[Spellyans] i ~ y

[nicholas williams]

Lhuyd writes: po kotha Lavar an Enez-ma 'or the older speech of this  
island' AB: 222. He also writes hui dho Kodha 'that you fall' AB: 250a.
It certainly looks as though Lhuyd distinguished intervocalic [T] from  
intervocalic [D]. I cannot believe he was simply basing himself on Welsh
in these items, since coth is not the Welsh for 'old', although cwyddo  
'fall' is common.
So we have a minimal pair kotha ~ kodha.

There is therefore a prima facie case for th ~ dh medially. Can those  
who deny the distinction in medial position prove their assertion?

I should like to see them do so. Suspicions and doubts are not enough.  
Proof please.

Nicholas
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On 4 Feb 2009, at 15:53, Hewitt, Stephen wrote:

> but I am certain that this is a serious linguistic question about  
> the phoneme inventory of Cornish from at least BM on.

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