How to pronounce those tricky letters! A quick Welsh learning tool for happyinpembrokeshire.com
Welsh appears like a really hard language to read, but once you know how the letters are pronounced it gets a lot easier. The Welsh alphabet is different to the English one, although the characters look the same there are some differences. In Welsh there is no k, q, v, x or z, however the sounds of most of these letters are used, for example “f” in Welsh is pronounced like “v” in English. J is accepted as part of the alphabet but few words use it and are mostly derived from English. Some letters are made up of two characters, eg “ch” but still only count as one consonant, be aware of this if you’re ever doing a Welsh crossword! Vowels can be pronounced differently depending on their context, for example “y” is pronounced “uh” but becomes “ee” when at the end of a multisyllabic word. Sometimes a circumflex is used above a long vowel, for example “a” is pronounced “ah” as in “axe” and “â” is pronounced “aah” as in “hard” These differences are few and you’ll pick them up through practice.
This short video gives a quick recital of the alphabet for you to get a feel for how the letters sound.
