hwn ‘this man’. The different forms are—sg. mas. hwn, hwnnw, fem., hon, honno, neut. hyn, hynny, pl. m. and f. hyn, hynny.
The following forms occur in O.W.: hinn m.c., juv., cp. ‘hyn’; hunnoid ox., hunnuid m.c. ‘hwnnw’; hinnoid ox. ‘hynny’; hirunn juv. ‘yr hwn’, ir hinn m.c. ‘the one’, m., see iv (1); hunnuith cp. f. hinnuith ib. m., hinnith ib. neut. and pl.
(2) hwnnw means ‘that’ person or thing out of sight, ‘that’ in our minds. To indicate objects in sight, adverbs are added to hwn; thus hwn yna ‘that (which you see) there, that near you’, hwn acw, Ml. W. hwnn racko ‘that yonder’. So hwn yma ‘this here’. But yma and yna are also used figuratively; hwn yma ‘this’ which I am speaking of, hwn yna ‘that’ which I have just mentioned. Hence we can have the abstract hyn before these; but not before acw which is always used literally of place.
Vy arglwyẟes i yw honn racko r.m. 175 ‘that (lady) yonder is my mistress’. Guttun Ywain a ysgrivennodd hwnnyma Gut.O. auto. Ỻ 28/33 r. ‘Guttun Owain wrote this’.
- An-áml yw i hwn yma
- Nag ystôr nag eisiau da.—I.D., tr. 149.
‘It is rare for this one to store or to want wealth.’
These expressions are sometimes used adjectivally as y wreic weẟw honn yman Ỻ.A. 114 ‘this widow’; o’r byt hwnn yma do. 117 ‘from this world’; y vorwyn honn yma s.g. 143 ‘this maiden’. But for this purpose the adverb alone is generally used: yn y byt yma Ỻ.A. 102, 155 ‘in this world’; o’r esgobawt yma r.p. 1272 ‘from this diocese’; y vyẟin burwenn racco r.m. 151 ‘the white army yonder’. Any other adverb of place may be similarly employed: y fan draw, y tu hwnt, etc.
In the spoken language hwn ýna, hon ýna, hɥn ýna are commonly contracted to hẃ|na, hó|na, hɥ́|na (not hwnna, etc.); and these forms occur in recent writings.
(3) The neut. sg. hyn, hynny always denotes an abstraction; it means ‘this’ or ‘that’ circumstance, matter, thought, statement, precept, question, reason, etc.; or ‘this’ or ‘that’ number or quantity of anything; or ‘this’ or ‘that’ period or point of time.
Hynny, hep ef, ansyberwyt oeẟ w.m. 2 ‘that, said he, was ungentlemanliness’ (meaning ‘that’ conduct); Pater noster…sef yw pwyll hynny yn tat ni Ỻ.A. 147 ‘Pater noster…the meaning of that is our Father’. A wnelo hyn nid ysgogir yn dragywydd Ps. xv 5; wedi hyn ‘after this’.
