Talk:Cornish language

Cornish Alphabet

Would someone like to put up an article Cornish Alphabet? --172.175.234.186 01:11, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It's A-Z, with macrons over a, e, i, o, u, y in dictionaries; Yogh is used in some Cornish manuscripts for /ð/. Evertype 01:16, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)

Well, in one orthography at least. Isn't the alphabet different in different orthographies?--172.209.250.217 03:07, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

No, it isn't. Evertype 11:55, 2004 Jul 23 (UTC)

I'd like to clarify that by saying yes, all the Cornish orthographies use the Roman alphabet. However, Kernewek Kemmyn is a little different; it teaches that ch is a single letter in place of c, and it doesn't use a few other letters (q, x, z, there might be some others I'm forgetting). But just as in Finnish or Welsh, for example, people writing Kernewek Kemmyn must still make use of these letters for proper names and foreign expressions. QuartierLatin1968 18:48, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Duelling Cornishes

Attentive readers of this article will notice the back-and-forth regarding POV and facts and such. For my part, I support Unified Cornish Revised orthography, and edited Nicholas Williams' English-Cornish Dictionary as well as his translation of the New Testament. Anonymous contributors 62.254.128.4 and 212.219.240.8 have tended to be rather apologetic about Kernewek Kemmyn -- and not all that neutral, though 62 has tried to be a good deal more neutral than 212.

The academic community at large has criticised (not just "at times") Kernewek Kemmyn -- not just Nicholas Williams, though he has published comprehensive critiques of the Kemmyn orthography, which is not (despite claims) particularly accurate nor based on solid scholarship. Rather, it is based on Ken George's private database which Williams has shown (in a number of articles in Cornish Studies) to be less than the perfect thing the vociferous adherants have claimed it to be. (They also constantly claim numeric superiority, though reports from my colleagues in Cornwall suggest otherwise.) Kernewek Kemmyn was foisted upon the Cornish community as "the perfect solution", in a manner which deeply and rather bitterly split the community. Ken George has had to revise his orthography several times after flaws in his "phonemic" scheme were pointed out; it continues to have flaws which remain unrevised.

62.254.128.4's revision appears to confuse the chronology. Yes, everyone saw shortcomings in Nance's Unified Cornish, but Gendall's Modern Cornish came out as a reaction to Kernewek Kemmyn -- which was a replacement orthography, not a reform of Unified Cornish. Williams' Unified Cornish Revised was a reform of Unified Cornish.

In due course I will revise the "Revival" section; I am not neutral with regard to Cornish orthography, but I have striven and will continue to strive to stick to the facts.Evertype 12:55, 2004 Jul 8 (UTC)

Several points. I am the IP address beginning with 62(I should have logged in, and still haven't, but you know). I have indeed been apologetic to Kernewek Kemmyn. Not through advocacy, but in order to present an NPOV face. Now, 'vociferous' seems to have a slightly negative spin, in my opinion. I removed it. Also, declaring that the 'academic community' have criticised Dr. George is somewhat misleading. I'd expect that the number of experts in Cornish is rather small, and, as such, 'the academic community' does not refer to very many people. Again, of course, the phrase 'criticised by the academic community' puts a negative spin on the article. My revisions removed that negative spin, and also offered a (small) bibliography on the subject, for people to consult.

I will not fall on either side of the debate, yet. I don't know nearly enough. But I do know that the article, as it stood, was POV. I rectified that. I won't revert it, but I can't see how my revisions imperilled NPOV, but rather rectified it. BovineBeast

I reverted (but revised) the most recent anonymous revisions. Kernowek Kemyn supporters like to crow about their numeric superiority, but this assertion is unsupported, and indeed contrary to reports I have from prominent members of the Revival. I know KK supporters do not like the criticism that Williams, Mills, and indeed I have made of George's work, but those criticisms are based in linguistic facts and expertise. George's work is based on his database and phonemic theory, which lack accuracy, as has been established in numerous articles in print. Evertype 20:42, 2004 Jul 30 (UTC)

I reverted again most of today's anonymous revisions, where were not in the least bit neutral. Evertype 11:44, 2004 Aug 4 (UTC)

In my opinion, there is nothing POV in saying that the 'academic community' doesn't favour Kernewek Kemmyn. It is a fact, whether Dr. George likes it or not. Most people with some knowledge of Celtic languages tend to favour Unified Cornish in William's version. I cannot say whether they are right or wrong, but that is certainlt the general opinion. Jonas

It's mildly POV in the sense that a non-specific reference to the academic community as a whole, can be taken as implying a unanimous scholarly consensus against Kernewek Kemmyn. In fact, most serious academic Celticists have no interest in any variety of revived Cornish, and have treated the entire revival movement with (IMO) unwarranted scorn. It would be nice to see some kind of support for the statement that academics on the whole disfavour Kemmyn in particular. (My hunch is that mediaevalists and aficionados of historical literature will be more attracted to UCR, and comparative linguists – particularly those acquainted with Breton – to Kemmyn.) Concerning the question of numerical support for Kemmyn, I'm interested to hear how people feel about the statement that "approximately 80% of the Cornish speaking population now use it [Kernewek Kemmyn]" – this is from the report "Cornish: The Cornish language in education in the UK" by Mercator-Education, authored by Arjan Hut of the Frisian Academy. At first glance, this appears to be an independent source, no? But I wonder what methods they used to obtain that one-sig-fig estimate. And of course, numerical strength is relative: even 80% of Cornish speakers is only a few thousand people! QuartierLatin1968 18:48, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC) PS: In the interests of full disclosure, I do use Kernewek Kemmyn and like it the best, but I'd welcome a consensus-based orthography (as alluded to in the Cornish Language Strategy) that could accommodate everybody.

It's very true that many linguists are uninterested in revived languages, including revived Cornish of any kind. What it true is that those who are interested, almost exclusively within the field of Celtic philology have tended to favour UCR. I would argue against the statement that comparative linguists would favour Kemmyn - they are more likely than others to be able to spot the errors. It should be kept in mind than Dr George has no education in linguistics or Celtic languages. Hin enthusiasm is to be congratulated, but it is unfortunate that he has refused to accept some obvious errors that he commited. I'm sad to say that his contribution to Cornish has been more negative than positive. His two main contributions is a version that has drawn much criticism and a split in the language movement. It is probably true that this article will never be POV if that means that it cannot mention the errors on Kemmyn. 20:51 08 Aug 2005

Hi, I'm a linguist with no special knowledge of Cornish (or any Celtic language--I'm interested tho as my wife is of Cornish extraction). It seems to me this article is confusing the language with the orthography--it certainly leaves me somewhat confused. As far as I can tell, the main difference between the Unified/Modern/Revised/Common Cornishes is the orthography. Is this correct? Is there general agreement on the phonology? Or is the dispute over orthography actually about different views of what the phonology should be? Or a bit of both? It would certainly help to have the phonology (phonologies?) laid out with some clarity, as well as the orthographies. Dougg 12:45, 7 August 2005 (UTC)

By and large the phonologies are the same. Kernowek Kemyn posits sounds that could hardly have existed and which apparently most of its speakers don't really try to produce. I will put the UCR chart into the Wikipedia article when time permits. You might be interested in my review of the linguistic situation, http://www.evertype.com/gram/gerlyver-2000-preface-me.pdf Evertype 15:47, August 7, 2005 (UTC)

• KK makes a number of phonological distinctions which UCR believes no longer existed in Middle Cornish. These mostly relate to the difference between open and close mid vowels. On the other hand UCR believes that vowel length was phonemic, whereas KK believes that as in Welsh and Breton the length of vowels was allophonic governed by stress and syllable type. Mongvras 19:47, 18 October 2005 (UTC)

Duelling Cornishes revisited

The figure of 80% for KK supporters, is based on Table 3.2 of the MacKinnon Report. Focus groups from each faction were asked to estimate the number of supporters each had, by levels of competance. Combining the top two levels (fluent on everyday topics and complex/specialist subjects) the figures are: KK 300, UC(R) 30, Late 35. Combining the next three levels (from a few words and phrases up to simple conversation) we get : KK 195, UC(R) 50, Late 120. The figures for learners (classes and by correspondence combined) are : KK 582, UC(R) 105, Late 83. Thus the figure of 80% would seem to be a fair, perhaps slightly conservative, estimate of KK support, allowing for the fact that a proportion of learners drop out and so do not become part of the Cornish speaking "community". These figures are admittedly only estimates, but to date they're the best we have. They were also self assessed, so if the minor factions underestimated the strength of their support they only have themselves to blame! Mongvras 19:47, 18 October 2005 (UTC)

Enthusiastic uptake of KK Although some were reluctant to change (was the advantage worth the cost etc.?), the majority were indeed enthusiastic, and there was great pressure to produce materials, dictionaries etc. in the new system. This can be ascertained by reference to contempory publications, the records of Kesva, Kowethas an Yeth etc. The change over can be tracked in back issues of An Gannas for instance. This is fact not conjecture. I was there, I saw it, Everson was not. Yth esen vy ena, my a'n gwelas! Mongvras 00:23, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

I have to reject this. I know a good many people who tell a very different story about how the orthography was "adopted" at meetings from which they had been excluded. Evertype 10:52, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

This is hearsay, just more of the propaganda that anti-KK factions constantly churn out. We're all sick to the back teeth with it, and long ago gave up arguing with them. Unfortunately it must be countered here as many people will read Wikipedia and believe it to be true. The final adoption of KK was by a vote of Kesva and Taves Kernewek, a largely elected body. There was only a single vote against. Kesva is elected every four years by the members of Kowethas an Yeth Kernewek. Membership of Kowethas is open to anyone on payment of a small annual subscription. Had the majority of Cornish speakers (who are nobody's fools) been somehow conned into taking up KK, then over the years the deceit would have been exposed and the decision reversed. If the Kesva members didn't represent the will of the majority they would not have been re-elected. Indeed were there a great "silent majority" against KK, they would long ago have "carpetbagged" Kowethas and elected their own supporters to the Kesva. They have had 18 years to do this, 10 years since Williams published Cornish Today. I have given sources for my statements, Everson is relying on hearsay. Mongvras 15:44, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Fluent prose style of UCR UCR is an orthography. Anyone can write any kind of prose, fluent or stilted, in the orthography of their choice. An orthography per se cannot have a "prose style". This statement is pure propaganda pushing Everson's own POV. Mongvras 00:23, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Not so. Wella Brown published a grammar using Kernewek Kemmyn orthography, did he not? Nicholas Williams also published Clappya Kernowek which uses UCR orthography; because it is informed by Late Cornish materials unavailable to Nance and others, the prose style of UCR is more fluid and than UC was, which is what the article was saying. Evertype 11:01, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Either of the works mentioned above could be transliterated into the other orthography, the process is an entirely mechanical one. Indeed the first (1984) edition of Wella Brown's Grammar was in fact in UC. In any case neither book is written in Cornish, both are books in English about Cornish. An orthography does not have a prose style. The discovery of the Tregear Homilies, the only Tudor Cornish Prose I know of (aside from a few "tourist phrases"), has informed Revived Cornish in general regardless of one's preferred spelling practice. Not that Tregear is exactly lucid, but that is clearly POV. Mongvras 15:44, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Vandalism Can something be done to prevent Evertype's continual vandalism of this page, in particular the removal of authenticated factual information and its replacement by his own propaganda. The vast majority of Cornish speakers support KK, the figure may be 60% or 95% but the other factions are small (noisy) minorities. The battle was lost years ago, but as they continually demonstrate, they are very bad losers. Mongvras 00:23, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Now, now, Mr Mongvras, whoever you are, (ty a woer yn ta pyw ov vy Mongvras) that's just not acceptable. In the first place, opponents of Kernewek Kemmyn do not believe that the battle is lost, and support for Kernewek Kemmyn within the Revival is not as definitive as supporters of Kernewek Kemmyn would have the world believe. I do not like George's orthography, and I certainly do not I believe that this article should make it look as though the Cornish Revival is satisfied with Kernowek Kemyn. Many in it are not. That a second edition of Williams' English-Cornish Dictionary is about to be published is one proof of the demand for materials in UCR (as well as demand for a good dictionary with 25,000 headwords). Many of my sources believe that many supporters of KK know that the game is up: that the linguistic principles of George's orthography are shaky at best. It seems likely that an independent panel of linguists will be brought in to review the situation and make recommendations. I should be very surprised indeed were they to choose to retain Kernewek Kemmyn with its many flaws. It is easy to sit back and cry "vandal", but I think that the recent dishonest deletion of reference to the FIRST publication of a complete Cornish New Testament (which was in UCR, not in KK) shows where the real vandalism lies. Evertype 11:39, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

I am not responsible for the information re the NT translations, it is a matter of fact that Williams' translation was published first. The remainder of the above is your personal POV, as you clearly state, "I do not like Georges Orthography". You say, "many of my sources believe ...". This is both hearsay and POV. Please lay off the propaganda and stick to facts. No one, for example, disputes that Williams has published a dictionary, and that it is in his and his publisher's interest to sell as many as copies as possible. Mongvras 15:44, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Does it EVER occur to you, Mr Everson, that 'your sources' that you so often quote, may be leading you up the garden path? Just how do you substantiate what they tell you? For example, your 'sources' believe that "many supporters of KK know that the game is up". It's rubbish. It's just plain rubbish - and I know because I meet and talk with 'supporters of KK' every day of my life. So either your supporters are misleading you, or you are intentionally setting out to mislead others. I'm inclined to believe the latter is the case because your edits on this subject are almost entirely POV - but very cleverly so, in that you mislead as much by what you don't say as by what you do. Shame on you. And shame on John11 for his bible edits - the pair of you are as bad as each other. Ass owgh hwi pla. Branvras

Kosel ow howeth, kosel! ("Go easy, boy") Mongvras 15:44, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Clear Pronunciation Rules The pronunciation guides for UC as given by Nance and by A.S.D. Smith, were far from clear and in places self-contradictory. Gendall did rather better in Kernewek Bew (1972), but was attempting to describe what were essentially Late Cornish sounds, since the phonology of Middle Cornish had not then been thoroughly investigated. My statement is therefore factually correct and I should think significant. It explains in part why so many teachers were enthusiastic supporters of KK. Mongvras 17:20, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Phonemes /dj/ /tj/ sic. Leaving aside the fact that <dj, tj> are graphemes, this is a very detailed technical subject, probably one of the most difficult areas of Cornish historical phonology. George was wrong in assuming that OC non-initial /d/ became palatalised, and the grapheme <dj> was indeed unfortunate. Nevertheless the underlying phonemic distinction between a sound always written "s" in the texts, and another written with "i" or "g" alternating with "s" (depending on the text) is quite apparent. This latter sound might be symbolised as /z/. The failure to distinguish between /s/ and /z/ is one of the remaining weaknesses of KK, which may well be addressed in due course. I can see little point in bringing this up in a brief history of the language. There either needs to be a technical article on Cornish historical phonology and its alternative reconstructions (perhaps too specialised a subject for Wikipedia?) or simply references to the works of George, Williams, Jackson etc. Mongvras 17:20, 21 October 2005 (UTC)

Alternative Revisions of UC KK was conceived as a revision of UC. A few years later, Williams, thinking that George had got it all wrong, did his own revision of UC, UCR. It was therefore an alternative revision, because we could then choose between them. Which you prefer depends on your POV, that they were alternative, indeed competing orthographies is just plain fact. Mongvras 16:04, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Theories George based KK on his model of Middle Cornish phonology. Williams in turn based UCR on his own, rather different model. Since there is no direct factual information concerning the pronunciation of Middle Cornish, both models are of necessity theoretical, designed to account for the spellings found in the extant MC texts. How well you think each succeeds is again POV, but there can be no doubting that each is theoretical. Indeed any phonology even of a well studied language like English must be theoretical, since phonology is a abstraction, the only facts are the many utterances and documents that provide the raw data. Mongvras 16:04, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Other discussion

"While the scholars were busy collecting the last vestiges of spoken Cornish, there was no lack of testimony that the language was now nearing extinction. It was Daines Barrington who was responsible for spreading the belief that the last speaker of Cornish was Dolly Pentreath of Mousehole. During a tour of Cornwall in 1768, Barrington was directed to Dolly Pentreath as a person able to speak the language. 'I desired to be introduced', he wrote, 'as a person who had laid a wager that there was no one who could converse in Cornish; upon which Dolly Pentreath spoke in an angry tone of voice for two or three minutes, and in a language which sounded very like Welsh...' Barrington reported this exchange to the Society of Antiquaries which published an account in its Journal in 1776. Dolly Pentreath died in the following year. Barrington contributed another paper to the Society's Journal in 1779, adding a letter written in Cornish in 1776 from a fisherman named William Bodener who clamed to know five persons in Mousehole (Raginnis) alone who spoke Cornish, thus disproving the belief that Dolly Pentreath was the last Cornish-speaker.

     Whether or not Cornish survived into the nineteenth century is difficult to say. The expansion of industry, particularly mining, and the growth of towns and railways, dealt the final blows to the language. It is believed that a few cases of genuine bilingualism existed for a few decades more, but the evidence is pitifully scanty: John Tremethack, who died in 1852 at the age of eighty-seven, had taught Cornish to his daughter who was still alive in 1875; Henry Jenner's mother-in-law, Mrs Rawlings of Hayle (Heyl) who died in 1879 aged fifty-seven, had learned the Lord's Prayer in Cornish at school; Bernard Victor learnt Cornish from his father and passed on a great deal to Jenner in 1875; Dr Stevens of St Ives, talking to the historian J. H. Mathews in 1892, said he had been taught to count in Cornish; and so on. Of John Davey of Zennor (1812-91), a more substantial claim was made: on a plaque in his memory in the village church-yard, are the carefully chosen words 'who was the last to possess any traditional considerable knowledge of the Cornish language'. Davey, it is believed, could converse and sing in Cornish."

Also, it should be noted that Henry Jenner, the man who started the original movement for the revival of the Cornish language, learnt his Cornish from native speakers (if he wasn't one himself; of this I am not sure). He died in 1934. So I think it can be said very truthfully that, if the chain of Cornish *was* broken (which it was, afaik), it lived well into the 20th century and experienced no breakage at the second-language-learner level, but only at the first-language-learner level (perhaps? I don't know if Jenner taught his kids Cornish; if he was a native and he DID, then perhaps it wasn't broken then)

Similarly, though many say Manx died in the late 70s with Ned Maddrel, there is still an old man in a nursing home who is, for all practical purposes, a native speaker of Manx, which he learned in part from his childhood, in part from Ned Maddrel himself, and in part with other Manx speakers he met throught the course of his life. This man also passed the language on to many others, including (iirc) children who learned to speak it natively from him. Thus the chain of Manx was arguably never broken... but that depends on how you view this.

Anybody who knows more about Henry Jenner may be able to tell us whether or not he was a native, and if he passed the language on to children.

Love,

Node

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The linguistic sources indicate that Dolly was the last native speaker of Cornish. Several general and linguistic encyclopaedias I checked also attest to that fact. When the language has no native speakers, it dies, according to modern linguistics. The fact that it was carried on later as a second language, preserved in place names and numbers, and is being revived doesn't change that fact.

This atricle is written in an extremely biased tone. Can you please state scholarly sources that prove that Dolly was not the last native speaker of Cornish? -- AV

Firstly, a number of children I know personally are native speakers, i.e. they have been taught Cornish from birth, and speak it principally. Secondly, the Dolly Pentreath story is actually incorrectly stated in most sources: the belief was that she was the last native monoglot speaker; she actually spoke a little English so she is disqualified on that count; the last native monoglot Cornish speaker was Chesten Marchant who died in 1676. William Bodinar, who died in 1789 also spoke Cornish but not as a native. Cornish was effectively extinct from about 1750 to 1904 when Henry Jenner published A Handbook for Cornish, although the language was still spoken in part by many inhabitants. Furthermore, the Daveys, pere et fils were also fluent Cornish speakers (although it is not known whether they were native speakers) and the son did not die until 1891.

Here is some primary source evidence for you from Bodinar, written in July 1786, in both English and Cornish:

"My age is 65. I am a poor fisherman. I learnt Cornish when I was a boy. I have been to sea with my father and 5 other men in the boat, and have not heard one word of English spoke in the boat for a week together. I never saw a Cornish book. I learnt Cornish going to sea with old men. There is not more than 4 or 5 in our town can talk Cornish now, old people 80 years old. Cornish is all forgot with young people."

This kind of buries the Pentreath myth for me if Bodinar is to be believed, and I see no reason why this should be questioned.

As for bias, well, yes, I admit that the Cornish language is a subject which is dear to my heart. sjc

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Well, as you say, "Cornish was effectively extinct from 1750 to 1904". That means it died. The language dies when it is no longer transmitted from parents to children as their native language. I don't know why you feel you have to label it as a "myth" and try to debunk it. You speak of the revival; but one revives something dead, not something alive. The Cornish language was dead, and now it's in a process of revival, with a small number of native speakers. There's nothing to be ashamed in that and there's no need to deny it. The revived version of Cornish is bound to get some aspects of Cornish as it was actually spoke wrong -- for instance, intonation and some aspects of phonology are almost always lost in such circumstances. There's nothing to be ashamed there either - it's just lignuistic reality. --AV

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There are similar oddities or differences in Modern Spoken Hebrew - a language which had not been used as an everyday speech for a L-O-O-O-N-G time. That doesn't necessarily mean the language was "dead." Please remember, these uses of "dead" and "revival" are metaphorical. Languages are not living entities. --MichaelTinkler

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Yes, I know about that (I'm actually a speaker of Modern Hebrew). It's linguistically accurate to say that Hebrew was dead, and then it was revived. The uses of "dead" and "revival" are metaphorical, but they may at the same time be scientifically accurate, without any contradiction. This is in fact the case with the (reasonably) accurate definitions of what it means for a language to be dead or to be revived, which are used by linguists.

The point is, any language without native speakers may be called 'dead' with equal justification, be it Latin, Hebrew or Cornish (until the recent revival attempts which produced a small number of native speakers of the "new" Cornish). The article refers to the accurate description of the state of Cornish as a "myth" which is to be debunked. --AV

No, the article deals with the Cornish language and touches on the Doll Pentreath myth; the story is, as the article indicates, based upon conjecture. The fact remains that Cornish as a language was not actively in use for a hundred years or so.

How do we know that Ms Pentreath was the last native speaker? Hearsay and at best tertiary sources, many of which are controverted by a number of primary sources. Just because a few encyclopedias and other tertiary sources are apathetic enough to recycle a piece of conjecture, does this mean that we have to treat it as gospel?

Let us therefore bury this one for all time. This is the evidence:

Dolly Pentreath (who more accurately is called Dorothy Jeffery due to her marriage) was a fish-wife of Mousehole who was a bit of a character, and who I think we will accept died on 27th December 1777. There is plenty of primary source evidence for this. She was reputed to have been 102 years old. This is uncheckable since her birth is anterior to any extant records.

There is no direct evidence that she spoke Cornish as a native; moreover she also spoke a considerable amount of English. There is the uncomfortable Bodinar letter (op.cit), which definitely contradicts the fact that she was the last Cornish speaker. Some sources, in fact, indicate that she spoke very little Cornish at all. There is also the tombstone at Zennor church to John Davey: 'the last to possess any traditional considerable knowledge of the Cornish Language'; the claims for Davey may be inflated yet nevertheless he was known to have some knowledge of the language as a native speaker, as did his father. There was no definitive 'last speaker'; just a larger than life local character who has been mythologised. sjc

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Well, Latin was a living language well into the 1960s, and is the process of being revived at certain (admittedly minority) seminaries and monastic establishments. I know two men who heard all their graduate coursework lectures and wrote their dissertations in Latin, and both are still themselves teaching (one at Georgia State Univesity and one at the University of Tennessee). It certianly wasn't classical Latin, but it was a recognizable descendent thereof. --MichaelTinkler

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BBC News (Spotlight SouthWest) today indicated that the UK government is to officially recognise Cornish as a minority language. sjc

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What about adding references to some of the pre-1660 texts we have in Cornish? Not many people know that they even exist--there's the Cornish "mystery" cycle of plays, and the "new" plays discovered in a medieval manuscript in 2002, and I believe there's a complete Bible--I'll look this up is some contacts me / wants me too.

Also some "References" would be helpful--the more who learn Cornish, the better off the langauge will be. DigitalMedievalist 04:36, 6 Jan 2004 (UTC) Lisa

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It's very strange - and somehat amusing - that people still get caught up in a conceptual tangle about Cornish. The fact is that it's THERE: the task of the scholar is to find out how it got there, what it's like, and how it works. I'm always puzzled as to how people who insist that it's not there work themselves up into such a tiz about something which they insist doesn't exist. TSS

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Be cautious about the "three mutations" story in Welsh. It depends how you count mutations and whether you count them the same way in each language. Welsh "soft mutation" has two variants for different situations (ll/rh being left in one form and mutated in the other). The "three mutations" is based on the way the language is taught not neccessarily on a strict linguists count. - Alan

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My main objection to the article is that two-thirds of it are about very recent efforts to revive the Cornish language. Which is fine - it's a hobby for a few ethusiasts. Still I think that an article on Cornish should reflect on the actual meaning, use, and distribution of a language. And that will get completely distorted when two-thirds of the article are taken up by a discussion on rather recent (and I would opine: rather artificial and very marginal) efforts to revive a dead language, while the actual historical and linguistic facts get pushed to the margins. It's a good thing that there are enthusiast for such matters. But articles here, in an encyolopedia, should defintively reflect a more objective perspective. There's enough space elsewhere on the web for special pleading.

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The state of the Cornish language today is part of the "actual meaning, use, and distribution" of the language, and it seems that people are interested in it. If you think the article should contain more information about the history and linguistics of Cornish then perhaps you should add it yourself rather than winge about other people writing about what they're interested in. It's perfectly possible to write about the Cornish revival in an objective and factual way, and I think the article does that, more or less.

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At the end of a section that seems to describe four versions of Cornish, the article currently says "Each of these three systems has its proponents". Presumably two of the four versions are in fact subversions of the same version, but which two? Could someone please clarify the text?

Language politics

For the rest of us, the most interesting aspect would be the politics behind this. Cornish republicans? Anti-centrists? Anti-EU? Isolationist? Anti-intellectual? Anti-immigrant? This aspect is essential and needs its own subheading. Wetman 07:26, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)

If you mean "Why Cornish?", it is a question of identity for most speakers, not a question of politics. Certainly none of the questions you have asked. If you mean "Which Cornish?" for which see above. Evertype 23:12, 2004 Sep 16 (UTC)

Old Devonian

I really don't think Biddulph qualifies as a linguistic expert, and this reference, and the main article Old Devonian, should be deleted unless substantiated. Evertype 14:21, 2005 Mar 5 (UTC)

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I have critically reviewed a text of the Lord's Prayer in Dewnansek. (See the discussion section of the Southwestern Brythonic language entry). This text, which appears on a Devonian website, was taken from Biddulph but with a number of caveats and alternatives removed. It is an amalgam of Middle Breton and Unified (Middle) Cornish with an occasional Welsh influence and a little re-spelling. If it represents anything in the real world, it might be seen as an approximation to the way a Breton immigrant to Cornwall might have spoken around 1500 c.e. It is badly constructed and incomplete and can by no stretch of the imagination be taken as representative of SW Brythonic in the eighth century. I might add that it feels rather odd to be agreeing with Michael Everson for once -- Mongvras 12:49, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

You're welcome. Evertype

Number of speakers

I see that "3,500" is quoted widely as being the number of speakers of modern Cornish, not just here. I was just wondering where the figure comes from and if anyone had any information on perhaps exact figures and distribution of these speakers- does the figure include those outside of Cornwall who speak the language or just those in the Duchy? Dewrad 17:04, Apr 2, 2005 (UTC)

University courses

I have added it to the main article, but I thought I would mention it here too - Students can study the Cornish language not only at the University of Exeter, but also in the department of Welsh at the University of Wales, Lampeter, as of next academic year. See the link here Twrist 12:44, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Fishermen counting

"Fishermen, for example, were counting fish in the Cornish language into the 1940s."

This appears to be analgous with the Cumbric language, which has 'Although the language is long extinct it appears traces of its vocabulary persisted into the modern era. In the 19th and 20th centuries sheep counts and children's counting rhymes which are possibly derived from Cumbric were collected throughout northern England: eg Yan, Tan, Tethera, Methera, Pim compared to Old Welsh "Un, Dou, Tri, Petwar, Pimp".' Morwen - Talk 11:57, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

Couple of new links added

• Uniting the Cornish language
• Cornish - The Cornish Language in education in the United Kingdom

Bretagne 44Bretagne 44 13:52, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

Less dishonesty, please

I reverted the usual unsubstantiated "Kernewek Kemmyn users are 95% of the Revival". But I could not believe the audacity when I saw the changes that had been made to the article about the publication of the New Testament. Nicholas Williams' Testament Noweth was published at Easter 2002, two years before Syed and Edwards' translation, yet the person who edited it (John11) simply lied, in order to make it look as though Kernowek Kemyn was better than it is. Shame on you, John11. Evertype 12:54, 17 October 2005 (UTC)

Inaccurate map

(The following is a duplicate of comments I made here: Talk:Scottish_English#Inaccurate_map.)

The following map has been applied to the English English page, and to Scottish English:

Diagram showing the geographical locations of selected languages and dialects of the British Isles.

It appears to have one major flaw, and several quibbles:

• Where on earth is the Scots language? Its ommission seems particularly inappropriate considering the debt owed to Scots by Scottish English. Somewhat bizarrely, only one dialect of Scots is included, and that is the tiny number of Ulster Scots speakers, only about 2% of all Scots-speakers! I know that the map is titled "Selected languages", but it is baffling why the only language the auther has "selected" not to include is Scots!
• Why on earth have two distinct languages, Scottish Gaelic language and Irish language, been shown as a homogenous blob?
• Highland English is missing: another rather stark absence on this Scottish English page.
• Why are several subdivisions of English English shown, but only two of Scottish English? The differences between the Fife dialect and Aberdonian are just as big, if not bigger, than the differences between Brummie and Yorkshire dialect.
• Where on earth did Shetland go? A stunning ommission, considering that it is one of the most distictive linguistic groups in the entire British Isles?

I find it very depressing to hear that a German textbook publisher wants to use it in textbooks for 600 schools. No wonder many people grow up with a very strange perception of the language situation in the United Kingdom.--Mais oui! 10:34, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

2005 Conference

Can we please put a stop to this pathetic reverting back and forth? Can we actually see some evidence either way, please- rather than unsubstantiated speculation or anecdotal evidence? "Being there" is just anecdotal evidence, as is "having heard" something. This is supposed to be a factual article, not propaganda for either UCR or KK! Dewrad 21:50, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

Examination of the official list of attendees suggests that at least half were known KK supporters. Of the remainder, a good few had no Cornish at all. Perhaps next time we'll all have have a t-shirt to wear, then there will be no doubt! Mongvras 22:42, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

Cornish in Mexico

The Mexico article (in the "Language" section) states that there are still Cornish-speaking decendants of immigrants in Hidalgo. Does anyone know anything more about this. If so, it would make an interesting article addition. aliceinlampyland 16:08, 6 January 2006 (UTC).

• Strongly doubt it! Almost any verifiable fact about the Cornish language tends to be widely trumpeted within the revival community, so I doubt I'd have failed to hear this before if it were true. Maybe they mean English-speaking descendents of Cornish miners? QuartierLatin1968 15:58, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Anyway, the Mexico article has to be amended. Anyone willing to do this? (I don't know enough about the matter to 100% rule out the posibility of C. speakers in M., so I won't edit.) Bab

Vowels

The table for short vowels currently lists three low and near-low vowels: /æ, a, ɒ/ (I presume these to be phonemes not phones). I wonder what the attribution is for this. I know Ken George only recognises one such short vowel for Middle Cornish (conventionally /a/), and I'm pretty sure Iwan Wmffre recognises only one for Late Cornish... Does Nicholas Williams recognise more? (Perhaps an argument could well be sustained that Lhuyd's <a> and <ɐ> represented a different phoneme from <o> [at least in Late Cornish], but what about /æ/?) QuartierLatin1968 15:58, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, when I figure out how to do tables on Wiki, I could set out the vowel system as reconstructed for Middle Cornish by Ken George, on which Kernewek Kemmyn is based. Basically there are a maximum of nine vowel phonemes although some of the contrasts are neutralised e.g. in short or unstressed vowels. Trouble is it would almost certainly be vandalised by the opposing factions so why bother? Mongvras 02:16, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

Opposing factions! We're all trying to revive the same language. :-) Anyway, surely nobody can have a problem if we make no pretense of having the One Ultimate Truth, and just say, look, here's the vowel phonemes according to Williams, here's what they are according to George, here's what they are according to Jenner. (Footnotes would even allow you to do that without multiple tables – for example, we could add /o:/ with a footnote saying Williams believes this merged with /ɔ:/ early, George believes it merged late.) QuartierLatin1968 16:04, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

John Boson

The link needs disambiguating. Here it refers to John Boson (1700-25??) of Newlyn, the son? or Nicholas Boson (1660-1700+??), notable for producing some of the few documents in Late Cornish. (See The Cornish Writings of the Boson Family O. J. Padel (Ed), Institute of Cornish Studies, Redruth, Cornwall, 1975 ISBN 0 903686 09 0). At present the link point to another John Boson entirely. Mongvras 14:45, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I've known about that for awhile, but haven't done anything with it since the real John Boson may not be notable enough for English Wikipedia's standards. Should we rename our John Boson John Boson (antiquary)? or perhaps John Boson (non-cabinet maker), hehe? (In kw, as you may have noticed, Mongvras, I've copped out by making him a redirect to Teylu Boson.) QuartierLatin1968 05:31, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Not a copout at all, probably the best solution. There's so little hard fact about the Bosons Nicholas, Thomas and John and afaik none are notable except for Cornish, but within Cornish they are very notable having between them reputably supplied perhaps half the Late Cornish texts we have. There was an historian in Australia I think (Cornish family) who was researching as far as he could the various characters associated with the Newlyn School and Late Cornish. Hmm, should we set up a stubs for The Newlyn School and/or Late Cornish and redirect ALL the individuals there Bosons and others (like Keigwyn and Wella Rowe)? Mongvras 18:40, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

cornish speakers elsewhere

I Don't know if anyone has deleted the thing about mexico yet but if that was true it would be pretty remarkable and I think we would have heard. With regards also to Cornwall being changed to Devon and cornwall in the sentence 'people in many areas of cornwall did not speak english': I've removed this because I cannot find any evidence that this was the case ( ie many monoglot speakers of cornish in devon at this point) . I've seen reports that there might have been a few cornish speakers in areas of devon later than expected, but I think even that is debatable so I feel that the previous sentence really gave the wrong impression. Indeed one of the qoutes about cornish speakers east of the tamer seems to come from jenner and Morton-Nance later reported that he would have retracted it.

I certainly think the history section should be expanded a bit more before we start including more shakey ideas like this and cornish speakers abroad.

131.111.8.102

You shouldn't remove something because you can't find the history of it nor should it be removed because it hasn't been cited as then everything would need a reference and Wikipedia wouldn't work to the level that it has. There were speakers of the Cornish language in Devon at the time to which the history refers. You must remember that this article is about the language, not the county. You are doing a great disservice to British history to remove Cornish speakers from Devon. If I had the time, I would go and find the sources and perhaps soon I shall. In the mean time I will revert to including Devon in this piece and will continually do so whenever I visit this page if you have added again your POV. 130.195.86.38 20:19, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Have edited the prayer book rebellion section, it is a very significant event if one looks at the number of cornish speakers (setimate obviously.) I think it is NJ williams who has re lookd at ken goerges estimates of speakers but need to check. Also have again removed the 'many people in devon and cornwall spoke only cornish'. I see a reference in edits to someone referring to something like this as a 'devon hating cornish nationalist', i don't know if this is in reference to my edit. However I'm not a 'devon hating cornish nationalist' and i have changed this because there is no evidence that there were cornish monoglots in devon at this time. Indeed for many of the references to devon in this article i would like to see some primary evidence. Including, I am not sure that ken goerge looked at cornish speakers outside of cornwall when calculating his estimates of speaker numbers. I have had a browse around and can't find ay accurate info. However seen as the continuation of cornish in devon is very debatable (no matter what certain celtic obsessed devonians might wish) I would think this extremely unlikely.

131.111.8.97