
xxx141 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
pop plwydyn (Myv., ii, 186, 304, 309) for pop blwydyn, every year. 
 
The provection sometimes continues to take place 
after the infecting consonant has been dropped or depressed: 
thus, o keill, if he can (Leg. A, 28, 156), where o
is for os, and keill for geill; ked kouenho, though he 
ask (ib., 46), ked being for ket, and kouenho for gouenho. 
The same fact is seen in Armoric, e.g., ho preur, your 
brother; ho being for hoc’h, and preur for breur. 
 
In later Welsh this mutation disappears, except in a 
few compounds, e. g., attychwel, return, from at, modern 
ad, and dychwel. 
 
Among the lately discovered glosses to Martianus 
Capella, an edition of which has appeared with the 
learned annotations of Whitley Stokes (1), is orcucetic cors, 
"ex papyro textili." I think cucetic is, by provection 
after a strongly uttered r, for guëetic, woven. Compare 
or Kocled for or Gocled (from the North), in the Venedotian Laws (104). 
 
In Prydain (Britannia) I suspect the provection of 
the initial was originally owing to the habitual use of 
the word ynys before it: thus, throughout the Triads, 
ynys Prydein and ynys Prydain, the Isle of Britain. 
 
XII. Zeuss overlooks the Welsh plural-ending -awr, 
-iawr, with which we may compare the Armoric -ier. 
Plural substantives in -awr are frequent in the old 
Welsh poets; nor are they very rare in the poets of 
the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. As primitive ā 
into Welsh au and Armoric e, we may infer - ār 
the earlier form. This view is corroborated by the 
rhymes in the Gododin, of which the following stanza 
contains five of the most common plurals of this form 
(B. An., 73): 
 
Gwyr a aeth Gatracth yg cat yg gawr, 
Nerth meirch a gwrymseirch ac ysgwydawr; 
Peleidyr ar gychwyn a llym waewawr 
A llurugeu claer a chledyuawr. 
Ragorei, tyllei trwy vydinawr, 
 
(1) See, ante, pp. 1-21. 
 
xxx142 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
Kwydei bym pymwnt rac y lavnawr — 
Ruuawn Hir — ef rodei eur e allawr 
A chet a choelvein kein y gerdawr. 
 
Men went to Catraeth arrayed and shouting, 
A force of horses and brown trappings and shields; 
Shafts advancing, and keen lances, 
And shining coats of mail, and swords. 
He excelled, he penetrated through armies; 
Five battalions fell before his blades, — 
Rhuvon the Tall. He was wont to give gold to the altar. 
And treasure and precious stones to the minstrel. 
 
Deprived of initial inflection, the plurals referred to are 
as follows: ysgwydawr, shields, from ysgwyd, 
"scutum"; 
gwaewawr, spears, from gwaew; cledywawr (Armoric 
klezeier), swords, from cledyv, modern cleddyf, 
Irish claidheamh,; bydinawr, armies, from bydin, 
modern byddin, old Welsh bodin; llavnawr, blades, 
from llavn, modern llafn, "lamina." 
 
Allawr, rhyming with these plurals, represents an 
older altār, Latin "altare." Cerdawr, modern cerddor, 
is not a plural but a derivative in -ār (Armoric -er, 
Irish -air, Latin -ārius, Z. 781, 829), signifying a 
minstrel, from cerd, i. e., cerdd, song; so telynawr, 
harper, from telyn, harp; drysawr, a doorkeeper, from 
drws, door; etc. This class of derivatives, which are 
numerous, form their plurals in -orion: thus, cerddorion, minstrels. 
 
Plurals in -awr are unmistakably indicated by the 
associated words in such expressions as 
yt lethrynt lafnawr (B. Tal., 154), blades glanced; 
gwaywawr ebrifet (ib., 172), spears without number; 
lleithrion eu pluawr 
(Gwalchmai, Myv., i, 193), glossy are their plumes. 
 
As examples of the plural in -awr in early middle 
Welsh, I take the following from Cynddelw: llafnawr, 
blades (Myv., i, 214), bydinawr, armies; aessawr, targets; 
preidyawr, "praedae" (ib., 243). That plurals of 
this form disappeared in later Welsh was owing, doubtless, 
to a natural tendency to choose forms not admitting of more than one meaning. 
 
xxx143 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
The form -iawr occurs a few times, as in the above 
preidyawr, and in cadyawr, conflicts (B. An., 82). 
 
I had proposed to compare -awr with the Teutonic 
-er. Professor Hadley, of Yale College, to whose learning 
and genius I have often been indebted for aid in 
these studies, suggests that, as the Teutonic -er originally 
belonged to the stem, and became a distinctive 
mark of the plural only by being dropped in the singular, 
so the Welsh -awr probably had a similar history, 
though, on account of the long quantity of the latter, 
indicating as it does a primitive -ār, it would be unsafe 
to assume its identity with the Teutonic -er; that more 
probably it should be compared with the Latin -āris, or 
with -ar, gen. -āris, as in "calcar," "laquear," etc. 
 
XIII. In the old Welsh poets I find a termination of 
the second singular, present indicative active, which
does not appear to have been noticed in Zeuss or elsewhere. 
It is usually written -yd, and always rhymes 
with words which, in middle and modern Welsh, end 
with the dd sound; hence, in old Welsh, it must have 
been -id, not -it. Verbs with this ending have been 
translated variously, but by no author consistently, and 
scarcely ever correctly. I think the following examples 
with, after a careful view, be considered decisive as to 
its true meaning. 
 
One of the Urien poems, attributed to Taliesin (B. 
Tal. 184), begins thus: 
 
Uryen yr echwyd, 
Haelaf dyn bedyd, 
Lliaws a rodyd 
Y dynyon eluyd. 
Mai y kynnullyd 
Yt wesceryd. 
Llawen beird bedyd 
Tra vo dy uuchyd. 
 
Urien of the plain, 
Most generous of Christians, 
Much dost thou give 
To the men of earth. 
As thou gatherest 
 
xxx144 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
Thou dost scatter. 
Joyful are Christian bards 
While thy life lasts. 
 
The words dy uuchyd, thy life, in the last line, show 
that the passage is an address, and that the verbs ending in -yd 
re in the second person. 
 
Again, in the Book of Taliesin (1-45): 
 
A wdost ti peth wyt 
Pan vych yn kysewyt?
Ae corff ae eneit 
Ae argel canhwyt? 
Eilewyd keluyd 
Pyr nam dywedyd? 
 
Restore the rhyme of the second couplet by reading 
canheit, luminary (modern canaid), then translate: 
 
Knowest thou what thou art 
When thou art sleeping? 
A body or a soul 
Or a hidden light? 
Skilful minstrel, 
Why dost thou not tell me? 
 
The following is from a religious poem in the Book 
of Taliesin (180): 
 
Ti a nodyd 
A ry-geryd 
O pop karchar. 
 
Thou dost help 
Whom thou lovest 
Out of every prison. 
 
The Red Book of Hergest contains the dialogue entitled Cyvoesi (Ages), 
between Myrddin and his sister. 
Gwenddydd says to Myrddin (231): 
 
Llallawc, kan am hatebyd, 
Myrdin uab Moruryn geluyd, 
Truan a chwedyl a dywedyd. 
 
My twin brother, when thou dost answer me. 
Skilful Myrddin son of Morvyn, 
Woful is the tale which thou dost tell. 
 
Note that truan a chwedyl is archaic for truan o 
chwedyl. 
 
xxx145 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
In a dialogue found in the Black Book of Carmarthen (56), 
where, it should be observed, the dd sound is represented by t, 
Ugnach says to Taliesin: 
 
Y tebic y gur deduit, 
Ba hid ei dy a phan doit? 
 
Thou that seemest a prudent man, 
Whither goest thou and whence dost thou come? 
 
I submit whether after a comparative study of these 
passages, which together exhibit nine examples of verbs 
ending in -yd, it is possible to avoid the conclusion that 
this termination marks the second person singular, of 
the present indicative active. It corresponds regularly 
to the Cornish -yth, -eth, and the Armoric -ez, which belong to the same place. 
 
There are many other examples of -yd scattered 
through the old Welsh poems, and some poems whose 
old Welsh origin has been questioned; but in place of 
it we also find -i, as in Irish and in later Welsh. In 
the unquestioned productions of the twelfth and later 
centuries, I find no example of -yd. The proverb 
Gwell nag nac addaw ni wneydd, better a refusal than 
a promise which thou dost not perform, I regard as 
old, though it comes to us in late orthography (Myv., i, 
174). 
 
We cannot account for -yd by supposing the pronoun 
ti, thou (Irish tu), to have been suffixed, without 
admitting that this is a very old formation, that in fact 
the t was already depressed to d in old Welsh. This, 
as before stated, is proved by the words with which the 
termination rhymes. Thus, in the above extracts it 
rhymes with deduit, i. e. dedwydd, prudent, a compound 
which contains the root gwydd, Irish, fiadh, indicating 
a primitive vid; also with celuid,i. e. celfydd, 
skilful, old Welsh celmed (Eutych. ); also with eluyd, 
later elfydd, world, old Welsh elbid (Juv.); also with 
bedyd, modern bedydd, baptism, old Welsh betid 
(Juv.); etc. 
 
XIV. The Irish -id of the third singular, present 
indicative active, is not used in "subjoined" verbs, that is, 
 
xxx146 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
in verbs following certain particles, among which are 
the negatives ni and na, and the verbal ro (Z. 425). 
This idiom obtains also in Welsh. The termination -it 
or -id of the same place, as I have elsewhere shown, 
occurs often in the old Welsh remains; but I have 
found it only in "absolute" verbs. The fact will be 
best illustrated by examples where the same verb occurs 
both as absolute and as subjoined, in the same passage. 
The following is from Llywarch Hen (Herg. 289): 
perëid y rydieu, ny phara ae goreu, the trenches remain, 
they who made them remain not. Among the 
ancient proverbs interspersed through the alphabetical 
collection in the Myvyrian,I find the following: trengid 
gohid, ni threing molud (iii, 177), riches perish, glory 
perishes not; tricid gwr wrth ei barch, ni thrig wrth ei 
gyvarwys (ib.), a man starves on honour, he does not 
starve on bounty; tyvid maban, ni thyv ei gadachan 
(ib.), the child grows, its clout grows not; chwarëid 
mab noeth, ni chwery mab newynawg (ib. 152), a naked 
youth plays, a hungry youth plays not. So again in 
the Gosymdaith (Viaticum) of Llevoed Wynebglawr, a 
versified collection of old Welsh aphorisms (Herg. 307): 
 
Ny nawt eing llyfyrder rac lleith; 
Eughit glew oe gyfarweith. 
 
Not usually does cowardice escape destruction; 
The brave escapes from his conflict. 
 
I do not recognize an exception in the nyt echwenit 
clot kelwyd of the Gosymdaith (Herg. 305). I know of 
no verb that will explain echwenit unless it be achwanegu, 
to increase. The true reading, I think, is nyt 
echwenic clot kelwyd, falsehood does not advance fame. 
The umlauts here postulated are regular. There is a 
similar example in the Black Book (5), ny dichuenic but 
pedi, begging does not promote gain. Here we have a 
compound dychwanegu. 
 
XV. Dr. Davies and other Welsh grammarians very 
properly give -a as a frequent termination of the third 
singular, present and future indicative active: compare 
the Irish -a of the subjoined indicative. Zeuss or his 
 
xxx147 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
editor seems to consider this -a, in middle ^Welsh examples, 
as a part of the stem, as if all the verbs thus 
ending were derivative verbs in -äu (old Welsh -agu, 
modern -au, denominative and causative), which preserve 
the a in conjugation. 
 
It is certain that in middle as well as in modern 
Welsh -a is often used as a termination; and in derivative 
verbs in -äu it is accordingly often added to the a 
of the stem, giving -äa, or -aha, or -häa. Thus, in an 
early-middle translation of Geoffrey's Prophecy of 
Merlin (Myv., ii, 261-7), arwydocäa, "significat," 
adurnocäa, "adornabit," atnewydaha, "renovabit," 
grymhäa, "vigebit," etc. In modern Welsh, -äa has 
become -â; and in consequence of this synaeresis the 
accent is thrown on the last syllable. 
 
Examples abound also in verbs other than those in 
-äu: thus (ib.) doluria, "dolebit," from doluriaw; palla, 
"peribit," irom. pallu; eheta, "convolabit," from ehetec; 
cerda, " procedet," from cerdet; etc. 
 
The following examples, among others, appear in the 
oldest copy of the Laws: guada (86), denies, from 
guadu (ib.); palla (162), fails; gnäa (114), does; 
truharhäa (ii, 4), has compassion. 
 
The following are from one of the poems of Cynddelw 
(Myv., i, 250-1): pwylla, considers; treidia, penetrates; 
bryssya, hastens; atveilya, decays. The i or y before 
-a in the three last examples is foreign to verbs in -äu, 
that is to say, there are no verbs in -iäu. 
The infinitives are, pwyllaw, treiddiaw, brysiaw:, and adfeiliaw. 
 
In the old Welsh poems, as they come to us, -a as a 
termination is infrequent but not unknown; thus in 
Llywarch Hen (Herg. 287, bis), yd äa, goes. We cannot here 
regard the first a as the verbal particle, for it 
is not used after the particle yd. 
 
XVI. In modern Welsh, the present subjunctive (and 
optative) terminations are -of, -ot or -ych, -o, -om, -och, 
-ont. I think it may be shown that the o in these terminations 
represents an old Welsh oi. In the earliest 
Welsh MSS., instead of o we often find oe and wy and 
 
xxx148 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
sometimes even oy, all of which point to an earlier oi: 
compare loinou, gl. " frutices," later, llwynau; gloiu, gl. 
“liquidum," later, gloyw and gloew; etc. 
 
The first singular -wyf for -of is not yet obsolete; in 
middle Welsh it was the usual form. The Venedotian 
Laws furnish one example of -oef in a talloef (120), 
"quod reddam." 
 
The anomalous -ych of the second singular prevails 
in middle Welsh; it is found in one old Welsh gloss, 
anbiic guell, " aue," later, henpych gwell and henffych 
gwell, "mayst thou fare better." This is undoubtedly a 
pronominal ending equivalent to -yth. The latter occurs 
nce in the place of -ych in the Book of Taliesin 
(116): ry-prynhom ni an llocyth tydi vab Meir, may we 
gain thy protection (lit. that thou protect us) Son 
of Mary. I find a comparatively recent example in 
Huw Llwyd of Cynfal (Cymru Fu, 352), who speaks of 
conscience as one nac a ofnith moi gefnu, whose desertion 
thou wilt not fear. In the Laws, ych law occurs 
for yth law, to thy hand (ii, 280, bis). So also in 
Armoric we find ec’h for the more usual ez, 
as in ec'h euz, "tibi est." 
 
The other second singular form, -of, seems to be 
modern so far as it appears in books; but it probably 
came down in some spoken dialect from an old Welsh 
-oit; in fact the form -wyt also occurs (Z. 512). 
 
In the early poets the third singular often has -wy 
instead of -o, e.g. guledichuy, "dominetur" (Carm., 26), 
cothvy, i.e. coddwy, "laedat” (ib. 39), digonwy, "faciat" 
(B. Tal, 121), carwy, amet (Gwalchmai, Myv., i, 193), 
rodwy, "det” (ib. 202), syllwy, "videat," catwy, "servet" 
(Cynddelw, ib. 217). The Black Book (22) has one example of -oe, 
in creddoe, "credat." 
 
For the first plural -om we find wym in bwym, "simus" 
(B. Tal. 181). 
 
For the second plural -och I have observed no other 
form. From analogy, however, we may suppose this 
to represent an old Welsh -oich. 
 
In the oldest copy of the Laws the third plural -oent 
 
xxx149 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
is quite as common as -ont: thus kafoent, "acquirant" 
(1O), menoent, “velint" (22), ranoent, “dividant” (34),
euoent, “bibant” (106), deuedoent, “dicant” (l52), 
kemerhoent, "capiant" (260), etc. Codex E of the Laws has examples of -oynt: 
thus deloynt, "veniant,” elhoynt, “eant" (i, 192); 
llesteyryhoynt, "impediant" (ib. 170); etc. In the Book 
of Taliesin -wynt is frequent: thus prynwynt, "assequantur" (109), 
ymgetwynt, "caveant" (128), atchwelwynt, " revertantur," 
ceisswynt, “quaerant" (129), etc. 
 
It will hardly be questioned that the old Welsh forms 
in oi, thus clearly indicated, were primitive optative forms. 
 
XVII. I think, however, that the present subjunctive 
in o had one other source, or rather that there were certain 
old forms in au (aw), used as future indicative, 
which by the regular change of au to o early became 
indistinguishable from the subjunctive forms in o (from 
oi), and were lost in them. 
 
I begin with the third plural -aunt revealed in the 
cuinhaunt, "deflebit," (scil. "genus hoc,") of the 
Juvencus Glosses (Beitr., iv, 404). I find this termination 
preserved in a few instances. Thus in the Book of 
Taliesin (124): 
 
Gwaethyl gwyr hyt Gaer Weir gwasgarawt Allmyn; 
Gwnahawnt goruoled gwedy gwahyn. 
 
The wrath of men as far as Caer Weir will scatter the Allmyn; 
they will make rejoicing after exhaustion. 
 
Again (ib. 212-3), pebwyllyawnt ar Tren a Tharanhon, 
they will encamp on the Tren and the Taranhon; 
gwerin byt yn wir bydawnt lawen, the populace of the 
earth truly will be happy; etc. 
 
As -aunt passed into -ont its indicative use did not at 
once cease; thus we find in the Black Book (27): 
 
Gwitil a Brithon a Romani 
A vvnahont dyhet a divysci. 
 
Gwyddyl and Britons and Romans 
Will create discord and confusion. 
 
A third singular -au is also estabHshed by a few examples. 
Thus in the Book of Taliesin (l50): 
 
xxx150 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
Ac Owein Mon Maelgynig denawt 
A wnaw Peithwyr gorweidawc. 
 
And Owain of Mona, of Malgonian custom, 
Will lay the Picts prostrate. 
 
Here gwnaw is for gwnäaw, just as gwnant is for 
gwnäant. 
 
In a versified collection of proverbs in the Black 
Book (5) is the following: nid ehalath as traetha ny 
chaffaw ae hamhevo, he who does not relate a thing too 
amply will not find those that will contradict him. 
 
Meilyr ab Gwalchmai, who composed religious poems 
late in the twelfth and early in the thirteenth century, 
has the following (Myv., i, 332): 
 
Ar Duw adef y nef uy llef llwyprawd 
Yny edrinaw ury rac y Drindawd 
Y erchi ym ri rwyf, .... 
 
Toward God's abode, toward Heaven my cry will proceed, 
Until it ascend on high before the Trinity 
To ask my sovereign King, .... 
 
This example, however, and the two next are not 
decisive as to the mood, the connexions being such as 
to admit of either the indicative or the subjunctive. 
 
In Codex B of Brut GrufFudd ab Arthur (Myv., ii, 
305) is the following: a pwy bynac a damweinaw idaw 
yr ageu honno . . . . , and to whomever that death 
shall happen. . . . 
 
In a reputed prophecy of Heinin Fardd addressed to 
Maelgwn Gwynedd (Myv., i, 553), the language of 
which, however, is middle Welsh, is the following line: 
mi anfonaf wledd or sygnedd ir neb ai haeddaw, I will 
send a feast from the constellations to any one who 
shall deserve it. 
 
As -aw passed into -o its indicative use did not at 
once cease. Thus in a poem on the Day of Judgment, 
in the Book of Taliesin (121): 
 
Pryt pan dyffo 
Ef ae gwahano. 
 
When he shall come 
He will separate them. 
 
In the predictive poem entitled Daronwy (ib. 148S): 
 
xxx151 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
Dydeuho kynrein 
O amtir Rufein. 
 
There will come chieftains 
From the vicinage of Rome. 
 
XVIII. Of the third singular -awt, we have already 
seen two examples, gwasgarawt and llwyprawd, in the 
extracts of the last article. Mr. Silvan Evans was the 
first to point this out as a future-ending (Skene, ii, 
424). It is not "-awd, -awdd," however, but -awt, 
-awd, as we may see wherever it is a rhyming syllable, 
as in the above llwyprawd. In the old Welsh poetry 
it occurs often. It also occurs a few times in early-middle 
productions. Thus in Codex B of Brut Gruffudd ab Arthur the clause 
"et Gallicanos possidebit saltus," 
of Geoffrey's original, is rendered a gwladoed 
Freinc a uedhawt (Myv., ii, 262). The Mabinogi of 
Kilhwch and Olwen (Mab., ii, 201, 202) contains three 
examples: bydhawt, it will be, methawd, it will fail, 
ymchoelawd, it will turn. Ebel seems to regard the 
two last as used optatively (Z. 1097). Lady Charlotte 
Guest, adopting the sense naturally suggested by the 
context, translates them as future indicative. 
 
I think this termination is not distinctively future, 
however, but another case of what in Welsh is a general 
fact, the use of the present to supply the place of a 
future. If so, we have in -aut, and probably also in 
-aunt, a remnant of the ā-conjugation. This view is 
favoured by the crihot, " vibrat", of the Luxemburg 
Glosses, which have o for au in final syllables. It is 
favoured also by a few examples in poetry, where the 
present tense woidd naturally be understood, as in the 
following proverb of the Gosymdaith (Herg., 307): 
gwisgawt coet kein gowyll, the wood wears a fair hood. 
 
XIX. The common middle Welsh conjugation of the 
perfect active indicative is -eis, -eist, -awd(d), -asom, 
-asawch, -asant. The third singular, however, had 
besides -awd(d), the endings -u'ys, -as, -es, and -is. To 
these I must add -essit, -yssit, -sit, of which there are 
evident examples in the early poetry, though they have 
 
 
 
xxx152 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
generally been confounded by translators with the 
similar terminations of the pluperfect passive impersonal. 
 
The Gododin (B. An., 71), in recounting the deeds of 
one of its heroes, says: seinyessyt e gledyf ym penn 
mameu, his sword resounded in the head of mothers 
(that is, he killed the sons). 
 
The following is from a religious poem in the Book 
of Taliesin (181): 
 
Prif teyrnas a duc Ionas o perued kyt; 
Kiwdawt Ninieuen bu gwr llawen pregethyssit. 
 
The Chief of Sovereignty brought Jonah from the belly of the whale; 
To the city of Nineveh it was a joyful man that preached. 
 
Kiwdawt is Latin "civitāt-"; kyt is Latin "cetus." 
 
The translators in Skene recognise the perfect active 
in the above examples. Why not also in the following? 
Kewssit da nyr gaho drwc (B. Tal., 148), he has found 
good who does not find evil. This aphorism, in a later 
form, appears in the Myvyrian collection (iii, 150): 
cavas dda ni chavas ddrwg, he has found good who has 
not found evil. 
 
The next is from Cynddelwv (Myv. i, 224): 
Llary Einnyawn lluchdawn llochessid 
Veirtyon — vab kynon clod venwyd. 
 
Gentle Einnyawn, lavish of gifts, protected 
The bards — the son of Cynon, the glory of wit. 
 
The next is from Meilyr ab Gwalchmai (Myv., i, 324): 
 
Delyessid Yeuan yeuangc deduyt 
Diheu uab Duu nef yn dufyr echuyt. 
 
John the young, the wise, held 
The true Son of God in the water of the plain. 
 
From the same (ib.): prynessid mab Duu mad gerennhyt, 
the Son of God purchased a blessed friendship. 
 
In Brut Gruffudd ab Arthur (Myv., ii, 249) there is 
an example of -assit: ar gwenwyn hwnnw trwy lawer o 
amser ac llygrassyd, and that poison [the Pelagian 
heresy] for a long time corrupted them. Geoffrey's 
original here has the pluperfect: "cujus venenum ipsos 
multis diebus afiecerat." But the translation in the 
 
xxx153 STUDIES IN CYMRIC PHILOLOGY. 
 
Brut is free. The rest of the above examples, either on 
the face of them, or in view of the connexions in which 
they occur, are decisive, and indicate the perfect. 
 
May we not compare here the -sit of Latin perfects 
in si? 
 
XX. The Welsh perfect passive forms in -at and -et 
are doubtless perfect participles which passed into finite 
verbs by the habitual omission of the auxiliary, — the 
place of the participle being in the meantime supplied 
by the verbal adjective in -etic, with which Ebel 
compares Latin " dediticius," “facticius," "suppositicius," 
etc. These changes must have taken place at a very 
early period; yet I find a few middle-Welsh examples 
where the participle, in composition with the auxiliary 
oedd, was, retains its proper meaning. I am not aware 
that they have been pointed out. 
 
The following are from Brut Gruffudd ab Arthur: 
keyssyaw y wlat ry-vanagadoed udunt (Myv., ii, 103), 
to seek the country which had been mentioned to them; 
pym meyb hagen a anadoed ydaw (ib., 160), there had 
been born to him, however, five sons; 
a megys y dyscadoed ydaw, brywaw y pryvet a oruc (ib., 170), 
and as it had been taught him, he bruised the insects; megys 
yd archadoed (ib., 286), as it had been commanded. 
 
The following is a stanza of uncertain authorship, 
printed among the early-middle poems in the Myvyrian 
(i, 254): 
 
Eurwas kyn lleas, yn llyssoet enwawc 
Mygedawc magadoet 
O bob da dofnytadoet; 
O bob defnyt deifnyawc oet. 
 
The illustrious youth, before he perished, 
had been bred in famous and grand courts. 
Of every good was he composed; 
in every matter be was skilled. 
 
The verbs here to be noticed are, managad-oedd, 
ganad-oedd, dyscad-oedd, archad-oedd, magad-oedd, 
dafnyddad-oedd. They are not imperfects, as the similar 
combinations in Armoric are, e. g., oa caret, was 
loved; but pluperfects, like the Latin "amatus erat." 
 
________________________________
 

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