Welsh Word of the Day: Hwyl (fun / goodbye / sail)

The Welsh word hwyl (pl: hwyliau) has a staggering list of meanings, ranging from a sail, to a journey, to someone’s mood or temper. However, it’s also by far the most common way to say say goodbye. This is because hwyl is also the noun form of fun, and can convey a sense of enthusiasm and good spirits. So, when you say hwyl to a Welsh friend, you’re wishing them good times until you meet again.  

Of all of hwyl’s many meanings, the oldest is sail, with the word having been borrowed from the Old English seġl. This is also the root of the modern English word.

The word then began to be used to mean journey in the 13^th century, and later developed connotations of success, progress, and eventually humour and fun. It’s also possible that its evolution was influenced by the word gŵyl, meaning festival. You could say that the word itself has had a bit of a journey!

Hwyl is a feminine noun, with the adjective form of fun being hwyliog, digrif or difyr (though people do use hwyl as if it were an adjective, too, especially when speaking casually).

Hwyl is probably the most common word for fun throughout Wales, but sbort is also in regular use, and in the South-West you might come across the slang word topyn. You might also hear the playful phrase hwyl a sbri, which translates to something like fun and games or fun and merrymaking.

Since hwyl begins with the non-mutating letter h, you don’t have to worry about learning any mutations of it.

Though fun is a pretty good translation of hwyl and covers a lot of its everyday uses, it’s more complicated than that. Hwyl can refer to someone being on good form or in good health (mewn hwyliau da), to a musical instrument being in tune (mewn hwyl), or even to a preacher being consumed with religious fervour (mynd i’r hwyl, yn yr hwyl).

Hwyl expresses a sense of energy, motivation, passion, and joy – Welsh speakers will tell you that it’s a sentiment that can’t be fully expressed in any other language.

All that being said, many of the English uses of the word fun translate pretty well into Welsh. To make fun of someone is to gwneud hwyl am ei ben (make fun about his head), someone who’s full of fun might be described as llawn hwyl, and just for fun is er mwyn hwyl.

However, you can also use hwyl in a negative sense, to describe someone who’s a bit unwell or out of sorts: essentially, it can describe someone’s mood and condition, negative or positive. So, if you’re asking someone how something went or how they got on with something, you might say Sut hwyl gest ti?

While hwyl dda means a good mood, hwyl ddrwg is a bad mood, and describing someone as drwg ei hwyl could mean either that they’re under the weather, or that they’re bad-tempered. Hwyl is also the root of anhwylder (pl: anhwylderau), meaning disorder, sickness, or indisposition.

The very formal and old-fashioned expression Gras o’m hwyl! would probably raise a few eyebrows were you to use it in everyday conversation, but it means something like Woe is me!. It would sound slightly more natural to say Gwae fi!, though even this is very over-the-top.

Of course, there are also many nautical expressions stemming from the sailing-related meaning of hwyl. This is especially true since the word is often used not only for a ship’s sails but also for any large sheet or flag.

For example, a hwylbren is technically a mast, but might be used to mean flagpole in descriptive writing. Ar lawn hwyl means in full sail, and can be used figuratively to suggest that someone or something is making fast progress. Codi hwyliau means to set sail, and is also often used in a figurative sense. Similarly, dodi ar hwyl or gosod ar hwyl is to set sail or get going.

If this is all starting to sound a bit overwhelming, don’t worry: the most important meaning of hwyl to learn is definitely goodbye. Hwyl, hwyl fawr and pob hwyl are all popular farewells that you’ll hear all the time in Wales, alongside alternatives like da bot ti/da boch chi or wela’ i di/chi eto (see you later).

Hwyl fawr!