How and when to use Soft Mutations in Welsh

In today’s video I’m going to talk to you about Soft mutations. Lots of Welsh language learners are nervous of using them because they seem so complicated. I’m going to show you how easy they are to learn, with a little bit of practice. I’ll explain exactly how they work and when to use them with lots of example sentences.

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[wren_bean]

I was struggling with this in duolingo because they presented mutated words but no explanation of how mutations work. Diolch yn fawr, this is immensely helpful!

[allenjenkins]

You forgot to mention the other two reasons for soft mutation - 1.To make the the word easier to pronounce and flow more freely, even for native Welsh speakers. 2. To confuse the English.

[iorathbennett]

Trying learn to Welsh with Duolingo and never understand when the mutations happens. Hoping that you'll cover the other mutations too

[AUR_dan]

As a newer welsh learner from the states, your explanations of welsh nuances help immensely! Keep up the awesome work, Diolch Jason!

[gusshirnam]

Great vid, really enjoyed it and moan still, at my parents for sending me to an English medium school and not giving me the opportunity to learn Welsh was learning was easier 😥

[danjeory]

I grew up in Wales to English parents, and unfortunately never properly learnt Welsh. I only learnt it for a couple of years when I switched schools before dropping it when I took my options. It's a big regret because I ended up becoming a linguist and a German translator. Now, 35 years on, I've decided to learn the language I would have been fluent in by now if I'd had good, encouraging teachers. I'm mainly using Duolingo at the moment, as others on here have stated, but I've just found this podcast, which I can already see is going to be a great help. Dw i eisiau byw yng Nghymru eto. Dw i'n hoffi cerdded yn Eryri!

[evil_cottoncandy]

Thank you! I struggle with this so much. So helpful!

[zulkiflijamil]

Bore da Jason. Congratulations you have almost 20K subscribers and I am pretty confident you would have more new subscribers in the weeks and months ahead. I am still learning Cymraeg and I always refer to your channel. Da iawn. Diolch.

[RoyCitySlicker]

Really quality explainer. Diolch yn fawr iawn!

[cs_fl]

When I was tinkering with Welsh the most frustrating fact is that there is no obvious "rule" for masculine or feminine. In France there are rules like -ure, or -ion is feminine and -age single syllable is feminine and -age two or more syllables is masculine. I mean. Beard in Welsh is feminine and Make up is masculine. Road vs path, what's what?? My wife's people came from Wales, her aunt spoke fluent Welsh. My wife use to sing the anthem at the opening of the Eisteddfod in her church when she was younger. I think I speak more Welsh than she does now...though every year we fry up a mess of Welsh cookies at Christmas...

[kernowforester]

Thankfully Cornish and Breton do not have the double ll. So we have Lansallos, Lanivet etc. We do have mutations, so for instance bean for small mutates to vean (pronounced vee-un in English spellings), (e.g. Coose vean or Hendra vean) and pean (e.g. Nanpean or Porthpean).

[petrovonoccymro]

Hence Dw i’n dod I Bontypool, not Pontypool and Dw i’n dod I Fangor, not Bangor. Cheers Jason, a very great help.

[toneycd]

Awesome lesson Jason. Diolch yn fawr!! Hwyl.

[elizabethmaybrown]

My daughter is learning Welsh on Duolingo and I have shared this video to her after reading someone else's comment on it, Hwyl

[wookie]

Maybe a stupid question, but why is the cath/gath written with a th instead of a dd?
Is it because one of the sounds is voiced and the other is voiceless?

[TerencePetersenAjbro]

Feminine plural nouns do not mutate after the definite article, right? So "y cathau" (the cats). Interestingly these mutations in Welsh are also found in many other languages, especially bdg, ptk. It's just the way the human mouth and tongue work!

[zulkiflijamil]

Y ci
Y gath
Y gadair
i'r dre
Car bach
Hoff fwyd
Un broblem
Dau ddyn
Hello Jason Shepherd, this lesson on Soft Mutation is nice.
A big thumbs up. 👍👍👍👍👍

[hariowen]

When at secondary school in the 60s, Welsh lessons concerning grammar and treiglo etc., being taught the complicated rules for mutation. With Welsh being my first language I wasn't the least bit interested in learning these rules, as mutation just comes automatically natural to fluent first language Welsh speakers, i.e. there's no need to learn the rules unless you want to become a Welsh teacher possibly. So very often I would fall asleep with the boredom of it all. To get her own back on me for falling asleep in her lesson, the Welsh teacher, knowing full well that I wouldn't have my own time-table for lessons, she wouldn't wake me up until all the other kids had completely left the lesson, knowing that I would therefore be wondering around the school, during lesson time, on my own, trying to find the classroom where my classmates had gone to. Leaving me open to being punished for being late to my next lesson and or being caught by the headmaster wondering around the school aimlessly during lesson time.

[PedroRodrigues-cwui]

At least now I know German isn't that hard, diolch yn fawr!

[aileinoclumhain]

S'mae Jason, nesi fwynhau'r fideo. Diolch yn fawr.