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(3) They are adjectives when they qualify nouns expressed or implied:
- Y gŵr marw̯, e gâr morwyn
- Ddaear dy fedd er dy fwyn.—T.A., g. 229.
‘Dead man, a maiden loves the dust of thy grave for thy sake.’
- Ar ôl y marw̯ yr w͡yli,
- Ar ôl y fyw’r w͡ylaf fi.—D.E., p 112/840.
‘Thou weepest for him who is dead; I weep for her who is alive’; lit. ‘the dead’ mas. sg., ‘the living’ fem. sg.
When following yn with the soft mutation:
- Ni bu ’n fyw, cyd bo ’n i fedd,
- Ni bu ’n farw̯ neb un fawredd.—H.K.
‘There has not been alive, though he is [now] in his grave, there has not been dead any one so great.’
Also when they are complements, without yn, of the verb ‘to be’, as bydd fyw lit. ‘be alive’ i.e. live! hwnnw a fydd marw Ezec. xviii 4.
- Fy Nuw, pei cawn fy newis,
- Ni byddai fyw o’m bodd fis.—D.G. 174.
‘My God, if I had my choice, he would not be alive a month with my consent.’
Silvan Evans s.v. byw treats the word as a v.n. here; but no v.n can stand in this position. We cannot say bydd rhodio for ‘walk!’ but we say bydd da or bydd dda ‘be good!’
(4) As adjs. they have pl. forms bywi̯on E.P. ps. xxvii 13, lvi 13, late and rarely used, and meirw̯, meirw̯on. In periphrastic conj. the pl. meirw̯ is used for the v.n. when the subj. is pl., as y maent wedi meirw̯, by a confusion of the v.n. and adj.; cf. gwedy myẟw m.a. i 228 for gwedy meẟw̯i pl.—Compared: marw̯ed L.G.C. 218 ‘as dead’, yn gynvywẏet s.g. 77 ‘as alive’; marw̯ach, S.Ph. cy. ix 34.
(5) byw < *ɡu̯i-u̯os § 63 vii (3), which may be an adj. like Lat. vīvus, or a noun like Gk. βίος.—marw̯ < *mₑru̯os (ₑr, not r̥, before u̯ § 63 iii) similarly formed from √mer ; in Lat. mortuus < *mr̥tu̯os the t is intrusive according to Brugmann² II i 448.
§ 205. The v.n. is always mas. in construction. But many of the forms were originally fem., and some remain fem. when used as abstract nouns. Thus bod < *bhu-tā is f. in hafod § 189 iv (6); abstract nouns in aeth are f. § 139 ii; gafael noun is f., gafael
