My battered Welsh dictionary

What's so interesting about a dictionary you may ask? This is the one in question:

It's abit tired looking now, worn on the edges, as you might expect from being a few years old, and I really had not counted on buying it to begin with. I bought it more on impulse, you could say I bought it out of a sense of pride. Pride? What pride can you possibly get out of a dictionary? Especially being the only one wedged between Yiddish and some other language. Being in a foreign country certainly helps, noting that some other place is aware of this small country and even smaller the minority who speak it. Have I held you in suspense enough? So where did i buy this particular dictionary? None other:

The United Nations building in New York City. Lodged between Yiddish and another language was my dictionary, So while we may not "legally" be a nation on an absurd archaic historical legal term. At least our language is recognised by the United Nations, even if we do have problems making it "official" in Wales. Perhaps one day, we'll have our own seat in the general assembly, not just the one in the bay.

New Photos added

I’ve uploaded some pictures of Cardiff and Newport I took last year, enjoy =)

      Cardiff / Caerdydd          Newport / Casnewydd

Click either image to be redirected to the gallery page.

Tracing your roots

I stumbled across this university surname profiler for the U.K and gave it ago, I was pleasantly surprised

So I started with my dad’s surname: “Williams”

1881

As you can see, it’s particulairly prolific in my part of the U.K, which was surprising, as I thought it was much more widespread across the U.K.

Category of surname Celtic; Welsh; Name of Parent Ending in -S

Great Britain Frequency (1998) 285836 100
Northern Ireland 901.09 12.7
Republic of Ireland 107.36 1.5
Australia 6303.59 88.8
New Zealand 6095.81 85.8
United States 8723.42 122.8
Canada 3662.88 51.6

Great Britain top area (1881) Llandudno
Great Britain top area (1998) Llandudno (not much has changed there since 1881 i gather!)

Great Britain top area index * 923

Australia top state Tasmania
Australia top state index * 140

New Zealand top province Gisborne
New Zealand top province index * 135

United States top state Mississippi
United States top state index * 201

Mosaic type with highest index # Upland Hill Farmers

Cultural, Ethnic, Linguistic categories of surname English, Welsh

1998

My mothers side “Scott”

1881

Celtic; Scottish; Personal Name

Well, perhaps I have some Scottish in me after all, I’m going to have to dig deeper

Great Britain Frequency (1998) 103204 100
Great Britain Frequency (1881) 76058

Northern Ireland 3861.29 150.6
Republic of Ireland 66.73 2.6
Australia 2572.74 100.3
New Zealand 3709.75 144.7
United States 2660.67 103.8
Canada 3042.48 118.7

Great Britain top area (1881) Galashiels
Great Britain top area (1998) Galashiels (no similarity with Llandudno then)

Australia top state Tasmania
Australia top state index * 146

New Zealand top province Nelson
New Zealand top province index * 180

United States top state D of Columbia
United States top state index * 150

Mosaic type with highest index # Sharing a Staircase (WTF?)

Cultural, Ethnic, Linguistic categories of surname English

1998

I think more investigation is in order

If you want to have a go, the link is here: Surname Profiler