A special character for the sound ỿ was used by some 16th century scribes, and is regularly employed by J.D.R. and Dr. Davies in their grammars. A distinctive character is also needed for the clear sound; and ɥ is convenient because it suggests u which has now the same sound.
Note. The idea that y has borrowed its clear sound from u, which, as we have seen, is the exact reverse of the truth, has led some writers to call ỿ the primary, and ɥ the secondary sound of y. The former is of course secondary, being the obscured form of ɥ and other sounds.
¶ On the use of the two sounds of y see § 82.
ii. (1) In O. W. the sounds of y are denoted by i, and are therefore not distinguished in writing from the sound i. That ɥ and i were then distinct requires no further proof than that they are different in origin, and if the difference had been lost it could not have been recovered.
(2) In Early Ml. W. mss., as in the b.b., y and i are used indifferently to express the i sound and the sounds of y. In b.ch. (= a.l. ms. a.) y is used in some parts almost to the exclusion of i, as brenyn, tyr for brenin 'king', tir 'land'; yx p. 9 for ix 'nine' (printed nau in a.l. i 18!) shows that the scribe treated y and i as identical. In some early mss. the sounds of y were represented by e; see the passage in ancient orthography in a.l. ii 36–8, where ỿ lle, ỿ dɥn appear as elle, eden 'the place', 'the man'.
(3) In Late Ml. mss., as in Mn. W., the sounds ɥ, ỿ are written y, and are not confused with i which is written i (except that y also represents i̯, § 25 iii).
In a few monosyllables of frequent occurrence, ɥ by constant repetition advanced to the easier front position of i towards the end of the Ml. period. These are y 'to', y 'his' or 'her', ny, nyt 'not'. The latter often appears as ni, nit in w.m., see 46, 48, showing the thinning of the vowel to be so early. That the sound was once ɥ is shown by the fact that ny̆d, written nɥdd (dd ≡ double d, not ẟ) by J.D.R. in 1592, may still be heard in Anglesey.
☞ In this grammar the Ml. W. y 'to' and y 'his' or 'her' are dotted thus, ẏ, to distinguish them from the article y ≡ ỿ. As the ẏ was probably sounded i some time before it came to be so written, it may be read i. [There can be no confusion with ẏ ≡ i̯, which never stands by itself, § 25 iii.]
iii. Though not indicated in writing, the difference between ɥ and
