Many of my relatives in Merionethshire filled in their 1911 census in Welsh, using a Welsh version of the form. The rubrics of the form offer various standard terms such as 'Penteulu', 'Priod', 'Gweddw', 'Meistr', 'Gweithiwr' (i.e. Head, Married, Single, Employer, Worker). I have seen 'Morwyn gyffredin' entered by informants more than once, and 'llafurwr amaethyddol' for 'agricultural labourer', so I imagine these were recommended terms. They don't appear on the printed form as one can see it on-line, but a note at the top of the 'Gwaith personol' column (employment) refers to instructions being available on the reverse of the form. Interestingly, although the printed form is entirely in Welsh, the English words 'scullery', 'landing', 'lobby', closet', and 'bathroom' are used in the note about which rooms to count! I think I may have seen Welsh entered occasionally in an earlier census too, but don't have it immediately to hand. Shirley ________________________________________ From: powys-bounces@rootsweb.com [powys-bounces@rootsweb.com] on behalf of John Ball [john@jlb2011.co.uk] Sent: 07 August 2012 12:02 To: powys@rootsweb.com Subject: [POWYS] Welsh in census returns. Roy Davies <roydavies@gmail.com> wrote: "Cadw ty" means keeping the house, i.e. she was either a house keeper or a house wife, depending on her relationship to the head of the household. "Morwyn" means "maid" (or maiden) and "cyffredin" means common so she would have been someone who did general domestic duties. Off hand I can't think what how we would normally describe that occupation in English, "general maid," I suppose. ================ Dear Listers, What an interesting answer from Roy Davies. Many thanks, Roy. I must say this is the first time I've encountered an example of a householder responding in Welsh to a census question. Perhaps Georgina could tell us whether the householder filled in the Welsh language version of the census form? Has anyone else seen similar examples while studying census returns? I suppose the 1911 is the most likely source, because in that census we can see the answers as written by the head of the household, rather than the census enumerator's transcription that we see in all the other censuses. Kind regards, John -------------------- John Ball, Brecon, Mid-Wales, UK E-mail: john@jlb2011.co.uk Personal Homepage: http://www.jlb2011.co.uk Images of Wales: http://www.jlb2011.co.uk/walespic/ Welsh Family History Archive: http://www.jlb2011.co.uk/wales/ Joint Webmaster, Breconshire Local & Family History Society http://www.blfhs.co.uk/ GENUKI Breconshire Maintainer: http://www.genuki.org.uk/big/wal/BRE/ Joint Administrator - Powys (& BRE/MGY/RAD) RootsWeb mailing lists =================== Visit the Powys Mailing List webpage at: www.jlb2011.co.uk/powyslist.htm ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to POWYS-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message