Mn. W. odfa for oedfa ‘appointment, meeting’; Mn. W. addfed ‘ripe’ for aeddfed, Ml. W. aeẟvet w.m. 73, Ỻ.A. 166, r.b.b. 175; Mn. W. glendid for Ml. W. gleindit ‘cleanliness, beauty’. (Dial. gwergloẟ for gweirgloẟ, cosnoth sgernoth for coesnoeth esgeirnoeth.)
ae > a in aeth- § 108 iv (2).
vi. In the ult. ae sometimes became e § 31.
§ 79. i. (1) Old and Ml. W. ei appears as ai and ei in Mn. W. With some exceptions, § 81 iii (1), ai appears in the ultima and in monosyllables, and ei (pronounced əi § 29 iii) in other syllables. Thus Mn. W. ai stands in the syllable generally accented in O. W., and ei in the syllable then unaccented. The natural inference is that the Mn. mutation ei/ai is an exaggeration of a difference in the pronunciation of ei going back to O. W.
(2) O. W. ei was originally e̦i with open e̦, § 69 vii. But in unaccented syllables it came to be sounded ẹi to avoid lowering the tongue to e̦ and raising it again to i in the short time available. The same thing took place in accented syllables ending in a group of consonants, as beirẟ, since the time required to pronounce the consonants left less time to sound the diphthong. But in accented syllables with a simple or no consonantal ending the e̦i remained. Ml. W. ei therefore represented ẹi and e̦i; the former gave Mn. W. ei, sounded əi; the latter gave ai. The old distinction is reflected in the Gwynedd pronunciation of a preceding guttural: ceiniog, ceirch are sounded k̑əini̯og k̑əirch; but caib, cais are qaib, qais; the velar and palatal alternate in the same word: qaib, k̑əibio; it may be added that before ordinary ỿ (≡ ə) the consonant is the velar, thus cybyẟ, cynnar are qəbɥẟ, qənnar. It is seen therefore that the first element of əi must be from close ẹ, for it differed from that of ai which comes from open e̦, and also from the old ỿ (≡ ə). The present sound əi seems to be as old as the 16th cent., for rhəir contracted for rhỿ-hir (rhə-hir) is written rheir in g.r. 101. The present sound ai is at least as old as the 14th cent.: gwnai (< gwnaei) is rhymed with delei in r.p. 1271 by M.D., and with divei r.p. 1293 by G.V. The oldest appearance of the spelling ai seems to occur in the Red Book: benn r͑aith r.p. 1194, diwair do. 1200, kain 1205, arynaic 1227, kain, main 1318; but Norman scribes heard the e̦i as ai much earlier, to judge by such a form as Trefwalkemay in the Extent of Anglesey dated 1294 (Seebohm, Trib. Sys. ¹App. 10), Ml. W. Gwalchmei, Mn. W. Gwalchmai.
ii. O. W. ou (≡ oü) has a somewhat similar history. The o was probably close in unaccented and open in accented syllables. In Ml. W. it was unrounded in both cases, giving a close ə and an open ə, both written e, so that the two sounds of the diphthong were written eu. The close ə remains in Mn. W. eu, sounded əu; the open ə gave a in Mn. W. au. That the former was a close ə and not a close e̦ is shown by the fact that in Gwynedd ceunant, ceulo are sounded qəunant qəulo. The two sounds eu and au occur in the same positions in the word as ei and ai respectively; see § 81.
