Y Wladfa Patagonia

Many thanks to Alex Hill for this! They sometimes speak a purer form of Welsh now in Patagonia than in Wales because of the isolation of Patagonia. My cousin Gareth Hopkin recently went out to Patagonia to teach in Welsh. It is very nice of the Argentine Government to make this film. Trevelin is Tre Felin, the village of the mill. The village next to us is Felindre – Felin Dre – the same with mutation from t to d. In Galicia and Portugal there are are many words of Iberian Celtic origin. They are listed on the web and I easily understand them. In Patagonia and in Pennsylvania they speak Welsh (Brythonic Celtic), Gaelic is Irish, more or less, (Goidelic Celtic). There is a p to c transformation, so Pen in Welsh goes to Ceann in Irish, meaning “head”. The Brythonic Celtic languages are Welsh, Cornish and Breton. The Goidelic Celtic languages are Irish, Gaelic and Manx. Then in Spain and Portugal there are Iberian Celtic words, and in France, Gaulish Celtic words. In Switzerland there are some Helvetian Celtic words that I easily recognized. Welsh is under tremendous pressure, but we are fighting back with secondary school education in Welsh. It is the same for all small languages. Galicia was called “Third Britain”. Brittany was “Second Britain”. Welsh and Gaelic are now official languages of Great Britain. In around 400 BC the Celtic group of languages stretched from Ireland to Galatia in modern Turkey (St. Paul’s letter to the Galatians). UNESCO has warned several times about the imminent extinction of Welsh as a spoken language, so much more effort than at present is needed to protect it. This is why I am in favour of Broydd Iaith or Gealtacht areas in Irish. I agree that Spain and Portugal (Iberia) have a rich pattern of individual languages and cultures, all of which must also be protected.

Sent: 26/11/2014 22:09:53 GMT Standard Time
Subj: 150th anniversary

Today I received an email from my cousin, who lives in Patagonia, and who tells me that 2014 is the 150th anniversary of the arrival of the first Welsh settlers to Patagonia. He also included a link (below) of a short documentary filmed for the Argentine TV, so it is in Spanish) about the descendants of those Welsh, who live in several villages very close to the Andes mountains, in the northwest of Patagonia. This village in particular is called Trevelin, which in Spanish is pronounced the same but with the accent on the “i”, Trevelín.

You always mention that in Wales the gaelic language is being forgotten and lost. Well, in this film you can see a small school where children learn the language and its songs, while young people still learn their traditional dances. The chubby guy who welcomes the film party to his house mentions that his parents were Welsh, and that when he was old enough to go to school he spoke no Spanish, only Gaelic. Other play the Welsh harp, accordeon, etc.

Choir singing has always been very popular in all of Patagonia, and in Welsh communities many of their songs are those brought by the original settlers, although most of the present-day locals speak Gaelic, English and Spanish (which in Argentina is usually called “castellano” , Castillan from the Spanish region of Castille in Spain) since there is no such thing as a Spanish language, because each region in Spain speaks its own language or dialect. In the rest of Latin America, however, they call this language Español, Spanish. By the way, one of the ladies interviewed in the film is called Evans, while an interviewed man is called Ellis Williams, like your cousin. I hope you enjoy it.

http://blogs.tn.com.ar/variete/2014/11/21/galeses_en_trevelin/

Regards,