Talk:Breton language

message: I was reading an article about the Breton language on Omniglot, and I noticed that one of the four dialectal divisions pointed out to right were Breton came from.This dialectal division was in the county of Cornouaille (French for Cornwall), and the Breton dialect was Kerneveg. This seems sort of scary to me, especially when you compare the word for Cornish in their own language, which is Kernowek. You can sort of prove with this about the origin of Breton.I bet that before Englih and French impacted Brittany, speakers of the Breton language probably thought they were speaking Cornish, or at least a dialect of it, and probably even identified themselves as Cornish. Now this brings upon another subject that I will discuss on the Cornish language article ... Fabrizio Alessandro Bernabéi (talk) 00:00, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  About Dialectal Divisions of the Breton Language 

message: How do you say hello in Breton? >>
:There is no single agreed equivalent for hello in Breton. Various phrases tend to be used depending on time of day, familiarity of interlocutors, etc. Among the most common are demat and salud, but often one simply asks someone how they are with a phrase such as penaos 'mañ ar bed ganeoc'h. Man vyi 13:16, Nov 18, 2004 (UTC)
:In my family, it was usual to start a conversation by the weather : "Brav eo an amzer hirie !" ,"Nice weather today !". Even with strangers. Or a more familiar "Mont' a ra ?", a sort of "Are you well ?". Never heard an equivalent of "Hello". It was the way to speak, not a lack of politness. NEVER use the so-known "kenavo", wich means "goodbye" ! Gwalarn 03:10, 7 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: ''Hello'' in Breton language

message: I'm trying to disambiguate the Leon page. This page links to it with an ambiguous "Leon" dialog link. I don't know which of the options on the page to transfer the link to (or none). Can someone who knows please fix the link - either direct it to one of the Leon page disambig options, or link it to a new (to be created) page? Thanks, DarbyAsh 05:44, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: León link disambiguation

message: like brez-honeg, or is the zh one sound like in bonjour?
: No, zh is usually pronunced like a Z in Kerne Leon and Tregor, and it is pronunced like an H in the Gwennedeg dialect.
[bre'zõ:nEk], or ['brehõ'nEk],...  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Evarzheg (talk • contribs) 14:05, 25 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  How to prononce "Brezhoneg" 

message: Does Breton have the same masculine/feminie gender system as Irish and Welsh? — Hippietrail 00:13, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't know for those languages, but the gender system is the same as French, Spanish, Portuguese : masculine or feminine for every noun. But not in exact correspondance with the gender of French words. Gwalarn 10:04, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gender 

message: I had to remove the linked image showing a map of the distribution of Breton and Gallo languages, because it was deleted from wiki commons for not explaining where it came from. If someone could find a new image that would be great. Murderbike 01:32, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Are there any data anyone could find that shows the actual current distribution of Breton in Brittany similar to the Gaeltachtaed maps for Irish and Scottish Gaelic?  It says there are 500k speakers, but other places (like Wikitravel) says Breton is limited to a few old people and scholars.  I think it is important to paint a realistic portrait of the distribution and extent of language use.65.100.32.202 (talk) 04:21, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Distribution  

message: Strictly speaking,  and  do not belong in the two-dimensional IPA table. They are usually shown outside it. Right now, it looks like  is a voiceless j, which is not the case.
: Fixed it by adding a labiopalatal section. Generally speaking now, there's still a small problem in 'pedia regarding the matter of non-explicit "voiceness": if someone has no knowledge of the IPA, how is (s)he gonna know right-away that ʎ, ɥ, ʕ denote voiced consonants, while ɸ, ɬ voiceless ones, since in the IPA tables of many languages' (whose phonetic inventories have only one of the two "voice-varieties" of a consonant) articles all these symbols appear centralized in their table-boxes? Maybe, someone should start fixing this. --Omnipedian (talk) 06:53, 25 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  IPA table 

message: Hi,
I am proposing the article .bzh for deletion. Please see Talk:.bzh for explanation. Your input is welcome. --Amir E. Aharoni 07:23, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  .bzh - Proposed for deletion 

message: The article states that after the Second Vatican Council the Catholic Church turned against the Breton language. What does this refer to?--HarryHenryGebel (talk) 19:50, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Catholic church 

message: Considering that Breton is the only living Celtic language that has an indefinite article, it would appear to me that this has resulted from French influence. Am I wrong in saying that? Also, the word order in the Breton sentence "ul levr zo ganin" and the French "un livre est avec-moi" are identical in word order. "Ul levr zo ganin" is more similar to French than to Irish or Welsh in which the nearest word order would respectively be "Is leabhar atá agam" and "Lyffr ydy gen i" which would translate to something along the lines of "'Tis a book that is at me/with me" as opposed to "a book is with-me" which is again closer to English than to it's Celtic relatives. French influence? Enlighten me...  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.147.139.145 (talk) 00:32, 8 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Influence of French on Breton 

message: Robin, I think we discussed this already elsewhere. The sentence (in the History section) "It comes from a Celtic language community (see image) between Great Britain and Armorica (present-day Brittany), and even Galicia" is unclear in the extreme, and that is part of the reason I changed an earlier version of it. A language does not 'come from a community'; rather, it is spoken by members of a community. From the earlier discussion (and from your newly-added reference to the map), my understanding is that you want to say that a common community existed (when exactly?) between all of the Brythonic-speaking lands, despite (or even, as you imply, because of) the intervening ocean. I think you need to (1) cite a reference for that contention, and (2) make your sentence say that!--Yumegusa (talk) 09:30, 23 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  It comes from a community... 

message: It's almost trivial, I know, but I wonder if the song Gortoz a Ran - J'Attends, sung by Denez Prigent and Lisa Gerrard should be mentioned on this page, as an example of the use of Breton in wider popular culture. I heard it from the "Black Hawk Down" soundtrack, and realised it wasn't French or anything like that, but had to search the Internet to discover that the lyrics were written in Breton. It's pretty safe to say, I should think, that it's probably the only time most Americans (or most anyone outside of France) have ever heard Breton spoken (or sung). I don't know exactly how one would go about including it, but I think it's somewhat relevant. Thoughts? Sacxpert (talk) 06:45, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wider cultural references 

message: There is no detailed explanation of the phonology and orthography of Breton in this article. For example, what consonant does “c’h” represent? Cheers. – Kaihsu (talk) 10:29, 17 November 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Some sort of a [x], as far as I understand.--91.148.159.4 (talk) 23:12, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  phonology and orthography 

message: While I don't know much about Breton, this primer by a teacher of Breton at the Russian MGU seems to say that the Breton vowel system looks like this:
    	    	Front         	Front         	Back
    	    	unrounded     	rounded       	Back
Close    	Close    	              	              	
Close-mid	Close-mid	              	              	
Open-mid 	Open-mid 	              	              	
Open     	Open     	~ <SUP>1</SUP>	~ <SUP>1</SUP>	~ <SUP>1</SUP>
<SUP>1</SUP> - /a/ may be either front or back depending on the specific dialect.
This is basically the same vowel system as that of French minus the nasals and the "schwa". If nobody objects, I intend to add it to the article in a few days.--91.148.159.4 (talk) 22:57, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Nasals are common in Breton, for example brezhoneg (Breton) is pronounced (by many) /bʁez'ɔ̃:nɛk/, heñvre (dream) is pronounced /h'ɛ̃:vʁe/. I am not very knowledgeable about the language itself though. I can't seem to find an example of a word using a schwa, but this is definitely not a proof that there isn't. Oyp (talk) 12:45, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, you're right. The text I cited doesn't include the nasalized vowels in the chart, but instead mentions them in a footnote - just brilliant. It doesn't care to list them though, so I guess some other source will have to be found.--91.148.159.4 (talk) 23:03, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

text: The nasalized pronunciation of [bʁez'ɔ̃:nɛk] and similar words (more examples here) would seem to be allophonic, though, so it doesn't necessarily count. The <Vñ> series, on the other hand, can't be ignored.--91.148.159.4 (talk) 23:08, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: [ɔ̃] is standard AFAIK. The alternative is [u], I think it is mostly found in Leon. Oyp (talk) 19:00, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I didn't say it wasn't standard, I said it seemed to be allophonic (a variant of /ɔ/ by the following /n/ rather than an actual phoneme) - something I assumed because it isn't spelled with a following <ñ> like <heñvre>, and because all vowels appear to be nasalized before /n/ in the example words here. By the way, Press (see below) doesn't mention any /ɔ̃/, just /õ/, but I suppose he means there is no contrast between the two in Breton. Oddly, he also says that "basically, all the vowels can be nasalized" (p.30)! --91.148.159.4 (talk) 16:19, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  My mistake. Roñse (horse) may be a better example, then. All vowels are not nasalised before /n/, e.g. den (man) is pronounced [dɛn]. I wouldn't be surprised if all the vowels could indeed be nasalised, since some Breton speakers tend to nasalise more or less everything. Oyp (talk) 19:18, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, all vowels may not be allophonically nasalized before /n/, but /a/ and /ɔ/ apparently are, if this lesson site is to be trusted: it says that <an> is pronounced [ãn], and <on> is pronounced [õn]. Whatever, this point was moot from the start. The worst thing is that I just haven't been able to find a reliable academic source about the phonology of the language, except for the one mentioned below, which IMO has too original ideas for our purposes. It's just absurd to have a consonant chart and no vowel chart in the article. --91.148.159.4 (talk) 18:10, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

text: Ian Press (A grammar of modern Breton, 1986, p.24, available on Google Books) lists the following nasalized vowels:  /ĩ/  /ẽ/  /ɛ̃/   /ỹ/   /œ̃/   /ã/  /ũ/ /õ/. The oral ones are the same as the ones I wrote above. I am, however, disconcerted by the fact that he lists the front rounded vowels (both oral and nasal) as central. Perhaps this is supposed to be an elegant phonological abstraction that he is very proud of - in any case, if anyone feels more comfortable with this part, and has an innate talent for wikitables :), please go ahead.--91.148.159.4 (talk) 23:44, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Breton vowels 

message: There seems to be some confusion in this section, especially on the fact that different languages use different prepositions to translate "have". In Breton, either da (to) or gant (with) can do that, depending on the meaning.
* ul levr zo din : I have a book, in the sense that I own it. It might be located far away.
* ul levr zo ganin : I have a book, meaning it is currently available to me. I might own it, or not.
Oyp (talk) 18:58, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Take a look at Talk:Inflected preposition. --JorisvS (talk) 23:16, 18 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Inflected preposition 

message: I am missing the IPA representation of the soft version of c'h in the consonant chart, which is specified as /ɣ/ in the mutation table.
I am also confused, that the soft version of /x/ seems to be /ɣ/, while it is a voiced version of /χ/.
I do not know from whence I heard it, but I seem to recall that the breton sound for hard c'h was somewhere between /x/ and /χ/. Would that mean that the soft version is between (what is it?) /ʁ/ and /ɣ/? Buriaku (talk) 00:42, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I confounded /x/ with /χ/ so my first question should be ignored. But I'd still like to know if the hard c'h is /x/ or a little farther back between /x/ and /χ/. Buriaku (talk) 13:45, 2 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Soft c'h 

message: The vocabulary section deals with supposed loan words into English. This article is about Breton not English. I propose to remove this section until a more appropriate section can be created. Opinions? Ozdaren (talk) 16:01, 27 July 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vocabulary 

message: Word Order in 20th Century Breton (by Lenora A. Timm) from Natural Language & Linguistic Theory. I hope this helps. Komitsuki (talk) 14:19, 14 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Word-order related paper on Breton 

message: I have been unable to locate a source for the map Percentage of breton speakers in the breton countries in 2004.png.
Does anybody have an idea what it is based upon?
Otherwise, I think it should be removed from the article. Unoffensive text or character (talk) 10:28, 31 October 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Map "Percentage of Breton Speakers" 

message: Several decades ago I saw a BBC documentary that accused the French Government, at the end of WWII,  of trumping up false charges of (Nazi) collaboration against the major Breton nationalists, thus disposing of them via long prison sentences.  As I recall, there was a respectable amount of film footage.
Can anyone confirm (or deny)?
Paul Magnussen (talk) 20:54, 30 September 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: This is covered in Breton nationalism and World War II. It does not merit mention in this article on the language, but it should be mentioned in Breton nationalism and probably also in Bretons. Verbcatcher (talk) 19:12, 10 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Trumped-up charges? 

message: I see that "bretons"words are in fact Serbian words! I can understand it with my original mother tongue : Serbian ! Where are lingusts ?
:Agree! For me they speak kind of gentle, by waves like silenced, slavic e.g. here1 ni klęs uj mażisz ni ześ reś..dom..i bez utra ..  b[i]er żivisz .. ino slkiela duchom. More serbian than polish but slightly like lover-serbo-luzician influenced by lover-deutch . I looking for native-mono-linguistic video; best will be elders talking real life subjects, long enough to snap on whole language. I cant find much, mostly bacgrounded fragments with intrusive voices over(but i just started 2 hour ago). Here 0:40 nie chocziesz wiń skol[e] chałpoć se {like kalba sl mc +/- chlapać [jęzorem] pl, + cłapać - kłapć as kłapać [dziobem]} ga[dź]łik {~godka or beter quick 'go[d]a li tyśk (a bit)' + małvik (miła mova/ godzi se } 1:04 siłowi są - they force 1:34 uciś - uczysz -teach. 2:06 horeń nam durho spieło, (spieło śpiew-o[ją] i śpiewają - perfect, clear !). Thx.99.90.196.227 (talk) 14:16, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
thread_title: Slavonic / Serbian Roots ?

message: The same user has copy-pasted the same text across several articles. Relevant in some cases, but not here. Britonian and Breton split around 1500 years ago. We don't use the article English language for a lengthy discussion of Dutch language, nor do we use French language to discuss Italian language. Apart from being pasted across loads of talk pages, the request to have an article about the unattested Britonian language in modern Spain is irrelevant to this article. (non-admin closure) Jeppiz (talk) 19:36, 4 July 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Britonian