Talk:Gwalia, Western Australia

Untitled
Gwalia is the Welsh term for Wales? According to the page on Wales, it's Cymru. I find a lot of Welsh references to the name on Google though, but not the meaning. Anyone who knows like to explain the difference? Peter1968 10:39, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Nearly every secondary source which mentions the mine's name says Gwalia is the Welsh word for Wales. There is no such word in the Welsh language; the Welsh for Wales is "Cymru", which gives us the Latin Cambria. It is likely that the word is a colloquial Welsh pronunciation of Gallia, Latin for the land of the Gauls. That does not mean Wales specifically - it would also describe Brittany and other places - but it was used as an assertion of Welsh nationalism. In the late nineteenth century there was a nationalist organisation known in Welsh as "Mei Bion Gwalia": the Sons of Gwalia, which was probably the direct source of the mine's name. Peter Bell (talk) 04:01, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Assessment comment
Substituted at 16:54, 29 April 2016 (UTC)