#cumbric

[celticstudies]

2026 the year we find a cumbric manuscript

[lesbiansandgayssupporttheminers]

do you know of any languages in north west england?

I'm assuming you mean indigenous languages?

Caveat, I'm not a linguist and there are very likely people out there with a lot more knowledge of this than me!

There was a language called Cumbric- if you've heard the "yan tan tethra" counting rhyme, that likely came from Cumbric. Cumbric is a Brythonic language, meaning it's closely related to Welsh, Cornish and Breton. Cumbric is believed to have been spoken between Lancashire and Cumberland- so North West England to the Lowlands of Scotland. Lots of place names in the area have Brythonic roots.

Unfortunately, we don't know a lot about Cumbric, and it's believed to have been lost in the 11th Century, although there are suggestions that it could have survived into the 12th Century and beyond as a community language.

As far as I'm aware, there aren't any confirmed written sources for Cumbric, there are some poems which may be written in Cumbric, or may be written in a dialect of Welsh. As far as I'm aware, there's no Cumbric revival, and we don't know enough of the language to resurrect it from (near) death as Cornish was.

I'm not an expert, but if you wanted to learn something close to Cumbric, I would guess the closest option would be Welsh, probably with the North Welsh dialect. However, other linguists who are more expert than me may want to weigh in!

I'll leave you with some lines of a poem which may be (old) Welsh, but may also (possibly) be Cumbric.

Pan elei dy dat ty e vynyd Dydygei ef penn ywrch penn gwythwch penn hyd Penn grugyar vreith o venyd Penn pysc o rayadyr derwennyd When your father went to [the] mountain He brought a head of buck, head of wild pig, head of stag Head of speckled grouse from [the] mountain Head of fish from [the] falls of Derwent

[gaeilgeblr]

Duwoodh in Cumbraek

[source]

[hello-from-avalon]

I love American people, I love the enthusiasm for learning your Celtic roots, I love the revival spirit of connecting to your culture and ancestors, I love the curiosity, I love the silly questions, I love the different perspectives, I love the new interpretations.

I love the love, and respect, and joy you bring to Celtic cultures and the bond we form just knowing that we're all different but we're all Celtic and that's enough to make us care and happy to see one another and ask about each other and celebrate those differences, and forge ties and friendships. I love Americans and their connection to the Isles and the culture.

It's a huge bonus, a great side effect, just an additional point that makes me so happy, that when Celtic Americans connect to the culture(s), the overwhelmingly vast majority do so in a progressive and respectful way that lets any kind of white supremacist nonsense know it has absolutely no place with us.

Reclaim Celtic, revel in it, bond with it, learn about it, find your joy in it, and help us guard it from those who would twist it in to something evil.

[rvexillology]

Cumbric flag I created! Representation of the Celtic Cumbric speaking Britons of Cumbria

from /r/vexillology Top comment: That's amazing. Kind of reminds me of GOT

[allthingslinguistic]

History of British and Irish languages: an interesting gif by Starkey Comics

The original post contains still versions of all the maps with nice concise explanations. 

[ball-eis-korakas]

Early Greek and Roman scribes such as Herodotus (450 BC) and Polybius (200 BC) make reference to a loose ethnic grouping as the Keltoi or Galli in their written histories: a largely tribal society of warlike, iron-based communities.  The similarity in stone inscriptions and artifacts discovered in Europe and Britain dating from this period points towards a form of shared language.  The Keltoi described in the ancient Greek histories were the early Celts, dispersed as far north as the Iberian Peninsula and to the Scottish highlands in the north. Although there are undoubted similarities between these tribal groups in terms of linguistic unity (e.g. alphabetic symbols and verb, subject, object word order), the chronicles of the ancient historians are contradictory and confusing.  The Roman writer Tacitus stated that the language spoken by the Gauls was very similar to the language spoken by the early Britons.  Julius Caesar, however, saw little similarity and noted that the three principal tribes of Gaul spoke in noticeably distinct dialects.  As a result, to view the Celtic languages as belonging to one unified ethnic grouping is problematic, with modern historians preferring to divide the various dialects and forms into two distinct groups: Continental Celtic and Insular Celtic. The first of these groupings, Continental Celtic, comprises Leontic (spoken in the southern Alpine region), Celtiberian (spoken in parts of north-eastern Spain and Portugal), Gallaecian (France and northern Alpine region).  The second grouping, Insular Celtic, comprises two distinct linguistic families: Goidelic and Brythonic, which subdivide into other related languages.  The former (Goidelic) includes Irish and Scottish Gaelic and Manx and the latter (Brythonic) Pictish and Cumbric (both extinct), British [Common Brittonic], Welsh, Breton and Cornish.  As virtually all Continental Celtic is now extinct, exact geographical boundaries are a matter of vague approximation.  In all probability, certain tribes were nomadic in aspect and this added to a crossing and merging of dialects, hence the conflicting views of Julius Caesar and Tacitus.

“The Story of English: How an Obscure Dialect Became the World’s Most-Spoken Language”

[celticstudies]

every day i live in hope that someone will miraculously discover a cumbric manuscript