Understand and Pronounce Welsh Place Names
At first glance many Welsh town and place names appear to the English speaker as "unpronouncable" but this is only because Welsh and other Celtic languages have a few different rules. Learn these simple rules and you will not only find that you can pronounce most Welsh words, but that the pronunciation of Welsh is much more regular and logical than English....
Two Extra Vowels
Welsh has two extra vowels .... "y" ( pronounced "uh" as in thorough, or sometimes "i" as in tin) and.... "w" (pronounced "oo") as in room.
A village named Cwmtwrch, which does not appear to have any vowels, actually has two and is pronounced "Coomtoork."
Pen-y-bont is pronounced Pen-uh-Bont, as is the case whenever "y" is used to link two words in this way. eg Betws-y-Coed
( Betoos-uh-Co ed).
When "y" is not isolated by hyphens as above it is usually pronounced as in English eg.. Gwyn is pronounced "G oo in" (Gwin) and a common house name in Welsh is Ty-Gwyn ( Tea Gwin ) which means White House.
Aberystwyth is therefore pronounced ... Aber i st oo i th. (Aberistwith )
Four Specials to Remember
These are the four pronunciations special to Welsh which are additional or different to English...
So that in Welsh ...
"u" is pronounced "ee". Cwmdu is pronounced... Coomdee.
"f" is pronounced "v". Fan-Fach is pronounced... Van-Vark.
( Notice that the sound of the two "a"s changes as it often does in English. e.g. match, park. In Welsh before the letters "ch" it is pronounced as the long "a" as in Bach( Bark). It's most common pronunciation however is as the short "a" in Pat or Aberystwyth)
The English "f" as in fish is represented in Welsh by "ff" and "Fforestfach" is pronounced in Welsh as "forestvark"
"dd" is pronounced " th" as in thing. So that Giedd is pronounced "Gi eth"
"ll" is pronounced "cl" as in clan. So that Llansamlet is pronounced " Clansamlet"
And that's it. Who said you couldn't speak Welsh ?........
Just to be sure have a practice on these place names below then see the lists and their meanings on the following pages.
| Remember that all the letters are pronounced in Welsh, not like English where some are silent. |
Abertawe ( The Welsh name for Swansea, means mouth of the river Tawe ) pronounced Aber ta weh.( the final "e" being pronounced "e" as in wet.
Cwmgiedd ( meaning the valley of the river Giedd) pronounced Coom gi eth.
Brynmawr ( meaning large hill ) pronounced Brin ma wer ( with the "a" short as in cat).
Llanfair Caereinion (Castle by church of St Mary) pronounced Clan vair kire eynion.
Aberhonddu ( The Welsh name for Brecon, means mouth ( confluence ) of the river Honddu) pronounced Aber hon thee
Now see the roots for Welsh place names and their meanings using the alphabetical listings below.....