- Mae’r henwyr? Ai meirw ’r rheini?
- Hynaf oll heno wyf i.—G.Gl., p. 100/411.
‘Where are the elders? Are those dead? Eldest of all to-night am I.’
iii. Adjectival hwn and hon form improper compounds with nouns of time; thus yr awr hon > yr áwron (§ 48 iv), yr áwran; y waith hon > Ml. W. e weẏthẏon a.l. i 242 (ms. b) usually wéithon, Mn. wéithi̯on, wéithi̯an (§ 35 ii (1)); y pryd hwn > y prýtwn w.m. 102; y wers hon > y wérshon w.m. 128; all the above mean ‘now’. So y nos hon > y nóson ‘that night’, and y dydd hwn > y dýthwn, y dẃthwn § 66 ii (1) 'that day'. The form dỿthwn was still in use in the 17th cent.; see Silvan Evans, s.v. dwthwn.
- Arwydd ydyw yr awron
- Wreiddiaw Rhys o’r ddaear hon.—L.G.C. 206.
‘It is a sign now that Rhys is sprung from this land.’
- Ar bob allawr yr awran
- Y gwneir cost o’r gwin a’r cann.—D.N., g. 149.
‘On every altar now provision is made of wine and white [bread].’
- Bardd weithian i Ieuan wyf.—L.G.C. 275.
‘I am now a bard to Ieuan.’
By dissimilation yr awran (pron. yr owran § 81 iii (2)) became yr owan, and is now sounded in N.W. yrŵan. The loss of the r goes back to the 15th cent.: :O bu draw ’r bywyd ar ran,
- Mae’r Eos yma ’r owan.—G.I.H. p 77/384.
‘If his life has been spent partly away, the Nightingale is here now.’
As ‘this day’ and ‘this night’ were expressed by heẟiw and heno, the forms y dỿthwn and y noson were used for ‘this day’ or ‘this night’ of which we are speaking, i.e. ‘that day’ or ‘that night’. When the composition of the words was forgotten hwnnw and honno were added for clearness’ sake; thus in a.l. i 142, where ms. a. has ni ẟele y dithun kafail ateb ‘he is not to have an answer that [same] day’, the later ms. e. has y dythwn hunnw. This is the Biblical construction; see y dwthwn hwnnw Jos. iv 14, vi 15, viii 25, ix 27, etc.; y noson honno Dan. v 30, vi 18. Later, noson and dwthwn were wrested from this context, and taken to mean simply ‘night’ and ‘day’; e.g. a dreuliodd y dwthwn yn sanctaidd rh.b.s. 215 translating “who has spent his day holily”.
iv. (1) The forms yr hwn, yr hon and yr hyn (but not *yr hwnnw etc.) are used before the relative, meaning, with the latter, ‘the one who’ or ‘he who’, ‘she who’, and ‘that which’; in the pl.
