heb Dduw, heb ddim ‘without God, without anything’. Also in conditional sentences, as o phecha neb 1 Ioan ii 1 ‘if any man sin’; in questions; in comparisons; etc.
A derivative nebawd occurs: nebaud b.b. 21, 43 ‘any one’, ny gwybyẟ nebawt b.t. 19 ‘no one will know’.
ii. Owing to constant association with negatives neb and dim came to be used in certain phrases for ‘nobody’ and ‘nothing’.
As a rule it is the verb that requires the negation; thus ‘he gave me nothing’ is logically ‘he did not give me anything’ ni roes ef imi ddim, since there was no giving. But the verbal idea may be positive, as in ‘it is given for nothing’; this has to be expressed by fe’i rhoddir am ddim, where dim has to stand for ‘nothing’. dim is thus used as early as the 14th cent.; see Ỻ.A. 60, 89. But there seem to be no Ml. examples of neb ‘nobody’.
iii. dim and neb are positive in positive sentences in the phrases—
(1) pob dim ‘everything’:
Pob dim kywrein … goruc Kelvyẟ B.D., r.p. 1251 ‘every cunning thing the Artist made’. Duw, madden bob dim iddaw I.F. m 148/329 ‘God forgive him everything’. Cf. 1 Cor. xiii 7; Deut. iv. 7, xxviii 47, 48; Col. i 16.
(2) y neb ‘the one, he’ before a relative § 162 vii (1):
twyllwr yw y neb a aẟefvo kyfvrinach arglwyẟ ẏ’r nep a wypo ẏ vot yn elyn iẟaw Ỻ.A. 26 ‘he who betrays a lord’s secret to him whom he knows to be his enemy is a traitor’. Cf. Ỻ.A. 28, 32, 33, 34, etc. Y neb a atalio ei yd, y bobl a’i melldithia Diar. xi 26.
(3) neb un § 165 iv (3).
iv. (1) neb is used adjectivally, thus neb [rad.] ‘any’: ni bu yma neb amarch f. 14 ‘there has been no disrespect here’. It is rarely adjectival except in the following phrases:
(2) neb un above; neb rhyw § 165 iv (8); neb r͑yw ẟim ‘anything at all’, w.m. 64, 65, r.m. 46, 47; neb dyn ‘any man’ Ỻ.A. 126.
(3) neb cyfryw [soft] ‘any at all’, cf. § 168 i (2).
Kanyt oes neb kyfryw rym … y gallem ni vynet r.b.b. 178 ‘for there is no power by which we might go’.
(4) nĕ́mawr, nĕ́mor (for *neb mawr), with a negative ‘not much, not many, but little’.
