#gramadeg

                                             Present Tense

• There is only one present tense in Welsh. E.g. I play/am playing/do play are all conjugated as shown below • Present tense is conjugated in “long form” = bod (conj.) + subj. + yn/’n + verbnoun • The focus of this and all my grammar posts is spoken (particularly southern) Welsh • Conjugations in brackets are most likely to be encountered in formal writing

Word order = bod (conj.) + subject + yn/’n + verbnoun                     e.g. Dw + i + ‘n + cysgu = dwi’n cysgu                            This can mean “I sleep”, “I am sleeping” and “I do sleep”

Affirmative - Someone/thing does/is

I am/do                                (ry)dw i*                       You are/do (inf.)                   (rwyt) ti You are/do (pol.)                  (ry)dych chi* He/she/Tom is/does             mae (f)e/hi/Tom The sing. noun is/does        mae’r sing. noun (e.g. plentyn) We are/do                           (ry)dyn ni* You are/do (pl.)                   (ry)dych chi*                  They are/do                         maen nhw The pl. noun are/do             mae’r pl. noun (e.g. plant)

* May also be heard with “d” omitted (where y becomes ŷ) in speech: e.g. wi/ŷch   chi/ŷn ni

Examples - Bethan is singing = Mae Bethan yn canu                    The child stands = Mae’r plentyn yn sefyll                    We wait =  Ŷn ni’n aros

sy is a form of bod used for relative clauses!

for most cases it’s probably easiest to think of it as ‘that’ or ‘who’ - so, for example, ‘a child who speaks welsh’ would be plentyn sy’n siarad cymraeg. it’s also used for questions - e.g. ‘who’s watching the rugby tonight?’ would be pwy sy’n gwylio’r rygbi heno?

other examples:

the car that’s broken down - y car sy wedi torri i lawr

what’s wrong? - be’ sy’n bod? (literally “what’s being?”)

it’s me that plays football [i.e. not someone else] - fi sy’n chwarae pêl-droed

do you know what’s happening? - wyt ti’n gwybod be’ sy’n digwydd?

sy follows and relates to a subject, and is present tense. so, for contrast:

y dyn sy’n (fy) ngweld fi - the man who sees me

y dyn a welodd fi - the man who saw me

sy is actually short for sydd but that normally sounds p formal and i’d normally avoid it. the only time i might use it is for sydd ar gael, ‘that is available’. one note is that although sy and yn together make sy’n, you can’t do that with sydd - you have to say sydd yn.

affirmative:

(ry)dw i - rwyt ti - mae hi/e/o

(ry)dyn ni - (ry)dych chi - maen nhw

*

negative:

(dy)dw i ddim - dwyt ti ddim - dydy hi/e/o

(dy)dyn ni ddim - (dy)dych chi ddim - (dy)dyn nhw ddim

*

interrogative:

(y)dw i? - wyt ti? - ydy hi/e/o?

(y)dyn ni? - (y)dych chi? - (y)dyn nhw?

*

the elements in brackets are commonly omitted in speech. however: when the interrogative is used alone to mean “yes”, or with “nac” to mean “no”, the y cannot be dropped.

this is a north welsh paradigm. there is no standard form of welsh. other possible forms include:

rwy or wy for dw (south)

yw and dyw for ydy and dydy (south)

dan and dach for dyn and dych (north)

Adjectives follow nouns (as a rule of thumb, a few adjectives come before but you can learn them by heart), adverbs are kind of a mixed bunch.

Iawn on its own means ‘fine, OK’, but if it comes after an adjective it means ‘very’ - da iawn, very good; drwg iawn, very bad; blasus iawn, very tasty, etc. 

But eithaf, ‘quite’ (often eitha colloquially), comes before an adjective: eitha cyflym, quite fast; eitha araf, quite slow. 

There’s not really a set pattern with adverbs and adjectives: some adverbs come before the adjective, like eithaf, rhy, mwy, hollol, and some come after, like iawn. You’ll have to learn them for each adverb.

The BBC has an (archived) page for Welsh learners, and some PDFs explaining grammar - if you’re learning with Duolingo you might find these helpful.

Obviously, the present tense is kind of an essential thing to know if you’re looking to communicate with Welsh speakers - as it is in every language. Thankfully, the present tense is fairly simple in Welsh, and I’m going to teach you. You’re welcome.

There are two ways to form the present tense in Welsh, but I’ll just teach you the most useful one - the one used in everyday speech. To do this, you don’t need to conjugate any verbs. All you have to do is take a person (???) and add the verb on the end:

Rydw i’n - I am (note: in everyday speech, many people will use “Dw i’n” instead, but both are correct)

Rwyt ti’n - You are (singular, informal)

Mae o’n/mae hi’n - He/she is (note: you can also use “mae e’n” instead of “mae o’n” for the male version, depending on where you live in Wales - both are correct, and the female version always stays the same)

Rydyn ni’n - We are

Rydych chi’n - You are (plural, formal)

Maen nhw’n - They are

Once you have these, you can add the verb on the end. Here are some examples:

Rydw i’n canu - I am singing

Rydyn ni’n siarad - We are speaking

Mae o’n chwarae - He is playing

Sometimes, in Welsh, you need to change the first letter of a word. I would assume it's for aesthetic purposes, but I'm not all that sure. Soft mutation is one of the three mutations of words in Welsh - the others are nasal and aspirate, if you are interested in looking those up. Soft mutation occurs very often, but here are a few examples:

Singular, feminine nouns after the article y (the) e.g. merch (girl) becomes y ferch after the article y is added to the beginning Note: The consonants rh and ll are in exception to this rule. e.g. llaw (hand) remains y llaw

Feminine nouns after the numbers un (one) and dwy (two) e.g. cath (cat) becomes un gath after the article un is added to the beginning cadair (chair) becomes dwy gadair after the article dwy is added to the beginning Note: This also applies to masculine nouns after the number dau, the male (and most commonly used when counting) equivalent of two.

Adjectives that follow a singular, feminine noun e.g. tal (tall) becomes dal when it follows a singular, feminine noun (merch dal - tall girl)

Adjectives and nouns that follow the linking word yn e.g. coch (red) becomes yn goch when the linking word yn is added to the beginning Note: Again, the consonants rh and ll do not follow this rule.

The consonants that need to be changed in soft mutation are:

p --> b

t --> d

c --> g

b --> f

d --> dd

g --> disappears

ll --> l

m --> f

rh --> r