WELSH LANGUGE READING LIST
- Mabinogion or The Four Branches of the Mabinogi, unknown, tr. Jeffrey
Gantz, 1976, Penguin Books Ltd., Harmondsworth UK. Collection of eleven prose tales from
the Welsh oral tradition; the earliest manuscript dates from about 1325.
- The Mabinogion, By Jones, Gwyn, and Jones, Thomas. Dent, 1984. This is
invaluable for attempting to read the original manuscripts, as it's a very literal
translation of the material. It's drawback is the same as it's feature - if you aren't
translating, I would not choose this as my first exposure to Welsh, as it's written in
very stilted, formal, almost Victorian English.
- A Grammar of Middle Welsh by D. Simon Evans. If you're interested in
reading the original, this is your essential companion. Dublin Institute for Advanced
Studies, 1976. Be warned that this is what the title says: grammar. It's not a Middle
Welsh tutorial. Trying to learn Welsh from this would be like learning C from K & R,
Appendix A.
- The dictionary is: Evans and Thomas, Y Geiriadur Mawr; Gwasg Gomer,
Llandysul, 1986. (Welsh - English and English - Welsh sections.) I also suggest the
introduction from: Thomson, R. L., Pwyll Pendeuic Dyuet; Dublin Institute
for Advanced Studies, 1980. Try reading through some of the Welsh from the Jones and Jones
Mabinogion open to the same page. Pwyll (all of the Dublin
Institute series, actually) has a fairly complete vocabulary. Be warned, though, that one
of the fundamental parts of a Celtic language is initial mutation. Consonants at the
beginning of a word are not reliable. For example, the word for Wales is Cymru. But 'to
Wales' is 'i Gymru,' and 'in Wales' is 'yng Nghymru.' All of these would be in the
dictionary only under Cymru; you just have to know which mutation is taking place. (It's
not like Irish, where you keep the original letter and just add to it.)
