In April 2015 the Welsh Government announced that the GPC (Welsh Dictionary) app was to be one of ten projects to benefit from funds allocated to promote the use of the Welsh language through digital technology and media.

The University of Wales Dictionary of the Welsh Language (http://gpc.cymru) has been online since June 2014 and from now on it will also be available as an app for mobile phones and tablets. The app contains all the data of theDictionary of the Welsh Language (GPC), which is a comprehensive Welsh dictionary similar to the Oxford English Dictionary. In contrast with GPC Online, the content of the whole dictionary can be downloaded onto your device so that it can be used without an Internet connection. Each word is defined in Welsh with examples of its use from different periods as well as English equivalents and its derivation.

According to the First Minister, Carwyn Jones:

“Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru (A Dictionary of the Welsh Language) has already been regarded as one of the gold standards for the Welsh language and, as I know from experience, it is something that is being used continually by Welsh speakers and learners.

“I am therefore very pleased that we have been able to support the University of Wales in turning this comprehensive, popular and very useful resource into a new medium for a new audience.

This app feeds into our aim, as a government, of encouraging more people, of all backgrounds, to use the Welsh language in their everyday lives. A modern, confident and flourishing language for a modern, confident and flourishing Wales.”

The app will be launched at 11:00am today at Penweddig Comprehensive School, Aberystwyth, and it is expected that pupils and students will be among those who benefit significantly from it.

Professor Medwin Hughes, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Wales said:

“This is another extremely important milestone in the history of the Dictionary – the University of Wales is proud that all the riches of the Dictionary are now more accessible to everybody.”

Since the launch of the Online Dictionary a number of new words have been added and many more have been added to coincide with this launch. This batch contains a number of words dealing with food – words like eisin,eidionyn, grawnffrwyth, hambyrgyr, harico, lasania, llysfwytawr, macarŵn and the words hashish and goryfed have also earned a place! Words dealing with the use of computers such as ebost, ebostio, gwefan and gwallneges are also included for the first time together with jog and jogio.

“It’s wonderful to be able to add new words to the Dictionary like this,” says Andrew Hawke, the Dictionary’s Managing Editor. “As we are now online it is possible to add any word at any time and the earliest occurrence of words that appear fairly recent is often surprising. Who would have thought that jogio first appeared in the Rhyl Record and Advertiser in 1909? But the meaning then was ‘to continue in a plodding way’.”

The app will also contain two simple word games – one to find a hidden word and the other to solve an anagram.

/Ends

Launch of the Dictionary app - 11.00 a.m., Wednesday, 24 February at Penweddig Comprehensive School, Aberystwyth

The launch can be watched live through Periscope by following Y Geiriadur on Periscope or by clicking on a link which will be sent from the @geiriadur twitter account at the beginning of the broadcast. A twitter account is not necessary. For more information contact Sarah Down-Roberts – sdr@geiriadur.ac.uk neu 07773 470649.

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