Welsh name pronunciations

[EThreepwood]

Well after going back to the name book and wondering how to pronounce Esyllt... I found a BBC website of names and pronunciations.

Hope it helps someone as much as me.

www.bbc.co.uk/wales/livinginwales/sites/howdoisay/names/index.shtml?a

Forgot to post it...

I don't know if the clip for Esyllt is truncated but he doesn't sound the t
In my accent the t sounds soft almost like a d.

I tried a few of the other names, some fine, some slightly out. I think it's regional.

The list is quite short and some of the entries are a bit unusual or dated.

The ‘ll’ in welsh words is usually a difficulty for English/non welsh folk to pronounce.

If you're thinking of Esyllt but don't know how to pronounce it, I think you'd be better sticking with Iseult or Isolde or even Ysolda.

He gets Caerwyn wrong. Not that I've ever heard of anyone called Caerwyn so maybe it is a typo. Carwyn is more popular.

He gets Elin and Erin spot on, and they don't sound the same in a non-welsh speaking accent. Same goes for Eira, Aneurin, Rhys, Dylan etc

Gaynor is an anglicised form of Gaenor, which is a form of Guinivere. Gaenor is rather nice.

It's a shame the list is so short and that many of the names are dated or unusual.
I have never heard of an Adda, Awsta, Seirian or Sulwyn, and Gladys and Blodwen are awful.

It would be nice to have one that included names that frequently appear on here.

@ArseyWelshNameBore

He gets Caerwyn wrong. Not that I've ever heard of anyone called Caerwyn so maybe it is a typo. Carwyn is more popular.

He gets Elin and Erin spot on, and they don't sound the same in a non-welsh speaking accent. Same goes for Eira, Aneurin, Rhys, Dylan etc

Gaynor is an anglicised form of Gaenor, which is a form of Guinivere. Gaenor is rather nice.

Caerwyn is popular round here, the website does get it wrong. It's more like Ceirwyn rather than Carwyn. The page uses the soundbite for Carwyn for both names.

@EThreepwood I'd put more T on the end of Esyllt, I've never come across anyone called it though.

I know a two Esyllts.

two not a two. Trystan is the welsh form of Tristan.

This is amazing. A Welsh list from a Welsh speaker is not Welsh enough. Truly the baby names board is eating itself.

I love that name, I know a little 'Essie'!

It’s pretty good just a slightly random selection.
Agree Esyllt sounds truncated it should have a soft d/t sound at the end.
It’s a nice name but having a slightly less awkward to pronounce Welsh name myself I don’t think I’d choose that name.

Ps he def says Carwyn not Caerwyn but I don’t think I’ve ever come across a Caerwyn. Poss a typo?
Dwi’n dod o’r gogledd.

@Frazzled2207

Ps he def says Carwyn not Caerwyn but I don’t think I’ve ever come across a Caerwyn. Poss a typo? Dwi’n dod o’r gogledd.

I'm North too... maybe Caerwyn is from 😱 THE ISLAND 😱

@PuntoEBasta,
The list is short and several of the names are very dated or unlikely to be in use. The names starting with A has 12 entries, 6 for girls - one of which I have never seen before, but it doesn't include some more popular names like Anwen, Awen or Alaw.

The boys' names list has 10 entries - only 2 of them are likely to have been used in the last 50 years.

The list of names starting with Ll is as follows:

Girls:

Boys:
LlewellynLion-like. - Anglicised version of Llywelyn
Llwyd Grey-haired. - correct but usually a middle name or surname
Llyr One with grey hair. - incorrect, and missing the circumflex

My version would include:
Girls:
Lleucu
Llinos
Llio

Boys:
Lleu
Llew

Llifon
Llion
Llwyd
Llywelyn
Llŷr
Llywarch

The girls' names are popular and appear regularly on here.

The boys' names list has 10 entries - should read The list of boys' names starting with C has 10 entries -

Llwyd should be last in the list of Ll names.

That list s quite old - it was around in 2009 - I was at Uni at the time and used it to demonstrate how my name is pronounced to annoying non-Welsh people who insisted I was pronouncing it wrong

I wish it had a longer list of names. Some of them are quite dated.

Esyllt is my favourite name, it's absolutely gorgeous. I like Iseult too but there's no way DH would ever agree!

I can't use Esyllt as we're in England and there's no way people will pronounce it correctly due to the Ll - including all of DH's family (English) and my Dad's family (also English). She'd be Ess-ilt at best.

The Cornish version, Eseld, is also lovely.

Regarding Esyllt, I just couldn't imagine the pronunciation even coming from Wales!
It's a bit of a shame that it's no longer updating it was the most helpful website I could find the others were robots.

If you listen to the pronunciation for Anest, the t is like that. He seems to say Esyll. You definitely say the t.

Essie as a shortening is . I can't imagine an Esyllt as Esi even.
What a way of ruining a beautiful name.

The internet is generally not the best source on Welsh names - there's a lot of dodgy pronunciation guides out there on baby name sites. Think O-shan for Osian, Ellery for Eleri and Lowry for Lowri.

Then there's mispellings of names - Branwyn and Olwyn for Branwen and Olwen. And random Welsh words given as names like Ffanci and Artaith.

British Baby Names is well researched but lumps Celtic names in together. There's specific Breton, Cornish and Manx sections but not separate sections for Irish, Welsh and Scottish names.

One day I will get around to suggesting Eira and Osian for the names of the week list. Welsh names on there so far are Rhiannon, Branwen, Olwen, Megan, Seren, Eilonwy, Arthur, Bryn, Macsen, Rhys, Dylan, Idris, Maredudd and Owen.

Thanks for the ref. to www.britishbabynames.com/blog/.
The Manx names are interesting.
Strange lumping together of Celtic names though.

I scrolled through Can you tell I should be doing something else?and found the following welsh names:

DYLAN
OWEN
ROBIN
EVAN
IDRIS
RHYS
OSIAN
ELIS
REECE
TOMOS
MACSEN
IOAN
TUDOR
BOWEN
GETHIN
GRUFFYDD
ANEURIN
ARIAN (?)
EMRYS
BRYN
OWAIN
HUW
LLOYD
HAYDN
TOMI

ELENA
MEGAN
SEREN
FFION
IONA
CALI (?)
CARYS
CERYS
GWEN
BETHAN
LOWRI
IOANA (?)
ENID
CADI
NEL
ANWEN
ELERI
ELINOR

I appreciate that some of them aren't strictly welsh (Elena, Elinor, Megan etc) and I didn't include names like Ruth, Naomi, Miriam, Maria etc, which are used as first names by Welsh-speakers.

What struck me was that the name choices look like names that would appeal to someone who wanted a welsh name but probably doesn't speak Welsh. They don't look like the names that are popular with Welsh speakers.

The boy's names look more of a combination of names that might be used by Welsh-speakers and non-Welsh speakers.

My previous post refers to the top-1000-names-in-england-and-wales-2019.