the Welsh village (was: the New England lake)

Kari Castor castor.kari at GMAIL.COM
Fri Apr 24 14:57:22 UTC 2009


As I recall, at the time of my visit (which would have been some 12 years
ago now), the name was typically shortened to Llanfairpwyll or Llanfair.  I
don't recall having heard Llanfair PG, but Wikipedia claims it to be another
common shortening of the name, the PG added to distinguish the town in
question from a variety of other Welsh towns with "Llanfair" in their
namres.


On Thu, Apr 23, 2009 at 6:51 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: the Welsh village (was: the New England lake)
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I was indeed.  Thanks much!  I hadn't thought of that town name in
> ages.  I remember a version of the railway sign without the
> quasi-phonetic rendering or the powerlines overhead, but on the other
> hand I'd never heard it pronounced with a South Welsh or any other
> accent, and I'd never seen it rendered in IPA, so thanks to Kari for
> the link to the wiki-site and thanks also to whoever put it up there.
>
> LH, remembering that The Book of Amazing Facts claimed locals often
> just called it "Llanfair" for short, but maybe that's now considered
> unpatriotic.
>
> At 3:53 PM -0500 4/23/09, Kari Castor wrote:
> >You're probably thinking of
> >Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.
> >  I have photos of the railway station sign buried somewhere at home, but
> I'm
> >on campus, so it'll have to be Wikipedia to the rescue right now:
> >
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
> >
> >  (There was
> >  > also a town in Wales, complete with a railway
> >>  station, that had an even longer name, which I
> >>  can no longer recall if indeed I ever could.)
> >>
> >  > LH
>
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