Losing a language is a tragedy just as much as losing a species of animal to extinction. Long live diversity and not conformity in this world. Hi from Italy.

Manx Gaelic should be added to Duolingo.

My parents were both native Irish speakers from the Connemara Gaeltacht in Galway. My dad's oldest sister was on the Isle of Mann in the late 1940s and spoke Connemara Irish with Manx speakers who answered her back in Manx. She didn't say that they understood each other word for word, but her explanation made it sound like they were able to communicate pretty well without using English (of which my aunt knew very little or none at that time.)

RIP and long live Ned Maddrell (August 20, 1877 - December 27, 1974), aged 97 You will always be remembered as a legend.

i,m from Donegal in Ireland i can follow alot of whats being said here, the tone an way its spoke sound alot like Donegal Irish.

@Solstisol He was officially the last NATIVE speaker of Manx. At the time of his death (1974) there were a few hundred who could speak the language more or less fluently, but not native speakers (Madrell & a few others did recordings for posterity). There are now a few dozen young adults (maybe more) 'neo-native' speakers, who learned Manx from a very young age, including doing lessons in primary school in the language.

There are hundreds of good speakers of Manx, there are choirs singing in manx, original novels being written, and even a school which operates full time in Manx, hundreds more are learning it on the Isle of Mann. Children raised in manx have to be seen as L1 speakers, though I do not know how many there are.

When I played this recording my Manx cat started meowing.

As an Alaska Native there might be 60 first language speakers of Tlingit left. I saw Eyak “die” about twelve years ago. I knew of three elders who were from yet another tribe,a brother and sister and their cousin; the sister died then the brother. The remaining speaker was asked about his cousin’s passing and he replied with “Now I have no one left to answer me.” 💔

Manx is even being revived outside Man. Here in San Diego my grandpa spoke it as a 2nd language and raised my 2 uncles on it. When I moved here the 3 of them started teaching me (mostly by simply using it around me all the time) when I was 8 or so. So I speak it too. Granted, I speak it imperfectly, having learned it as a 2nd language by people who themselves spoke it as a 2nd language, but when I visited Man I was understood just fine. Now me and my two uncles are teaching our little cousins!

My Mum is Manx but when she grew up they didn't teach it in schools. Despite the Scottish Government's best efforts, Scots Gaelic is struggling to stay afloat in the tide of English. It's a tragedy.

@Solstisol Ned Maddrell was the last NATIVE speaker, i.e. he was brought up with Manx in the home, he dreamt and thought in Manx . The interviewer learnt the language by studying it from later age- he is a native speaker of English.

Manx Gaelic deserves the attention of all who love it. Every effort should be made to preserve it and document it in full by the people of the Isle of Man. I am looking at all aspects of Manx Gaelic since 15/08/2020 and would appreciate your advice and encouragement. Dia leat.

I love listening to languages I don't understand. It allows you to imagine people are speaking sense. As soon as you pick up the local lingo, it dawns on you that wherever you go, 95% of words are a waste of breath.

poor man. he had to see the death of his beloved mother tongue.

@Solstisol Brian Stowell (the interviewer) is fluent in Manx but is not a native speaker. Ned Maddrell was the last native speaker meaning that he was the last person alive who grew up speaking Manx as his native tongue. (Brian Stowell learned it as a student.) Manx is now being revived and has hundreds of speakers and probably has a few new native speakers by now.

It's great to have a reference to the old Manx accent like this, given that the accent of the revived Manx is so diluted. It's a shame about the quality, though, I'm finding it difficult to make out even the parts in english. Great video!

@michael1916 It is a shame, but they are reviving the language now and have a school which teaches directly through the medium of Manx Gaelic. So the future is bright :) Still though, the language language has suffered and even the Manx accent has been replaced with an English accent due to mass immigration from England.

Interesting to hear how different Brian and Ned's accents are. Really good for a learner to understand which is native!

That's really cool. I can hear the Irish, Scottish, Welch, Cornish and all the Gaelic influence on it. Nice to know we are all so close. Tá an lá go deas

RIP unknown stranger

This is what you sound like to your pets

Hello Reader, I am From Scotland i have stumbled across this and been stricken with curiousity and a slight overwhelmming sadness.. let us ponder forward.............. I think the Earth and the trees die, after hearing such sounds from people. They miss it, They're living things to, We have taken so much from here. When can we ever repay mother Earth?

OMG this is weird...I speak Irish and I can understand most of wat he's saying!!! How weird!

An-suimiúil ar fad a Sheáin ach bheadh sé i bhfad níos fearr leis na fotheidil, má tá sé agat. Beir bua!

One of my late relatives a few generations back now, spoke the native manx. Her surname was Boyd and she was one of two sisters from Peel. Her christian name was Emma and apparently she wasnt very amused by the fact that neither my father or my uncle spoke the native tongue. :-]

Amazing to hear - who I assume is Ned - speaking english in a 99% Scottish accent in parts of this great audio clip. I suppose that geographically and historically it would make sense to hear an old-timer speak in a Scots (or part Irish) accent ...even more so as Manx (along with Scottish Gaelic) as many of us know, is the result of the Irish language spreading across the water a long time ago. However, one of the reasons that I'm amazed by this clip is because the half-dozen folk who I have met from the Isle of Man over the years - most of them born there - all sounded like scousers! ...and many more here on KZfaq have various mixed accents from the north west of England. I've met many top-quality folk from the north west of England and have nothing against them (so please don't take offence), but If Ned's mostly Scots accent (with a hint of Irish) used to be commonplace (but exists no more), then I'm desperately sad that it too died out (for good so it would seem) So glad that many youngsters on the island are seemingly being taught Manx these days, but it's weird to think they could be speaking it with a Lancashire or Cumbrian accent! lol Really wish that when I was at school in the 90s (in Scotland) that my pals and I got taught some basic Gaelic. Sadly, that was never gonna happen in a million years with the Brit-obsessed labour council landscape at the time - who hated anything distinctly Scottish (or un-british) in a historical sense.

And the 3 of us (my grandpa belonged too when he was alive) are members of the San Diego chapter of the Manx Society, which is a group of Manx-descended people - almost all old-timers - me, my uncles and 2 other guys are the 5 youngest people there. About half of us altogether speak at least a little bit of Manx, and about half of THAT half can speak it with more fluency. I dunno how many Manxmen live outside Man, but there's a decent number in San Diego - enough to form a club at least lol

Brian Stowell. Brian learned Manx later on in his life. He wasn't a native speaker , although he's probably the most competent speaker of Manx today.

"Yes, please put the microphone there on the table next to A FRIGGING TICKING CLOCK"

I'm glad this language isn't lost. Yet. It's sad there are no more native speakers born to it. Such a long history to come to an end. I find this video very sad in a way. But I'm also sure it has motivated some in the re-birth of the language. And I really do hope there are some native speakers being born.

Iontach go raibh taifeadh mar seo déanta don deireadh cainteoir dúchas

My two uncles speak it better than I do, probably because they started hearing it when they were toddlers. But even so, the kind of Manx we speak together is probably exactly what you'd expect to hear from a 2nd language speaker's view of what is frankly a ball-buster of a language :P Even today I don't always lenite my consonants correctly, and if I'm being really lazy I won't do it at all. But really, consonant-lenition is among the hardest aspects of ALL Celtic languages, let alone Manx.

Amazing language. Amazing place.

I want to see the revival of regional languages and cultures in general. One may say that the 'cultural unification' (melting pot) is a natural process. I think that people start to realise the value of local cultures now, exactly because so much have been lost in the last 100 years. Revival of regional languages would mean a real diversity. Diversity meaning to be proud of your heritage without being negative towards others. I'm learning German and Japanese now, so my schedule is pretty tight. But I really, really want to learn one of Celtic languages in the future. My personal favorite is Welsh, but Manx is fascinating too.

@Solstisol David Clement of the School of Scottish Studies interviewed the last two Manx speakers sometime in the seventies. They were from different ends of the island and I think didn't know each other

Scots and modern English both evolved from the same language, but Scots is not English. Scots has been evolving on it's own for centuries. I suppose a parallel could be drawn between Swedish and Norwegian. Both fairly mutually intelligible, but different languages. The debate on whether Scots is a language or a dialect is in dispute, but since there is no real universal definition of each - it's difficult to say.

No sound recording of native speakers from the time when the language was still widely spoken, since it died out too early for that. (But there are some written records in phonetic notation which help understand the pronunciation.) There are, of course, recordings of Revived Cornish.

@SeanOBriain I studied pre-history and early history, and I learned some Scottish Gaelic, too.

This sounds very similar to donegal irish, beautiful recording

@Solstisol David Clement of the School of Scottish Studies recorded the last two Manx speakers some time in the seventies. They were from opposite ends of the island and didn't know each other

This is my first time hearing a pure native Manx Speaker. I'm felt so bad to hear that this language is extincted, but I'm glad they revived it.

Despite me not knowing what hes saying I'm still sad that the Englishmen of the past tried to destroy these languages.

Now i think that is what my parents who only speak Polish and some Russian hear when i watch movies in english

@AidrianODoughaill I agree - it sounds as if the recording was made at a gathering where everyone is throwing in their tuppence worth and its hard to make out when its is Ned and when it is Brian Stowell or someone else entirely. A precious recording nonetheless.

*I appreciate that this video was uploaded almost 10 years ago now, but with respect to Sean Ó Briain who uploaded it, it's as misleading today as it was back in July of 2010. The most common definition of the term **_native speaker_** is; **_"Someone who learned to speak a language as part of his or her childhood development"._** On that basis, clearly Ned (Maddrell) wasn't even close to being **_"...the last native Manx Gaelic speaker"._* *Literally thousands of children on the Isle of Man were being taught Manx Gaelic in school during Mr Maddrell's lifetime, and long after he passed away in 1974. I, along with my four brothers, our parents, aunts, uncles and cousins etc, are ALL fluent in Manx Gaelic, which we regularly chat to each other in. Not as some sort of novelty or teaching exercise, but as our regular mother tongue. So I wouldn't be too keen to try and confine Manx Gaelic to the history books just yet!*

Will youtube still be around to show a video of the last English speaker?

It would be interesting to know whether in 100 years time, there would be native manx speakers !!!! Of course there are people who speak Manx, as a learned language, but what would they speak it to their children, when they're born - That's a different thing !!!!

Sad to hear the last Manx speaker.

For some reason I can't reply to most comments on here. But I must say something to the fellow who calls himself 'Hibernian Hail'. Celtic languages are simply a branch of Indo-European languages, as are the Germanic languages. Germanic languages ARE NOT Celtic, both originated from a single parent language(I.European) and split off into thier own tongues. The Germanic languages are thought to have split off earlier than when Latin and Gaulish languages split apart. This explains why there are many similarities between Latin and Gaulish(Though we do not have a full picture of Gaulish). You seem to be mistaking the Celtic Languages as the parent languages, off of which all others split. This is NOT the case....There is no serious theory that exists that supports your statements.

Fascinating. Though a bit hard to make out, the pronunciation sounds like a mixture of Welsh, Scottish and Cumbrian or Lancashire. I think the accent or pronunciation of a language is very important part of it. I wonder how different it is to a modern Manx accent? Which from what Ive heard, is very similar to nearby northern English accents.

Slane Ihiat to ya Mr. Stowell. :) 3X3

@theworldvideos1 That's a good question, and hard to predict. The future will rest with the families. It will only survive if it is accepted as a community language, rather than merely a scholarly one.

@Solstisol: Per the title of the video, he was the last _native_ Manx speaker. One can still learn Manx (much like one can learn Latin, even though there are no native speakers alive), but the original line of native Manx speakers ended with this gentleman. There are revival efforts underway to resurrect the language within modern Manx communities. It should be noted the people in today's Manx communities are all native English speakers.

Tha e mar Gaelg Alabanach, cinnte. Chan eil e Eirreanach.

😢

@MattSteidl I'm sorry - but a handful of similar words doesn't imply that two languages share the same roots. Telefís is Irish for television, but you wouldn't say that Irish is derived from Greek or Latin. Show me a peer reviewed journal to backup your claims.

exactly :)

Would put you in mind of Donegal Gaeilge

This man is a character in Thomas Pynchon's "V".

@SeanOBriain At least thats somehting, Good to see children learning the language :) thats crazy that even the manx accent is disapearing.

I believe the original poster is talking about "Scottish Gaelic" when he says scots which obviously is a mistake on his part.

Yeah, I learned that awhile back and I was too lazy to correct it. It is confusing how there are two languages with nearly the same name.

@bugstrut It is a language. Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx all share the same roots - but they are all individual languages and are not all mutually intelligible. Although, some phrases and words would be understood - the spelling and pronunciation varies from language to language. The accent of the Manx people I'd attribute to alot of people from England moving to the Island, causing a direct influence on the accent. It's rare to hear an authentic manx accent, few have it. Mostly the elderly.

It's hard to hear because of the background noise, but this sounds like Irish to me. I've listened to some younger learners of Manx and it's diverged a bit more from Irish. The reason for this may be a break in continuity from speakers who have passed away and/or the misinterpretation of written to spoken. Although we in Ireland reformed our spelling which differentiates it more from Scots Gaelic. The written form of Manx gaelic has broken down and words are given an English written pronunciation. There's nothing wrong with that, just a different approach... One could argue, it makes it easier for the learner. It's fairly easy to read Manx.. Go n-éirí libh!

Great to hear Ned Maddrel speaking Manx Gaelg, but one thing I can't understand is why it is not written more like Scottish or Irish Gaelic, I feel it would benefit Manx Gaelg if it was more understandable ( particularly in writing) to other Gaelic speakers.. Ach le sinn raithe, tá súil agam go mbeidh sí linn go deo..

@AidrianODoughaill it's difficult for sure, it's kind of like cb radio, you need to train your ear to listen to it properly. i don't speak manx, but I can make out bits and pieces because it's phonetically similar to irish.

Scots is a Goidelic language which is in the Celtic language family so it which is related to Irish and Manx. Scots I believe has had a lot of English and Norse influence though, which may make you believe so. =)

@Hibernian hail The I.European languages are thought to have originated somewhere in the Russian Steppes, and spread in two distinct directions. The people who spread these languages also, for the most part, maintained certain cultural practices and structures that can be traced through many I.European/Iranian ancient peoples. The Celtic languages developed later on in Europe from a parent I.Euro language and not the other way around. The name, these early I.Europeans had for themselves, seems to be 'Aria' or something along those lines(hence the term 'Arrian' and also where the name 'Iran' comes from). Those who travelled East into Anotolia*, Persia, Afghanistan and India, were named I.Iranians, to differentiate them from those who went in the other direction, into Europe. Sanskrit, Pashtun, Farses, Sikh are all examples of Indo Iranian languages..none of which are Celtic. Sanskrit legends were found to be similar to Irish ones. These two were specifically compared, because they are both on the extreme edges of where I.European/Iranian languages reached in ancient times...NOT because people thought that Sanskrit was a form of the Irish language.

I still think you don't need to be insulting. Also, Welsh Cornish, Irish, Scottish, Breton, Manx are in different sub-groups, yes (Brythonic vs. Goidelic). But they are all still part of the larger family of Celtic languages and have shared influence.

Why aren't there closed captions on this video ? I'm sure you could contact the manx museum to look in to it ..

@SeanOBriain It DOES. In Roman times, on the Continent, many Germanic tribes were regarded as Celts and vice versa. Because in the early days they used to have similar cultures and habits and even a common proto language. Example with Scottish Gaelic and Bavarian/German: lament, cumha, Kummer. Children, Cloinne, Kloine. Girl, maighdeann, Maedchen. Eagle, iolair, Odler etc.

Is there any recording of Cornish?

@SeanOBriain "The Bavarians emerged in a region north of the Alps, originally inhabited by the Gauls, which had been part of the Roman provinces of Raetia and Noricum." ... "The name "Bavarian" ("Baiuvarii") means "Men of Baia" which may indicate Bohemia, the homeland of the Celtic Boii..." ... "The Boii (Latin plural, singular Boius; Greek Βόϊοι) were one of the most prominent ancient Celtic tribes of the later Iron Age. (Rankin, D. (1996). Celts and the classical world (2nd ed.). London)

@SeanOBriain I am German. Germany and France used to be Celtic territories before the Romans and Germans came. But there are quite a lot of similarities between older Continental "Germanic" dialects like Bavarian and Celtic languages. I mean, the Irish and the Brits didn't come from nowhere! They have their roots on the Continent.

@Hibernian hail, indo-european is a family of languages, not a branch. Germanic and Celtic are two of many branches of the Indo-European family, and are only very distantly related. Here's a diagram for you: upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/IndoEuropeanTree.svg

@xhemexx That's a pretty ignorant comment. Firstly - Celtic languages are in no way related to Germanic languages. Languages are group by branches based on what they descend from. Secondly, Manx has nothing in common with the Brythonic branch of Celtic languages - it is derived from a primitive form of the Irish language - So it shares alot in common with modern Irish and Scottish Gaelic.

@MattSteidl Like I said - I'm not disputing a geographical influence. That does not state anything with regards to the roots of Germanic and Celtic languages being of the same stock.

I would assume the Irish spoken in County Down was very similar in sound to Manx

You are correct, Germanic and Celtic come from a common root, but have since diverged in the last 2,000-3,000 years or so, and most of the territory of Celtic speakers has been taken by the Latins and Germanics.

Tá sé sin go hallain ag éisteacht leis seo.

Yes, Lorenzo, it's tragic. Where I live,(Sweden) we're slowly transforming Swedish into English, which is also sad and not good for any of the two languages, because they are both distorted this way, not beautifully spoken or written.

Te Me Galeg Dansee Ilaim!

im guessing he's the guy who sounds older in this conversation

No idea. I know there are conversational groups and what not, but you'd have to ask someone living there to get a clearer picture of the current state of the language. I would say it is better than it was doing 10 years ago. So, that's a start I guess.

I am part Manx.

I thought there was language continuity amongst the Rabbis regarding Hebrew? Is that not correct?

This would be fascinating to those of us who have some Irish or Gaidhlig, but could someone add subtitles in English? Go raibh mile maith agat!

Clearly there are two people talking here, if not three. Which one is Ned Madrell?

@Solstisol question 1: he was the last NATIVE BORN speaker,he learned it from childhood. He isnt the last to speak the language. Usually there is death involved when you name some one "The last XX" otherwise it would be rather stupid. Question 2: Usually you have information about the dying language and can tell what is silly noises and what isnt. just beacuse he is dead, doesnt mean you can't find information about the language. e.g. the Rosetta stone or this recording.

Person from port erin here

I guess by 1964 there were still other speakers.

Ellan Vannin dy Bragh!

@MattSteidl Ok so - Cite a peer reviewed journal to back up your claims. Similarities in languages does not imply shared roots, anymore than it implies a geographical influence between two different languages.

@xhemexx The spelling is not orthodox because written Manx is relatively new. The pronounication, verbs, nouns, adjectives and structure are quite similar to Irish and Scottish Gaelic. It is not related or does not resemble any Germanic languages.

Is there a transcription?

I doubt that Manx can be revived. A Manx culture has to be created and that is very, very difficult.

@RaphaelIsASexyName In 1964, shoe recording technology was at its apex! The following year shoe phone technology would be introduced, alas decades too early for Americans.

Mannin abù go brach

How neat. I can trace my family line back to the Christian family. Heritage lost is so sad.