Themorphology of theWelsh language has many characteristics likely to be unfamiliar to speakers ofEnglish or continental European languages likeFrench orGerman, but has much in common with the other modernInsular Celtic languages:Irish,Scottish Gaelic,Manx,Cornish, andBreton. Welsh is a moderately inflected language. Verbs inflect for person, number, tense, and mood, with affirmative, interrogative, and negative conjugations of some verbs. There is nocase inflection in Modern Welsh.

Modern Welsh can be written, and spoken, in several levels of formality, for example colloquial orliterary,^[1][2] as well as different dialects. The grammar described in this article is for Colloquial Welsh, which is used for speech and informal writing. Literary Welsh is closer to the form of Welsh used inWilliam Morgan's 1588 translation of the Bible and can be seen in formal writing. It does not reflect the spoken language presented here.

Initialconsonant mutation is a phenomenon common to allInsular Celtic languages, although there is no evidence of it in the ancientContinental Celtic languages of the first millennium AD; nor was there any evidence of this in the Insular Celtic languages around the 500s.

The firstconsonant of a word in Welsh may change when preceded by certain words (e.g.i, o, yn, anda), or because of some other grammatical context (such as when the grammaticalobject follows a conjugated verb). Welsh has three mutations: thesoft mutation (Welsh:treiglad meddal), thenasal mutation (Welsh:treiglad trwynol), and theaspirate mutation (Welsh:treiglad llaes; also calledspirant mutation in some grammars). These are also represented in theorthography:

A blank cell indicates no change.

The mutationts → j reflects a change heard in modern words borrowed from English. Borrowed words liketsips (chips) can often be heard in Wales and the mutated formjips is also common.Dw i'n mynd i gael tsips (I'm going to get chips);Mae gen i jips (I have chips). Despite this the 'ts' → 'j' mutation is not usually included in the classic list of Welsh mutations and is rarely taught in formal classes. Nevertheless, it is a part of the colloquial language and is used by native, first-language speakers.

The word for "stone" iscarreg, but "the stone" isygarreg (soft mutation), "my stone" isfyngharreg (nasal mutation) and "her stone" iseicharreg (aspirate mutation). These examples represent usage in thestandard language; there is some regional andidiolectal variation in colloquial usage. In particular, the soft mutation is often used where nasal or aspirate mutation might be expected on the basis of these examples.^[3]

Mutation is not triggered by theform of the preceding word; the meaning and grammatical function of the word are also relevant. For example, whileyn meaning "in" triggers nasal mutation, homonyms ofyn do not. For example:

• In the sentenceMae plastig yn nhrwyn Siaco ("There is plastic in Siaco's nose")trwyn has undergone nasal mutation.
• In the sentenceMae trwyn Siaco yn blastig ("Siaco's nose is plastic" )plastig has undergonesoft mutation, not nasal mutation.
• In the sentenceMae trwyn Siaco yn cynnwys plastig ("Siaco's nose contains plastic")cynnwys is not mutated.

Thesoft mutation (Welsh:treiglad meddal) is by far the most common mutation in Welsh. When words undergo soft mutation, the general pattern is that unvoiced plosives become voiced plosives, and voiced plosives become fricatives or disappear; some fricatives also change, and the full list is shown in the above table.

In some cases alimited soft mutation takes place. This differs from the full soft mutation in that words beginning withrh- andll- do not mutate.

Common situations where thelimited soft mutation occurs include:

• Feminine singular nouns after the definite article (y / yr / 'r), e.g.y rhyfel 'the war', not *y ryfel;y llwyfan 'the windpipe', not *y lwyfan.
• Feminine nouns following the numeralun (one), e.g.un rhyfel 'one war', not *un ryfel;un llwyfan 'one windpipe', not *un lwyfan.
• Nouns or adjectives used predicatively or adverbially afteryn.
• Adjectives followingmor ("so"),rhy ("too") orpur ("fairly, very").

Common situations where thefull soft mutation occurs are as follows – this list is by no means exhaustive:

• Qualifiers (adjectives, nouns, or verb-nouns) used to qualify feminine singular nouns, e.g.cath fawr 'a big cat' [<mawr];hogan ganu 'a singing girl' [<canu].
• Words immediately following the prepositionsam ("for"),ar ("on"),at ("to"),dan ("under"),dros ("over"),trwy ("through"),heb ("without"),hyd ("until"),gan ("by"),wrth ("by, near, beside, with"),i ("to"),o ("of, from")
• Nouns following the number two (dau /dwy)
• Nouns following adjectives (N.B. most adjectives follow the noun); i.e.hen ddyn 'old man' (fromdyn 'man').
• Nouns after the possessive adjectivesdy (informal/singular 'your') andei ('his').
• An object of a conjugated verb.
• The second element in many compound words, i.e.Llanfair fromllan ('parish') +Mair ('Mary').
• Verb-nouns following an indirect object, i.e.rhaid i mi fynd ('I must go').
• Inflected verbs in the interrogative and negative (also frequently, in the spoken language, the affirmative), though this should strictly be the 'mixed mutation'.

The occurrence of the soft mutation often obscures the origin of placenames to non-Welsh-speaking visitors. For example,Llanfair is the church ofMair (Mary), andPontardawe is the bridge on theTawe (pontar +Tawe).

Thenasal mutation (Welsh:treiglad trwynol) normally occurs:

• afterfy – generally pronounced as if spelty(n) – ("my"), e.g.gwely ("a bed"),fy ngwely ("my bed"), pronouncedyngwely
• after the locative prepositionyn ("in"), e.g.Tywyn ("Tywyn"),yn Nhywyn ("in Tywyn")
• after the negatingprefixan- ("un-"), e.g.teg ("fair"),annheg ("unfair").

Notes

1. The prepositionyn becomesym if the following noun (mutated or not) begins withm, and becomesyng if the following noun begins withng, e.g.Bangor ("Bangor"),ym Mangor ("in Bangor");Caerdydd ("Cardiff"),yng Nghaerdydd ("in Cardiff").
2. In words beginning withan-, then is dropped before the mutated consonant (except if the resultant mutation allows for a doublen), e.g.an +personol →amhersonol (although it would be retained before a non-mutating consonant, e.g.an +sicr →ansicr).
3. In some dialects the soft mutation is often substituted afteryn giving forms likeyn Gaerdydd for "in Cardiff", or it is even lost altogether, especially with place names, givingyn Caerdydd. This would be considered incorrect in formalregisters.

Under nasal mutation,voicedstop consonants becomenasals, and unvoiced stops becomevoiceless nasals. A non-standard mutation also occurs in some parts ofNorth Wales where nasal consonants are also unvoiced, e.g.fy mham ("my mother"; standard:fy mam). This may also occur (unlike the ordinary nasal mutation) afterei ("her"): e.g.ei nhain hi ("her grandmother", standardei nain hi).

The nameaspirate mutation can be misleading as the affected consonants do not become aspirated, but become fricatives. This is represented by the addition of anh after the original initial consonant (c/k/,p/p/,t/t/ →ch/χ/,ph/f/,th/θ/), but the resultant forms are pronounced as single phonemes.

The aspirate mutation occurs:

• after the possessiveei when it means "her" –eichi hi 'her dog' (<ci 'dog')
• aftera ("and") –coffi atheisen 'coffee and cake' (<teisen 'cake')
• afterâ ("with", "by means of") –cwtogi âchyllell 'cut with a knife' (<cyllell 'knife')
• aftergyda ("with") –teisen gydachoffi 'cake with coffee' (<coffi 'coffee')
• for nouns after the masculine numeral three (tri) –triphysgodyn 'three fish(es)' (<pysgodyn 'fish')
• after the number six (chwech, written before a noun aschwe) –chwephlentyn 'six children' (<plentyn 'child')

Aspirate mutation is the least-used mutation in colloquial Welsh. The only word that it always follows in everyday language isei ("her") and it is also found in set phrases, e.g.mwy na thebyg ("more than likely"). Its occurrence is unusual in the colloquial Southern phrasedyna pham ("that's why") asdyna causes the soft mutation, not aspirate mutation. Colloquially, the aspirate mutation is often replaced by the soft mutation, or ignored altogether – particularly mutation oft- andp-; one is likely to hearpaid âphoeni, paid âpoeni, andpaidpoeni for 'don't worry'.

A mixed mutation occurs when negating conjugated verbs. Initial consonants undergo aspirate mutation if subject to it, and soft mutation if not. For example,clywais i ("I heard") anddwedais i ("I said") are negated aschlywais i ddim ("I heard nothing") andddwedais i ddim ("I said nothing"). In practice, soft mutation is often used even when aspirate mutation would be possible (e.g.glywais i ddim); this reflects the fact that aspirate mutation is in general infrequent in the colloquial language (see above).

Under some circumstances anh is added to the beginning of words that begin with vowels, a process commonly called 'h-prothesis' and usually calledpre-vocalic aspiration (PVA) by linguists. This occurs after the possessive pronounsei ("her"),ein ("our") andeu ("their"), e.g.oedran ("age"),ei hoedran hi ("her age"). It also occurs withugain ("twenty") afterar ("on") in the traditionalvigesimal counting system, e.g.un ar hugain ("twenty-one", literally "one on twenty").

Although aspirate mutation also involves the addition ofh in spelling, the environments for aspirate mutation and initialh addition do not overlap except forei ("her").

Welsh has no indefinitearticle. This means that indefiniteness is implied by the lack of definite article or determiner. The nouncath, therefore, means both 'cat' and 'a cat'.

English has no plural indefinite article proper, but often uses the word 'some' in place of one: compare "I have an apple" and "I have some apples", where the word 'some' is being used as an article because the English language calls for something in this position, compare "I have apples" and "I have some apples", the former is rarely encountered in English. In these types of English sentences, the word 'some' is therefore left untranslated due to there being no concept of an indefinite article in Welsh:mae gen i afalau ('I have [some] apples').

The definite article, which precedes the words it modifies and whose usage differs little from that of English, has the formsy, yr, and’r. The rules governing their usage are:

• When the previous word ends in a vowel, regardless of the quality of the word following,’r is used, e.g.mae'r gath tu allan ("the cat is outside"). This rule takes precedence over the other two.
• When the following word (usually a noun) begins with a vowel orh,yr is used, e.g.yr ardd ("the garden"),yr haul ("the sun"). "w" counts as a vowel in words such asyr wyneb ("the face"),yr wythnos ("the week"); similarly "i" inyr iaith ("the language"). (But sometimesy is heard beforewyneb andiaith.)
• In all other places,y is used, e.g.y bachgen ("the boy"). "w" counts as a consonant in words such asy wlad ("the country"),y we ("the web").

The article triggers the soft mutation when it is used with feminine singular nouns, e.g.tywysoges "(a) princess" buty dywysoges ("the princess").

The definite article is used in Welsh where it would not be used in English in the following ways:

• To prevent a noun from being indefinite. In an English sentence likeI'm going to school, the nounschool has no article, but the listener is expected to know which school is being talked about. In Welsh this noun (ysgol) would take the definite article:dw i'n mynd i'r ysgol ('I'm going to school').
• With demonstratives likethis andthat, which in Welsh are phrases equivalent to Englishthe... here (this) andthe... there (that), e.g.y bore 'ma (this morning);y gadair 'na (that chair).
• In certain places where English uses an indefinite article. English phrases likeone pound per kilogram /one pound a kilogram replace the indefinite article with the definite article, e.g.un bunt y cilogram.
• In genitive constructions. English can again get away with no article in these phrases, e.g.Town Hall,City Centre. In Welsh these call for use of the definite article, e.g.Neuadd y Dref (Town Hall, lit. "hall of the town");Canol y Ddinas (City Centre, lit. "centre of the city").

As in most other Indo-European languages, all nouns belong to a certaingrammatical gender; the genders in Welsh are masculine and feminine. A noun's gender usually conforms to its referent's natural gender when it has one (e.g.mam 'mother' is grammatically feminine), but otherwise there are no major patterns (except that, as in many languages, certain noun suffixes show a consistent gender, as sometimes do nouns referring to certain classes of thing, e.g. all months of the year in Welsh are masculine) and gender must simply be learnt.

Welsh has two systems ofgrammatical number.Singular/plural nouns correspond to the singular/plural number system of English, although noun plurals are unpredictable and formed in several ways, since the plural form cannot be discerned simply by its singular form. Most nouns form the plural with a suffix (the most common, by far, is-au), e.g.tad / tadau. Others form the plural through vowel change (a process known asaffection in Celtic languages), e.g.bachgen / bechgyn 'boy / boys'. Still others form their plurals through some combination of the two, e.g.chwaer / chwiorydd 'sister / sisters'.

A few nouns also display adual number, e.g.llaw 'hand',dwylo '(two) hands', thoughllaw also has the general pluralllawau. The dualdwylo comes from combiningllaw with the feminine numeraldwy 'two';dwylo is only used to refer to the hands of a single person, elsellawau is used, e.g.dy ddwylo 'your hands',eich dwylo 'your hands',fy nwylo 'my hands',ein dwylo 'our hands', butmae llawau gyda phobol 'people have hands'.Deufis is used for 'a period of two months' anddeuddydd is 'a period of two days', these usingdau rather thandwy.^[4]

Welsh also has a special 'plural' for 'a period of three days',tridiau which is commonly used across Wales.^[4]

The other system of grammatical number is thecollective/singulative. The nouns in this system form the singulative by adding the suffix-yn (for masculine nouns) or-en (for feminine nouns) to the collective noun. Most nouns which belong in this system are frequently found in groups, for example,plant "children" andplentyn "a child", orcoed "trees" andcoeden "a tree". In dictionaries, the collective form, being the root form, is given first.

Adjectives normally follow the noun they qualify, while a few, such ashen, pob, annwyl, andholl ("old", "every", "dear", "whole") precede it. For the most part, adjectives are uninflected, though there are a few with distinct masculine/feminine or singular/plural forms. After feminine singular nouns, adjectives receive the soft mutation.

Adjective comparison in Welsh is fairly similar to the English system. Adjectives with one or two syllables receive the endings-ach "-er" and-a(f) "-est", which change finalb, d, g intop, t, c byprovection, e. g.teg "fair",tecach "fairer",teca(f) "fairest". Adjectives with two or more syllables use the wordsmwy "more" andmwya "most", e. g.teimladwy "sensitive",mwy teimladwy "more sensitive",mwya teimladwy "most sensitive". Adjectives with two syllables can go either way.There is an additional degree of comparison, theequative, meaning "as ... as ...", e. g.cymaint â choeden "as big as a tree", wherecymaint is the equative form ofmawr "big, great, much".

These are the possessive adjectives:

	Singular	Translation	Plural	Translation
1st Person	fy,'y(n)	my	ein	our
2nd Person	dy	your, thy	eich	your
3rd Person	ei	his, her, its	eu	their

The possessive adjectives precede the noun they qualify, which is often followed by the corresponding form of the personal pronoun, e.g.fy mara i "my bread",dy fara di "your bread",ei fara fe "his bread", etc. The corresponding pronoun is often dropped in the spoken language,fy mara (my bread),dy fara (your bread),ei fara (his bread) andei bara (her bread).

The possessive adjectivefy is most often heard as'yn or'y followed by the mutated noun. For example,bara ('bread') would likely be heard as'y mara ('my bread').

The demonstrative adjectives areyma "this"' andyna "that" (this usage derives from their original function as adverbs meaning "here" and "there" respectively). When used in this context they are almost always shortened to'ma and'na. They follow the noun they qualify, which also takes the article. For example,y llyfr "the book",y llyfr 'ma "this book",y llyfr 'na "that book"; literallythe book here andthe book there.

The Welsh personal pronouns are:

		Singular	Plural
1st Person		mi, i, fi	ni
2nd Person		ti, di	chi
3rd Person	Masculine	e/fe, o/fo	nhw
	Feminine	hi

The Welsh masculine-feminine gender distinction is reflected in the pronouns. There is, consequently, no word corresponding to English "it", and the choice ofe/o (south and north Welsh respectively) orhi depends on the grammatical gender of the antecedent.

The Englishdummy orexpletive "it" construction in phrases like "it's raining" or "it was cold last night" also exists in Welsh and other Indo-European languages like French, German, and Dutch, but not in Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Indo-Aryan, or Slavic languages. Unlike other masculine-feminine languages, which often default to the masculine pronoun in the construction, Welsh uses the feminine singularhi, thus producing sentences like:

Mae hi'n bwrw glaw.

It's raining.

Roedd hi'n oer neithiwr.

It was cold last night.

However, colloquially the pronoun is often omitted when it would be translated as "it" in English, leaving:

Mae'n bwrw glaw.

It's raining.

Roedd'n oer neithiwr.

It was cold last night.

Third-person masculine singular formso andfo are heard in parts of mid- and north Wales, whilee andfe are heard in parts of mid-, west and south Wales.

The pronoun formsi, e, ando are used as subjects after a verb. In the inflected future of the verbsmynd, gwneud, dod, andcael, first-person singular constructions likedo fi may be heard.I, e, ando are also used as objects with compound prepositions, for exampleo flaen o 'in front of him'.Fi, fe, andfo are used after conjunctions and non-inflected prepositions, and also as the object of an inflected verb:

Weloch chi fo dros y penwythnos?

Did you see him over the weekend?

Fe andfo exclusively are used as subjects with the inflected conditional:

Dylai fe brynu un newydd i ti.

He ought to buy you a new one.

Bothi, e, ando andfi, fe, andfo are heard withinflected prepositions, as objects of verbal nouns, and also as following pronouns with their respective possessive adjectives:

Wyt ti wedi ei weld e/fe/o/fo heddiw?

Have you seen him today?

Alla i ddim dod o hyd i fy allweddi i/fi.

I can't find my keys.

The use of first-person singularmi is limited in the spoken language, appearing ini mi "to/for me" or as the subject with the verbddaru, used in a preterite construction.

Ti is found most often as the second-person singular pronoun, howeverdi is used as the subject of inflected future forms, as a reinforcement in the imperative, and as following pronoun to the possessive adjectivedy ... "your ..."

Chi, in addition to serving as the second-person plural pronoun, is also used as a singular in formal situations, as is inFrench andRussian. Conversely,ti can be said to be limited to the informal singular, such as when speaking with a family member, a friend, or a child. This usage corresponds closely to the practice in other European languages. An alternative form ofti, used almost exclusively in some north-western dialects, ischdi;^[5][6] as an independent pronoun it occurs especially frequently after a vowel sound at the end of the phrase (e.g.efo chdi, i chdi, wela i chdi, dyna chdi).^[5]

The reflexive pronouns are formed with the possessive adjective followed byhun "self". There is variation between North and South forms. The first person singular possessive pronounfy is usually pronounced as if spelty(n).

		Singular	Plural
North	1st Person	fy hun	ein hun
	2nd Person	dy hun	eich hun
	3rd Person	ei hun	eu hun
South	1st Person	fy hunan	ein hunain
	2nd Person	dy hunan	eich hunain, eich hunan
	3rd Person	ei hunan	eu hunain

There is no gender distinction in the third person singular.

This sectionneeds expansion. You can help byadding to it.(December 2017)

Welsh has special emphatic forms of the personal pronouns.

The term 'emphatic pronoun' is misleading since they do not always indicate emphasis. They are perhaps more correctly termed 'conjunctive, connective or distinctive pronouns' since they are used to indicate a connection between or distinction from another nominal element. For example, 'minnau' may on occasion be best translated 'I/me, for my part'; 'I/me, on the other hand', 'I/me, however', or even simply 'I/me'. Full contextual information is necessary to interpret their function in any given sentence.

		Singular	Plural
1st Person		minnau, innau, finnau	ninnau
2nd Person		tithau	chithau
3rd Person	Masculine	fyntau (yntau)	nhwythau
	Feminine	hithau

The emphatic pronouns can be used with possessive adjectives in the same way as the simple pronouns are used (with the added function of distinction or connection).

While the singular demonstrative pronounsthis andthat have separate forms for masculine and feminine, there is only a single plural form in each case (these,those). This is consistent with a general principle in Welsh that gender is not marked in the plural. The latter forms are also often used for intangible, figurative, or general ideas (though cf. also the use of 'hi' discussed above).

	Masculine	Feminine	Intangible
this	hwn	hon	hyn
that	hwnnw, hwnna	honno, honna	hynny
these	y rhain
those	y rheiny

In certain expressions,hyn may represent "now" andhynny may represent "then".

In Colloquial Welsh, the majority of tenses and moods make use of an auxiliary verb, usuallybod "to be" orgwneud "to do". The conjugation ofbod is dealt with in Irregular Verbs below.

There arefive periphrastic tenses in Colloquial Welsh which make use ofbod: present, imperfect, future, and (less often) pluperfect; these are used variously in the indicative, conditional and (rarely) subjunctive. The preterite, future, and conditional tenses have a number of periphrastic constructions, but Welsh also maintains inflected forms of these tenses, demonstrated here withtalu 'pay' (pluperfect conjugation is rarely found beyond the verb 'bod').

talu — 'to pay'

		Singular	Plural
Preterite	1st Person	talais	talon
	2nd Person	talaist	taloch
	3rd Person	talodd	talon
Future	1st Person	talaf	talwn
	2nd Person	teli	talwch
	3rd Person	talith	talan
Conditional	1st Person	talwn	talen
	2nd Person	talet	talech
	3rd Person	talai	talen

• Notes on the preterite:
  • First and second singular forms may in less formal registers be written astales andtalest, though there is no difference in pronunciation since there is a basic rule of pronunciation that unstressed final syllables alter the pronunciation of the /ai/ diphthong.
  • Word-final-f is rarely heard in Welsh. Thus verbal forms in-af will be pronounced as if they ended in /a/ and they may be written thus in lower registers.
  • In some parts of Wales-s- may be inserted between the stem and plural forms.
  • In some dialects, forms liketalws are heard fortalodd.
• Notes on the future:
  • di is used instead ofti, thusteli di, not *teli ti.
  • Forms liketaliff may appear instead oftalith in some southern parts of Wales.
  • The future was formerly also used as an inflected present. A small amount of frozen forms use the future forms as a present habitual:mi godaf i am ddeg o'r gloch bob bore - I get up at ten o' clock every morning
• Notes on the conditional:
  • -s- or,-as, may be inserted between the stem and endings in the preterite and conditional (thus overlapping with the pluperfect in the latter case).

Questions are formed by effecting soft mutation on the verb (the effect of the interrogative particle 'a', often elided in speech and informal writing), though increasingly the soft mutation is being used in all situations. Negative forms are expressed withddim after the pronoun and the mixed mutation, though here the soft mutation is taking over in informal registers (dales i ddim forthales i ddim).

Bod 'to be' is irregular. In addition to having inflected forms of the preterite, future, and conditional, it also maintains inflected present and imperfect forms which are used frequently as auxiliaries with other verbs.Bod has separate conjugations for (a) affirmative and (b) interrogative and negative forms of the present indicative (there are also further variations in the third person singular, in the context of dependent clauses). The apparent high irregularity of this tense can be simplified and rationalised by tracing back the divergences to the standard formal written forms: e.g. 'dyw e ddim' and 'dydy e ddim' or 'dydi o ddim' (he is not) can all be seen as informal variants of 'nid ydyw ef (ddim)'.

The present tense in particular shows divergence between north and southern dialects. Though the situation is undoubtedly more complicated, King (2003) notes the following variations in the present tense as spoken (not as written according to the standard orthography):

		Affirmative(I am)		Interrogative(Am I?)		Negative(I am not)
		Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
North	1st Person	dw	dan	ydw?	ydan?	(dy)dw	(dy)dan
	2nd Person	—,(r)wyt	dach	wyt?	(y)dach?	dwyt	(dy)dach
	3rd Person	mae	maen	ydy?	ydyn?	dydy	dydyn
South	1st Person	rw, w	ŷn, —	ydw?	ŷn?	(d)w	ŷn
	2nd Person	—,(r)wyt	ych	wyt?	ych?	—	(ych)
	3rd Person	mae	maen	ydy?, yw?	ŷn?	dyw	ŷn

		Affirmative(I am)		Interrogative(Am I?)		Negative(I am not)
		Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Preterite	1st Person	bues	buon	fues?	fuon?	fues	fuon
	2nd Person	buest	buoch	fuest?	fuoch?	fuest	fuoch
	3rd Person	buodd	buon	fuodd?	fuon?	fuodd	fuon
Imperfect	1st Person	roeddwn	roedden	oeddwn?	oedden?	doeddwn	doedden
	2nd Person	roeddet	roeddech	oeddet?	oeddech?	doeddet	doeddech
	3rd Person	roedd	roeddyn	oedd?	oeddyn?	doedd	doeddyn
Future	1st Person	bydda	byddwn	fydda?	fyddwn?	fydda	fyddwn
	2nd Person	byddi	byddwch	fyddi?	fyddwch?	fyddi	fyddwch
	3rd Person	bydd	byddan	fydd?	fyddan?	fydd	fyddan

Bod also has a conditional, for which there are two stems:

		Affirmative		Interrogative		Negative
		Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
bydd-	1st Person	byddwn	bydden	fyddwn?	fydden?	fyddwn	fydden
	2nd Person	byddet	byddech	fyddet?	fyddech?	fyddet	fyddech
	3rd Person	byddai	bydden	fyddai?	fydden?	fyddai	fydden
bas-	1st Person	baswn	basen	faswn?	fasen?	faswn	fasen
	2nd Person	baset	basech	faset?	fasech?	faset	fasech
	3rd Person	basai	basen	fasai?	fasen?	fasai	fasen

• ddim ("not") is added after the subject for negative forms ofbod.
• There are many dialectal variations of this verb.
• Colloquially the imperfect tense forms areo'n i, o't ti, oedd e/hi, o'n ni, o'ch chi ando'n nhw. These are used for the declarative, interrogative and negative.
• In speech the future and conditional forms often receive the soft mutation in all situations.
• Welsh and other Celtic languages are unusual among the European languages in having no fixed words for "yes" and "no" (although many speakers do use 'ie' and 'na' in ways that mimic English usage). If a question has a verb at its head, the relevant part of that verb is used in the answer, e.g.Ydych chi'n hoffi coffi? (Are you liking coffee? = Do you like coffee?) then eitherYdw (I am = I do = Yes) orNac ydw (I am not = I do not = No)

A few verbs which havebod in the verbnoun display certain irregular characteristics ofbod itself.Gwybod is the most irregular of these. It has preterite and conditional forms, which are often used with present and imperfect meaning, respectively. The present is conjugated irregularly:

	Singular	Plural
1st Person	gwn	gwyddon
2nd Person	gwyddost	gwyddoch
3rd Person	gŵyr	gwyddon

The common phrasedwn i ddim "I don't know" uses a special negative form of the first person present. The initiald- in this form originates in the negative particlenid:nid wn i >nid wn i ddim >dwn i ddim. Such a development is restricted to a very small set of verb forms, principally this form ofgwybod and various forms ofbod (e.g.does, doedd, fromnid oes andnid oedd respectively)."

The four verb-nounsmynd "to go",gwneud "to do",cael "to get", anddod "to come" are all irregular in similar ways.

		mynd		gwneud		cael		dod
		Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
Preterite	1st Person	es	aethon	wnes	wnaethon	ces	caethon	des	daethon
	2nd Person	est	aethoch	wnest	wnaethoch	cest	caethoch	dest	daethoch
	3rd Person	aeth	aethon	wnaeth	wnaethon	caeth	caethon	daeth	daethon
Future	1st Person	a	awn	na	nawn	ca	cawn	do	down
	2nd Person	ei	ewch	nei	newch	cei	cewch	doi	dewch
	3rd Person	eith	ân	neith	nân	ceith	cân	daw	dôn

The formscaeth, caethon, caethoch often appear ascafodd, cawson, cawsoch in writing, and in places in Wales these are also heard in speech.

In the conditional, there is considerable variation between the North and South forms of these four irregular verbs. That is partly because the North form corresponds to theMiddle Welsh (and Literary Welsh) imperfect indicative, while the South form corresponds to the Middle Welsh (and Literary Welsh) imperfect subjunctive.

		mynd		gwneud		cael		dod
		Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural	Singular	Plural
North	1st Person	awn	aen	nawn	naen	cawn	caen	down	doen
	2nd Person	aet	aech	naet	naech	caet	caech	doet	doech
	3rd Person	âi	aen	nâi	naen	câi	caen	dôi	doen
South	1st Person	elwn	elen	nelwn	nelen	celwn	celen	delwn	delen
	2nd Person	elet	elech	nelet	nelech	celet	celech	delet	delech
	3rd Person	elai	elen	nelai	nelen	celai	celen	delai	delen

Prepositions are words likeon, at, to, from, by andfor in English.^[7] They often describe a relationship, spatial or temporal, between persons and objects.^[7] For example, 'the book ison the table'; 'the table isby the window'.

There are approximately two-dozen or so simple prepositions in modern colloquial Welsh. While some have clear-cut and obvious translations (heb ‘without’), others correspond to different English prepositions depending on context (i, wrth, am). As with all areas of modern Welsh, some words are preferred in the North and others in the South.

The main prepositions used in modern colloquial Welsh are:^[7]

Most of these (but not all) share the following characteristics:^[7]

1. they cause mutation of the following word
2. they inflect for person and number, similar to verbs
3. they can be used with a following verbal noun

Inflected prepositions

When used with a personal pronoun, most prepositions insert a linking syllable before the pronoun. This syllable changes for each preposition and results in an inflection pattern similar to that found in Welsh verbs. Broadly speaking, the endings for inflected prepositions are as follows:^[7]

		Singular	Plural
1st Person		-a i	-on ni
2nd Person		-at ti	-och chi
3rd Person	Masculine	-o fe/fo	-yn nhw
	Feminine	-i hi

• King, G. (2003).Modern Welsh. Oxford: Routledge.ISBN 0-415-28270-5

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• Welsh grammar

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