The Welsh: how come we never talk about them?

Don't forget me: one of DL's fave, Luke Evans.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

They'll talk your head off if you give them an inch. Generally Pixieheads like all the Celtic nations so they have everything that goes with that.

OP you mean HOPKINS?

RACISM!

Interesting genetics. So many have dark features (olive skin, black hair - see Catherine Zeta Jones) they could pass for Spaniards.

Matthew Rhys from The Americans. And Anthony Hopkins. And Vinnie Jones, who you would know if you saw him. Huge muscular bald guy. (Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, Snatch.)

Looking pretty solid so far as far as the men.

What about me?

And they can sing!

alas, MTV cancelled The Valleys. I love their lilting, melodic speech.

They're not very harmless if you're one of us.

If you've ever had the misfortune to spend a significant amount of time in Wales, you'd know that they are a horrid people. Inhospitable, surly, stingy, lacking in hygiene, and mean.

Christian Bale, my very favorite Welshman, and among the best actors of today.

Actually Christian Bale identifies as English. He was born in Wales to English parents. Just google it for confirmation. Also Tom Jones was born in Wales, and no doubt considers himself Welsh, but most of his grandparents were from southwest England!

The men are kind of hot. My dad never liked them. They ran the coal mines in PA where my grandfather worked and according to my dad treated their employees (Irish) like shit. What does pixieheaded mean?

Ugliest accent this side of Boston. Kudos to Burton, Hopkins and Sheen for (mostly) abandoning it

The Irish are soooo annoying though. They and their victim complex.

Timothy Dalton was born in Colwyn Bay

Bette Davis was of Welsh ancestry. According to British friends of mine, she looked very, very Welsh.

Richard Burton

I love their grape jelly with Skippy Cream Peanut Butter.

Guitarist Dave Edmunds, solo act and with the group Rockpile. Talented and super cute.

I forget they exist

Pixiehead?

Ray Milland was Welsh.

Also Ioan Gruffydd and the one who plays the evil fuck who brainwashes Theon in GoT. Also Helen McCrory from Peaky Blinders and Penny Dreadful (where she acts with fellow Welsh person Dalton). Also John Cale of the Velvet Underground.

The genes are Celtic, resulting in very dark hair, pale skin and sometimes blue eyes.

Whoever said Burton and Hopkins abandoned their accents has never heard a Welsh accent. Burton especially has an uber South Wales accent and it's for that reason that he played First Voice in the famous version of Under Milk Wood.

Gavin Henson. One of the reasons I love rugby!

R14 Jones has English lineage but he is Welsh. His accent and his whole joie de vivre is so Welsh. Bale on the other hand is English.

Tim Dalton was born in Wales but was raised in England. His father is English and his mom was American(Of Italian and Irish descent).

Ioan Gruffudd is indeed Welsh, R25, but it's Iwan Rheon who plays Ramsey in Game Of Thrones. Ioan Gruffydd isn't doing very much these days sadly. Last seen playing Kylie Ann Minogue's brother in San Andreas.

And Kylie's mother was Welsh, and moved to Australia as a little girl, just like Julia Gillard.

It's a running joke in Wales that Christian Bale is constantly referred to as "Welsh born actor Christian Bale" as if where his mother gave birth somehow defines him.

R12 You are a Taffy and you admit that? I wonder how you feel about The Irish Catholics, The Ulster Scots, The English and The Scottish? A Taffy is a better Britton than almost any other in the UK.

It looks depressing as shit weather wise but so does the entire UK.

No Welsh person would ever call themselves a "Taffy" in the same way that no Irish person would call themselves a "Paddy" or a Scot call themselves a "Jock".

From four years ago so they are all over 18 now. Just say no to pedophilia.

R31 Except that each of those nationalities DO have male individuals that identify as such. Sorry, but, it's a fact. I know a Welsh man whose nickname is "Taff". And I know Irish men called "Paddy". There certainly Scottish men who answer to the name "Jock".

*are....

Welsh and Irish seem very close in ethnicity. Except the Irish in my experience are lovely, fun people. I am not so sure about the Welsh. My one friend who is Welsh is a fun guy but he has a mean streak and hold a grudge like no other. They seem a bit more dangerous.

There's no worse accent anywhere in the English-speaking world than that of uneducated Welsh females.

R36 I take it you haven't experienced the Liverpudlian accent.

I was in Cardiff for a few days & went to some of their gay bars. It was pretty bleak. Irish and Scottish guys are much better looking, in general (not just in the bars - walking around anywhere). They worshiped Americans, though, to my surprise. They wanted me to keep talking bc they liked my accent so much "in person" (they get it on tv). They all were perplexed that I was in Cardiff, and a few (jokingly) asked me to marry them so they could move to the USA. They had a ton of questions about America & really glorified it. I thought Cardiff was really nice, though.

The one guy I hooked up with was very short...kinda cute...small penis. He was more friendly that the average guy here, though. The other one was a complete freak / weirdo / closet case (early 20s) who was the only uncut guy I ever knew to literally have (the constantly discussed on DL) cock cheese. I was like, wtf is happening there...and he was like, nothing, it's fine. Uh - no it's not fine. So, that didn't go well.

Oh I forgot this fucked up story until just now... In my hotel, there was an employee who apparently saw me on grindr. And, I was getting into the elevator and he literally put his hand in the elevator and goes "you're the American Visitor", right? And I was like...what do you mean. And he's like "what's your room number." And I was still confused because I didn't really know what he meant. So, I told him my room number & he said "ok i'll come up later" and then it clicked... and I was like oh shit - my grindr profile says I am visiting from the usa. So, I just said "no, I'm packing to leave..." and really I had no interest / energy for sex. He kept insisting he was gonna come up though...and when I finally said - "no" in a direct way, he got really pissed off. He wasn't welsh though, but that just seems like a classic DL story (except I did not have sex w him).

So, my Cardiff trip was pretty bad except for seeing where they filmed Doctor Who...and Cardiff castle is interesting.

[quote]lacking in hygiene

Is this a UK thing?

Netflix carries a Welsh detective series called Hinterland. It's not bad, brooding people and dreary/bleak scenery but I enjoyed watching it.

Wales is the cleanest country I've been to. Even cleaner than Switzerland.

However the Welsh are a grumpy, scowling people, depressing to be around. Humorless.

I love Matthew Rhys' accent. That is some serious lilting. He's also hilarious and seems like a lot of fun. Also, just to clarify R16 's post, that is Michael Sheen who is also Welsh. I adore him, too.

I put Wales on the map, bitches!

Sometimes when I watch UK series they'll make a passing reference to "Welsh tarts" or whatnot.

Are they supposed to be wild/slutty?

Last one I noticed was UK Skins, Abbey the psych teacher who was fucking her student, Chris. (I only watched it recently.)

"...who was the only uncut guy I ever knew to literally have (the constantly discussed on DL) cock cheese. "

This was your chance to make your mouth useful in any way...

Historically, they mine coal, sing, and drink. In this country, they seem to lack much of an identity. My Welsh grandfather (dead before my time) was a randy old guy chasing my grandmother around the dining table in his 70s, but he also was gruff and abusive. A teetotaling Baptist whose sons became athieists and married Catholics.

They had a terrifying male rapist gay storyline in Pobol y Cym, Britain's longest running soap.

What's a Pixiehead? Can someone explain, I'm desperate to know!

It's actually Iolo's hot brother Macs who gets raped.

Helgwn gwain enfawr. Cefnogwyr Cameron Fawr.

Anthony Burgess (who wrote Clock Orange) wrote in his autobiography that everyone in the UK was prudish when it comes to sex - except the Welsh, who are quite a randy lot. And they love to sing. And Tom Jones had a huge dick. And Richard Burton said actors were all alcoholics and fuck-ups because they were all gay but couldn't come to terms with it (said in the 1960's). Then there's faux opera singer Katherine Jenkins. She almost won DWTS. There's a handsome closeted Welsh "presenter" as they call them named Gethin Jones, who Katherine bearded for for a while.

*Clockwork Orange

And there's crazy Rachel Roberts who killed herself when Rex Harrison dumped her.

Bonnie Tyler is Welsh.

R47 Coronation Street is Britain's longest running soap. It started in 1960, long before the Welsh-language minority show Pobol y Cwm.

Best British royals EVAH.

"Wales, the land of my fathers, my fathers can have it" - Dylan Thomas

Matthew Rhys speaking Welsh.

R48 Here:

[quote]And Tom Jones had a huge dick.

Apparently . . .

The most famous Welsh of all.

Mostly incredibly ugly little midgets the any decent ones being those with Italian ancestry (big immigration for the mining industry)

Is it true that the dark Irish, and I imagine Welsh too, are descended from the Spanish that washed up ashore when the Spanish Armada crapped out? I had a girlfriend in college who was dark Irish and that was what she said.

r63 that's the legend I've always heard. Spanish sailors washed up on the shores of Ireland and stayed, interbred with the Irish women, and that's how we got Black Irish. I have no idea if it's true or not.

Not true. Original Celts were all dark - the Vikings brought the red/blond hair and blue eyes.

Your basic country stereotypes: rural, farming, uneducated, not that bright, drunks, not quite inbred, but small breeding pool. Can sing, dig coal, and play rugby.

I read somewhere that genes indicate they were originally from what is the Basque country now ... But from the time of the Celtic migrations ; the armada connection is a myth

But how about those Basque? They're really interesting.

Starlet Catherine Zeta-Jones is Welsh

R43 Dame Shirley Bassey was born in Tiger Bay, Cardiff to a Nigerian father and a white English mother. Although she was indeed born in Wales, she is not of Welsh ethnicity.

Not that it matters.

Pobol Y Cwm is the BBC's longest running soap.

The Celts were not all dark. Indeed not dark at all. Exhibit A:

R72 that stone is not representative of the colouring of those people. It is stone.

R5. THE TRIP with Rob and Steve Coogan is great for plenty of Welsh jokes, among other things Steve skewers Rob for.

It's a great series if you enjoy sarcasm, the angst of middle-aged men and the humour of the UK in general. Some also noticed a slightly wistful homoromantic tone to it, buried deep inside the sharp melancholy and banality on the surface.

Rob (and his lovely accent) with Steve at Latitude in 2011:

The Welsh are boring at best. Welsh culture is a yawn. THAT is why they aren't discussed much.

R73 the dry phrasing of your comeback is so beautiful that I laughed and cried (both dryly).

I think I might be scarred.

... really?

I can't decide which has the more beautiful countryside, Wales or Scotland? Wales has that irish, lush green fields and forests and Scotland has these great lakes (called Lochs, Loch Ness being the most famous one) and, of course the Highlands.

The best looking men I've seen have Welsh roots.

The Welsh have that dark look due to the Moors, who invade Spain as well as Wales.

Don't forget ME!!!

Iwan only speaks welsh

[quote]Jones has English lineage but he is Welsh. His accent and his whole joie de vivre is so Welsh. Bale on the other hand is English.

Jones was born in Watford, schooled in London and behaves and sounds like it. There is nothing Welsh about him save one Welsh grandparent. Getting into the Welsh football squad is a tad easier than getting a cap for England. Hence quite a few English footballers have played for the country of one of their forebears.

People do talk a lot of crap about ethnicity etc. Oh yeah the Irish welsh, and Scots are 'Celtic' whatever that means in the 21st Century I have no idea. Also, how the hel do you 'look Welsh'???? they are just white people. Do they have a specific look?? so stupid. I think ome people should actually listen to the shit that comes out of them sometimes haha!

Yes r71, BBC soap, it's not the longest running in Britain as you claimed.

R81 they're both lovely but for me I think Scotland is the most beautiful place I've ever been. It's not just the lochs and mountains of the highlands it also has the incredibly lush green of the lowlands, fjords on the west coast, palm trees, islands with perfect beaches. Wales, specially the south, is lovely but Scotland has much more.

R87... you can't tell the difference between someone from Ireland and someone from Sicily? ok..

Welsh features are a little less consistent, but most countries have a type of "look" that applies to a lot of the population. Not all, of course, but a significant percentage.

R88, palm trees in Scotland?

Yes r90. On the west coast.

Yeah, Ireland and Scotland have a lot of Palm trees & tropical plants... some parts of England too. It's because the climate doesn't get cold enough to kill them, usually. A few winters ago, when it snowed in Ireland, a lot of them died. I notice them more on the coast than in the cities.

Can somebody give a brief run-down of exactly what "Celtic" means? Americans tend to think Celtic is another word for Irish, but I know that's not really accurate.

The palm trees and tropical fauna look ridiculous there, they are not indigenous to those areas.

When did you go to Scotland to see the palm trees r94? Personally I thought the palm trees lining the beach looked exactly in keeping with how you'd expect palm trees to look.

Celtic refers to the Welsh, Scottish and Irish language and culture as distinct from the English Anglo-Saxon culture.

R93 - People of Celtic origin are the Irish, Scottish and Welsh. Cornwall in England (Cornish), Brittany in France (Bretons) and the Isle of Man are also considered to be members of this group.

R73 and R77 if you don't know a ginger when you see one represented in stone, then you are probably the sort of people who put their hands on a hot stove.

Memphis TN has palm trees.

Prince Charles: "The Welsh people wanted it"

Rapist!

And what precisely has Charles ever done for Wales?

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned yet the Manic Street Preachers.

R98 how exactly do you tell that a stone statue is representative of a ginger? Go on, this ought to be amusing.

That stone statue is called "The Dying Celt" and it's rather famous. Prince Harry bears a striking resemblance to it.

R95 I go there often to see relatives and friends. And no, they look out of place on a beach that is not tropical.

Still no explanation of how the statue clearly looks like a pale ginger.

I thought they were joking about that... but now that they said it, I can kind of see how it would be a ginger. I have no idea why.

Why Richard, it profits a man nothing to give his soul for the whole world... but for Wales?

r107 same here! If I were to colorize that statue I would make the man a ginger (redhead). Don't ask me why, I can't explain.

Sure it could R107, it could also be a swarthy Italian.

R109 the explanation is, the power of suggestion.

No it's not the power of suggestion. That statue just says "redhead" to me.

With that pointy noise and rounded jaw / pointy chin, the statue isn't of an Italian. Italian statues had bigger noses, thicker lips, and more square jaws.

R113 that still doesn't make it a ginger.

There's just something about the features that says "ginger" to me. Like I said, I can't really explain. Maybe it's some ethnic memory or something, lol!

R114... did I say that made him a ginger? I said it made him not Italian.

Go back to sleep R116.

Danny Bonaduce wants you all to know some Italians are gingers.

No such thing as a "swarthy" ginger, though. That statue doesn't look like a swarthy Italian. R117, why? Was that explanation too complicated for you?

No R119, it was too simplistic. Not all Italian status had those types of features.

It's the hair. The mustache and the hair. You'd have to add mud to dark hair to make it clump like that, and then presumably you'd have mud all over your body.

Yes, it was simplistic. There are tens of thousands of statues in Italy, but I am just trying to explain why it read less "swarthy Italian" to me. Fuck me, maybe he's from Milan.

naked statue guy is the new blue / black / gold dress.

The statue made me think of the guy who played Van Gogh on Doctor who.

Galatians

We never used to talk about the fact that we never talked about them.

Mary Hopkin singing "Those Were The Days" was amazing.

Do you think tulips look out of place in a Connecticut yard r105? Not like daffodils in Kentucky? No bamboo grass in California? None of those are indigenous species. Lots of plants are grown thousands of miles from where the originated. The palm trees look just fine.

I'm sorry, R70, I adore you, I love you, but you don't have the range!

They are surly, troll-like people with explosive tempers.

R128, give up. Someone doesn't see things the way you do, get over it.

Even Groundskeeper Willie never talked about them.

[quote]Celtic refers to the Welsh, Scottish and Irish language and culture

Cultures and languages, dear.

Six Celtic languages are still spoken in the world today, in north-west Europe. They are divided into two groups, the Goidelic (or Gaelic) and the Brythonic (or British). The three Goidelic languages still spoken are Irish, Scottish, and Manx. Welsh is a British Celtic language. Example: Rydw i'n hoffi Datalounge yn iawn = I like Datalounge a lot

No one cares.

Indeed it is, R134 and I couldn't care less. Times change.

That's a vast overimplification R33. Many Gaelic dialects are mutually unintelligible. More like a couple hundred languages really, and don't forget cant.

I thought Manx was a dead language.

Which Gaelic language did you learn, r135?

Manx is experiencing a revival, as is Cornish.

Taron Egerton is Welsh.

They're sortof like the dull cousins of the irish.

The cadence of the Welsh language is ideal for poetry and lyrics, though. Verse sounds so soothing written in Welsh.

Also, weren't Ioan Gruffudd and Mathew Rhys rumoured for years to be lovers? They shared a home in LA for 10 years.

The Welsh language sounds ugly though, like someone's speaking English backwards.

Welsh / Cymraeg, R138.

The odd thing about very fervent Welsh speakers, (most of whom treat the Welsh language as a political issue and want a separate nation i.e. to leave the United kingdom,) is that they don't really speak Welsh to each other, they use a bizarre mix of English and Welsh. They can't help themselves lapsing into English every fourth word. Yet they demand government policies to force kids in Welsh schools to learn Welsh. Hypocrites.

I think the reason for that is that Welsh is an ancient language so doesn't have words for many modern things so more recently invented words become loan words r144.

Apparently the Welsh spoken in the north is completely different to that in the south and not understood by each other. No way could Wales become independent it isn't even a country its a principality, it would be nothing outside of the UK.

It's not only that, R144 though that is part of it. All languages develop and create new vocabulary. There is some attempt by these Welsh language guardians to make 'official' versions of new words e.g. (yeah it's an old example) compact disc : cryno ddisg. But you won't hear Welsh speakers use it. They use the English instead of the Welsh.

And it's worse than that. Example of how my ex spoke to his brother (both Welsh) : Alright?- welsh words - yeah, maybe - welsh words - I don't know. I'll phone you tomorrow - welsh words , etc.

Back and forth, like that. Ridiculous. And all Welsh speakers do that.

[quote]Apparently the Welsh spoken in the north is completely different to that in the south and not understood by each other.

Not quite. The North Walians have a distinct accent and some distinct slang phrases e.g. cont = cunt. But the language spoken is the same.

[quote]No way could Wales become independent it isn't even a country its a principality, it would be nothing outside of the UK.

It's only a principality because the English say so. The political Welsh nationalists say it's a country. It used to have its own royal family and King. But, yes, it could not survive as a country without massive investments from outside. Money from England and from the European Union keeps it afloat. Most of it is rural and very poor. Jobs are mainly retail, tourism , farming and academia.

That's like Spanglish, commonly spoken in America. Perhaps you should call it Wenglish.

Code-switching is very common in multilingual societies.

That's exactly what it is called!

I typed "celtic people characteristics" in Google Image and this is what I got: Russell Brand. Not sure if diddily or ding-dang doodily...

[quote]The ancient Celts were also a branch of the Indo-Europeans who invaded Europe from 4,000 BCE and Haplogroup R1b is closely associated with the Spaniards as well as the Irish. The Irish and Britons descended from a group of fishermen from the Iberian Peninsula and the ancient Britons and Celts would have looked like the current inhabitants of the Iberian Peninsula until the Anglo-Saxon invasions and Viking raids dramatically changed the genetic makeup of the peoples of the British isles. As a result, the native Irish and Britons acquired strong Nordic traits such as blue eyes and blonde hair from new migrants from Scandinavia but celebrities like Kate Middleton and Russell Brand still represent Indo-European physical characteristics associated with R1b. Moreover, the frequency of Haplogroup E from North Africa is very low in Britain and Ireland (2%) compared to some regions in Spain and Italy (up to 22%) and Berber admixture is highly unlikely in the Irish population and the "Black Irish" people may completely lack Scandinavian admixture, thus preserving their ancestral Spanish heritage well.

Russell Brand is English though. And he's tall. Celts tend to be short. The dark hair and eyes fit.

Wales isn't a country. It's merely an outer London suburb.

The whole Celtic thing seems an overly romantisized myth for the most part. How 'Celts' were actually in Britain and Ireland. It's a dead culture. Like the 'Anglo -Saxons' and 'Vikings' but people will always cling to origin myths as it gives them a sense of belonging, and taps into our deep rooted tribal natures.

Okay shays a pixie head and what's s taffy? Like divines daughter?

I recently read that the Celts came from middle Europe. It was in the NY Times. Anyone see that?

I thought Russell Brand was Italian.

r155 you are an idiot. Those are not "myths" The various migrations and invasions are historical fact, with tons of archaeological evidence.

No R58 he's English, with a chimney sweep accent.

It's an English nursery rhyme, R156.

Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief; Taffy came to my house and stole a leg of beef; I went to Taffy's house and Taffy was in bed; So I picked up the Gerry pot and hit him on the head. Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief; Taffy came to my house and stole a piece of beef; I went to Taffy's house, Taffy wasn't in; I jumped upon his Sunday hat and poked it with a pin. Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a sham; Taffy came to my house and stole a piece of lamb; I went to Taffy's house, Taffy was away, I stuffed his socks with sawdust and filled his shoes with clay. Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a cheat, Taffy came to my house, and stole a piece of meat; I went to Taffy's house, Taffy was not there, I hung his coat and trousers to roast before a fire.

Dafydd, the only gay in the village, was Welsh

Shut up Myfanwy!

Rhys Ifans is cute, as is his brother Lyr. On another subject, the Gaelic spoken in Ireland and Scotland is very similar, only about 100 words are significantly different. Welsh has much less in common with them. Welsh bands include Stereophonics and Catatonia.

I always figured indie-pop waif Meinir Gwilym (may-NEAR gwill-IM) for Lezzie. She's never hinted, it's just a hunch.

Cerys Matthews doesn't really come across entirely straight, either.

[quote]Cerys Matthews doesn't really come across entirely straight, either.

It's that jawline. Easy to picture her in a hillbilly cap driving a truck up an ice road. But she's straight. I used to see her in a bar. Always surrounded by men. Always drunk and coked up. Also saw Rhys Ifans in a Japanese restaurant once with some tart. They sat there giggling and hunched over something and then took turns running to the lav. Subtle.

One more Rhys Ifans story (second hand). Friends of mine were at university with him. I think that was Bangor (N Wales). He was drunk most of the time and ran up a big over draught on booze. He tried to persuade his bank manager that Oddbins (off license) sold books.

HUGE PENISES!!!!

168 replies and no mention of Charlotte Church? Here she is singing Men of Harlech.

A lot of them are oddly dark...what's up with that?

More John Cale

More evidence that the Vikings were in Scotland and Ireland. My Scottish grandmother would use ingressive pulmonic speech, inhaling while saying 'yes' or 'yeah.'

Coal dust, R170.

R157) Celts had been in central Europe, and as their population grew they tended to move west. Then the Germanic migrations out of the Caucasus and the stepps, pushed the Celts further west into France and migrating across the Channel and the Irish Sea. In the first decade of the 4th Century BCE, one branch of Celts in France migrated into northern Italy, ultimately beating the Romans at the Battle of Alliain 390 BCE and occupying the city of Rome itself for several months in 387 BCE, until they were ultimately pushed out by the Romans. Most of the Celts in France were ultimately overrun by the first western wave of Germanic tribes, leaving only Brittany and south into northern Spain as areas mainly populated by Celts for the next several centuries. The British Isles remained mainly Celtic, even after the Roman Invasions in the first century CE, until the Norse invasions that started in the late 4th and early 5th Century CE.

In this Welsh serial Scott hurts Iolo and then rapes his brother.

What do people think of the theory that the dark, swarthy look in Ireland and Wales comes not from the Celts, but the people who were there before them? I see that one thrown around a lot these days...

I believe recent DNA studies link the Welsh with the Basques.

Lovely Tom Cullen.

They smell. They're not fond of bathing. Or deodorant. Or dental hygiene.

For what it's worth after living in England for years I lived in Wales for a year and found Welsh people emotionally available in a way few English were. I put it down to, in part, the lack of the hammering class system of particularly SE England. The Welsh had there own character and I loved their curiosity and cheek. An example- once I was jogging with my boyfriend and we had to run past 3 youths who were drinking by the path. The girl of the party decides to run with us but after a few steps realises it's not going to happen. She says "you're too fit for me" and as we ran off yelled "you've both got lovely legs"!

Craziness.

Wow bar.

Swansea Pride

Perhaps DL should adopt a nearly dead language that we could fall into when Boris and Natasha are especially active. Welsh (both northern and southern), Manx, and Cornish are available.

R102, that's because absolutely nothing about them is noteworthy, except maybe their laughable transformation into corny Welsh nationalists once pretty boy was out of the picture.

'Tis the season for this unnatural act...

They're really good at singing. And Tom Jones was hot when he was young. Richard Burton too.

They have beautiful choirs. Our high school choir competed at the Eisteddfod in Llangollen two years in a row.

There's no way 'Wyt T'in Gem?' is about anything other than a cunning lesbian seducing a straight girl who is in a confused state bc her bf is messing her about.

Meinir used to present a Countryfile knockoff of sorts on Welsh channel S4C. She comes over boisterous & outdoorsy even if she isn't gay.

Sorry, forgot lyrics. Here:

Ti'n haeddu gwell - paid a chrio//Ti mor ddiniwed a dwi yma i wrando//Gei di wely yma heno//A wedyn gawn i weld os wyt ti'n gem...//Wyt ti'n gem? Wyt ti'n gem? Storis cas amdana fo a genod -Dydyn nhw ddim yn wir dim ots be ti 'di glywad!//Mond chdi a fi a ddawn 'na neb i wybod//Gofyn oni cariad - Wyt ti'n gem?

[TRANSLATION: You deserve better - don't cry//You're so innocent, and I'm here to listen//You can sleep here tonight//Then we shall see if you are game...Are you game? Are you game? Nasty rumours about him and girls -They're not true, despite whatever you've heard! Just you and me, and no one will know..I was only asking, baby, are you game?]

2017 bump

I have a good friend who is Welsh on his Mom's side. He is Spanish on his Dad's side. He is really funny and can really sing, however he can hold a grudge like an Albanian. He is a tad unsophisticated and can be really surly as well.

yuuuuuuuuuuuum

[quote]Do you think tulips look out of place in a Connecticut yard

Only when they've been replaced with WAX ones!

Fascinating thread. Fank you Myfanwys! Was always curuous about the Welsh and was thinking of visiting.

Sorry for not tagging rhe original posts but here are a few things to say/ask

The palm trees in Scotland are due to a warm Atlantic current that hits it

Weren't asterix and obelix Celtic

Is Celtic readable phonetically? I know how Myfanwy is pronounced since I'm a Little Britain fan. But is C like and S or a K? How are LL, Y and W pronounced?

No clear picture if the Welsh are hung or not. Please elucidate. It might help me decide about visiting. The cockcheese post indicates uncut which is oh oh yes yes fine by me. But not the cockcheese tho.

They seem generally ok about outsiders, yeah?

What about the Picts then? Were they Celtic?

Did the Vikings bring a nordification of Celtic? Is there a diff between Scottish and Welsh Celtic

I imagine celts lived in central and got pushed out to the N, W, SW edges by the angles and saxons?

Yeah if Wales wants to go it alone, I'm for it. I'm into little bitty countries and distrust mismanagement by big bullies

Pixieheads was never explained. Please will someone without posting a link? TIA The taffy explanation was great!

S'all.

Wales in the news: octopuses found walking on beach!

R72 "The Dying Gaul"

The original may have been commissioned some time between 230 and 220 BC by Attalus I of Pergamon to celebrate his victory over the Galatians, the Celtic or Gaulish people of parts of Anatolia (modern Turkey).

The figure is represented as a Celtic warrior with characteristic hairstyle and moustache and has a torc around his neck

The Roman historian Livy recorded that the Celts of Asia Minor fought naked and their wounds were plain to see on the whiteness of their bodies.[7] The Greek historian Dionysius of Halicarnassus regarded this as a foolish tactic: "Our enemies fight naked. What injury could their long hair, their fierce looks, their clashing arms do us? These are mere symbols of barbarian boastfulness."[8] Detail showing the face, hair style and torc of the sculpture.

The depiction of this particular Galatian as naked may also have been intended to lend him the dignity of heroic nudity or pathetic nudity. It was not infrequent for Greek warriors to be likewise depicted as heroic nudes

sex-ooooooooooooo

Gethin Jones is so incredibly hot, and I suspect gay. 40 and no wife yet.

What's pixieheads R3?

[quote] Yeah, Ireland and Scotland have a lot of Palm trees & tropical plants... some parts of England too. It's because the climate doesn't get cold enough to kill them, usually.

I remember reading it was because a warm ocean current lands there making it possible for the palm trees.

Knew before I clicked on this it would be full of that uniquely American take on race and eugenics that Americans are obsessed with and seem to have no problem dropping into polite conversation.

[quote]Interesting genetics. So many have dark features (olive skin, black hair - see Catherine Zeta Jones) they could pass for Spaniards.

[quote]The genes are Celtic, resulting in very dark hair, pale skin and sometimes blue eyes.

[quote]Welsh and Irish seem very close in ethnicity.

I presume these posters keep a set of head callipers on their desk.

People of the British Isles are genetically indistinguishable from each other, I know that these obscene 'DNA Heritage' companies want to convince you otherwise so you can pretend to be something other than 'English', as Americans seem to have a comical, pathological hated of 'Englishness'.

I hate, HATE hearing Americans use words like England/English, Scotland Wales ect. Just say British/UK, an American has no business using those words and it belies their inner bigotry.

Intermarriage/mixture with Romans and other Mediterranean people might explain partly why some of the Welsh have darker features. Much of Britain was a Roman province for about 350 years (approx 50 AD-410 AD). Since the Romans sort of abandoned involvement with Britain in the 5th century, the native British (not English, that came later) people who by then were at least nominally Christian and had a thin veneer of Roman culture and city life, began to encourage Germanic mercenaries to help defend them from the Picts in Caledonia (later Scotland) and their raiding. The Germanic people responded then began to stay, many being from Saxony, Friesland and Jutland. Their related Germanic dialects evolved on the island of Britain as English. The Germanic people gradually pushed the native British into the more mountainous areas of western Britain which is the country known as Wales today, a name derived from the Germanic proto-English word for foreign. Some of the British braved the channel crossing to what became Brittany in Gaul (France)--Breton and Welsh are closely related languages. Now a question, if the Welsh in the 5th century were already supposedly Christian, as opposed to the invading Germanic people who later contributed to the English ethnicity who were pagan, who was Saint David? He is the patron saint of Wales, but in his day the Welsh were already Christian or no?? If so, he wasn't necessarily an apostle as St. Augustine was to the English was he?

To answer OP's question, I would say part of the reason is that Wales is smaller in area and population and tends to be overshadowed by England. The Welsh have done a better job of keeping their language alive than the Irish or those Scots who speak Gaelic but it has still eroded in favor of English, but now I think there is more broadcasting in Welsh on UK television networks. I'm not sure about publishing in Welsh.

No one has mentioned Dawn French, the actress and comedienne who is also Welsh. Tom Jones, when he had his American TV show used to sign off in Welsh, giving everyone the impression he knew the language, but supposedly he knows relatively little Welsh. Prince Charles, who had to study the language about the time he became Prince of Wales, probably knows more of the language than Tom Jones. I have no idea if Richard Burton knew any Welsh.

Fascinating thread. I learned so much about Wales and the six Celtic nations.

Thanks to all.

The one and only, Diana, Princess of Wales

It's always funny that Americans who are notoriously ignorant of world geography are suddenly experts when it comes to the British Isles and have now problem splitting the UK up into it's constituent parts, all because the are so desperate to exclude England from what ever it is they're talking about.

It's so fucking transparent and so fucking hateful, grow up. An American has no business using England/Scotland/Welsh use UK/Britain the name of the actual country or fuck off.

r202, the abbreviation for the Latin word "etcetera" or "and so on" in English is etc. not ect.

Cheers R102. I loved the Manics in their 90s prime. Richey and Wire were such campy beauties.

r206, what the hell are you talking about?

Dan Biggar, adorable Welsh rugby player

Bump bitch at R210