Being from Canada, I’m often asked here in Wales if I’ve ever encountered a bear. Thankfully, the only ones I’ve seen have been at the zoo, but I have friends who’ve come across them while hiking in the Canadian wilderness. In Welsh, this iconic and feared animal is known as arth.
arth
bear
Arth is a feminine noun whose plural form is eirth. However, don’t be surprised if you encounter these less common plural forms too: arthod, eirthod, and arthoedd. It is derived from from the Middle Welsh arth, which in turn comes from the Proto-Brythonic *arθ, from the Proto-Celtic *artos.
If you want to specify that a bear is male, you can use the term arth wryw, while a female is known as an arthes.
Did you know that there are only eight species of bear left in the world today? Interestingly, many of these species have both masculine and feminine names, even though the Welsh word for bear, arth, is traditionally feminine.
- arth wen / arth gwyn or arth y gogledd = polar bear
- arth frown / arth brown = brown bear (including the grizzly bear known as arth fraith or arth lwyd)
- panda mawr / panda anferth = giant panda
- arth ddu / arth du = North American black bear
- arth ddu Asia = Asian black bear
- arth frith / arth sbectolog = spectacled bear
- arth weflog = sloth bear
- arth Malaia / arth yr haul = sun bear
Many of these bears are at risk of extinction due to habitat loss (colli cynefinoedd), climate change (newid hinsawdd), poaching, and human-wildlife conflict, all of which threaten their survival in the wild. Conservation efforts (ymdrechion gwarchodaeth) are crucial to protect these magnificent creatures and the ecosystems they inhabit.
Bears – like humans – tend to be omnivorous (hollysol) with the only exceptions being the panda mawr which feeds almost exclusively on bamboo, and the arth wen which is mostly carnivorous (cigysol).
Bydd yr arth yn gaeafgysgu am fisoedd.
The bear will hibernate for months.
Typically solitary animals, they are adept runners, climbers and swimmers and use caves (ogofâu) and logs (boncyffion) as their dens (ffeuau). Most species hibernate (gaeafgysgu) during the winter for up to 100 days.
The words arth fach (f) or arth bach (m), both of which literally mean small bear, may be used to refer to a bear cub or a teddy bear in Welsh. Another possible name for bear cub is cenau arth whereas a teddy bear may also be called, you guessed it, tedi-bêr.
Yr Arth Fach, when capitalised, is also the name given to the Little Bear or Ursa Minor, one of the sky’s constellations. It’s also known by several other names, including yr Arth Leiaf (the Lesser Bear), the masculine yr Arth Bach, as well as yr Arth Fechan and yr Arth Bychan. The Great Bear constellation, on the other hand, goes by the names yr Arth Fawr, yr Arth Mawr and yr Arth Fwyaf.
Figuratively, arth can be used to describe a rough or fierce person, and when capitalised – Yr Arth – it serves as a metonym for Russia.
Dyna arth o ddyn!
What a bear he is!
Did you know that…
The famous fairytale Goldilocks and the Three Bears is known in Welsh as Y Tair Arth, without any mention of Goldilocks in the title. Note that in Welsh, nouns don’t change to a plural form after numbers—they stay singular. It’s also important to use the correct gender for the number. Since arth is a feminine noun, it’s tair arth rather than tri arth.
