Cumbric

Cumbric was a variety of the Common Brittonic language spoken during the Early Middle Ages in the Hen Ogledd or "Old North" in what is now Northern England and southern Lowland Scotland. It was closely related to Old Welsh and the other Brittonic languages. Place name evidence suggests Cumbric speakers may have carried it into other parts of northern England as migrants from its core area further north. It may also have been spoken as far south as Pendle and the Yorkshire Dales. Most linguists believe that it became extinct in the 12th century, after the incorporation of the semi-independent Kingdom of Strathclyde into the Kingdom of Scotland.

Problems with terminology

Dauvit Broun sets out the problems with the various terms used to describe the Cumbric language and its speakers. The people seem to have called themselves *Cumbri the same way that the Welsh call themselves Cymry (most likely from Brittonic *kom-brogī meaning "fellow countrymen"). It is likely that the Welsh and the Cumbric speaking people of what are now southern Scotland and northern England felt they were actually one ethnic group. Old Irish speakers called them "Britons", Bretnach or Bretain. The Norse called them Brettar. In Medieval Latin, the English term Wales and the term Cumbri were Latinised as Wallenses "of Wales" and respectively Cumbrenses "of Cumbria". The usual English usage was to call them Welsh. In Scots, a Cumbric speaker seems to have been called Wallace, from the Scots Wallis/Wellis "Welsh".