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= Radnorian English =

Radnorian English (Welsh: Saesneg Maesyfed) is a variety of Welsh English spoken by some elderly working class people in Radnorshire, a historic Welsh county now forming part of the county of Powys.

The dialect shares many features with other dialects of Welsh English and with some dialects of West Country English. It is unknown how many speakers the dialect has, as it has not been extensively researched or preserved and it is slowly being replaced by British English. The dialect is likely moribund.

The dialect formed in the 17th and 18th century as English rapidly began to replace Welsh as the counties primary language. Welsh influence on the dialect is notable, with many grammatical and phonological features being inherited directly from Welsh.

History
The Anglo-saxons arrived in what is now Radnorshire sometime ine the late 7th century, bringing with them the English language. Although English would not take root as a spoken language in the area until much later, the Anglo-Saxon did introduce some English placenamnes, Erwood being a potential, albeit disputed, example. English would not begin to constitute a populary spoken language in the county until the late 17th cnetury, and by the mid 19th century Welsh had been pushed all the way back to the far western areas of Rhayader, Cwmdauddwr and the Elan Valley. Radnorian English was dominant in the ciounty from the 19th century until the latter half of the 20th century, when it would begin to decline due to the effects of cross-border migration and intermariage, standardisation of education and the effects of globalisation.

Extinct features of the dialect
In his book titled Radnorshire, William H. Howse sets aside a sub-section of his chapter on the speech of Radnorshire to speak of the "old fashioned talk" he had heard stories of from interviewing natives of the county. Many features of Middle English were preserved in the dialect up to the early 20th century, for example:
 * The usage of thee, thou and ye in place of just you. Interestingly, thee and thou also are preserved within Yorkshire English up to this day.
 * The usage of the suffix -en, which was used to denote plurals in Middle English. Examples in Radnorian include "housen", "peasen", "hisen" and "hersen". The -en suffix had no real grammatical use within Radnorian, and the standard plural suffix of -s was also commonly heard alongside it. It was purely a preservation of older grammar.
 * A number of contractions were once common, including "canna" instead of can not, "dinna" for did not, "dunna" do not, "hanna" for have not, and "munna" for must not, among others.
 * Much like in Cardiff English, the Northern Subject Rule was once present in Radnorian grammar, phrases such as "I goes here" and "I takes that" were previously quite common.

Accents
Although the Voiced retroflex approximant, or West Country burr, is regarded as synonymous with Radnorshire, the feature is not necessarily native to the dialect and has creeped westwards from Herefordshire over the decades. Indeed, many features of what is considered the Radnorian accent are in fact influences of the accent of Herefordshire. To the west in the district of Rhayader an older and more traditionally Welsh accent can be heard, one which although historically rhotic has lost its rhoticity over time due to anglicisation. Although these two accents are distinct from eachother, they both belong to the Radnorian dialect as there is very little difference in grammar and vocabulary between teh two, just phonological differences.

Vocabulary
Radnorian English primarily derives its vocabulary from two sources, the Welsh language and the English dialect of Herefordshire. Although less common than they historically were, the use of Welsh words, Welsh idioms and anglicisations of Welsh sayings is common in the dialect. In his book titled 'Radnorshire', William H. Howse states that, "... the speech of Radnorshire would belong chiefly to that of Mercia, since it largely learnt its English from Herefordshire and Shropshire (particularly the former)". The best preserved dialect words are those related to farming, as the dialect is most commonly spoke by farmers and they very rarely live their home area.

Idioms
= Solidarity (Wales) =