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CELTIC FOLKLORE

J. RHtS

HENRY FROWDE, MA.

PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

LONDON, EDINBURGH, AND NEW YORK

CELTIC FOLKLORE

WELSH;.-A^NIi>:;iMANX

JOHN RHYS; M.A.; H'LiTT.

HON. LL.D. OF THE UNIVfiRSltY OF EDINBURGH

PROFESSOR OF CELTIC

PRINCIPAL OF JESUS COLLEGE, OXFORD

VOLUME II

OXFORD

AT THE CLARENDON PRESS

2onVc£tr>:^thr.Ta£ET^^

Ojcfoxi)

PRINTED AT THK CLARENDON PRESS

BY HORACE HART, M.A.
PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY

PROPERTY OF THE 3^g
CITY OF NEW YOnK ij^

Triumphs of the Water-world

Une des legendes !es plus repandues en Bretagne est cclie'd'une pretendue
ville d'ls, qui, a une 'epo'que inconnue, aurait ete eng4oAt;f par la men On
montre, a divers endroiiS de ^a cote, remplacement.d-i; <;ette cite fabuleuse,
et les pecheurs vous en' font d'etranges recits. Les jours de tempete,
assurent-ils, on voit, dans leS creiix des vaguts. 'le- ublliniet des fleches de
ses ^glises ; les jours de calif e, ';)p entend mpntei d^ I'abime le son de ses
cloches, modulant I'hymne du jour.^ — Renan.

More than once in the last chapter was the subject of
submersions and cataclysms brought before the reader,
and it may be convenient to enumerate here the most
remarkable cases, and to add one or two to their
number, as well as to dwell at somewhat greater length
on some instances which may be said to have found
their way into Welsh literature. He has already been
told of the outburst of the Glasfrj^n Lake (p. 367) and
Ffynnon Gywer (p. 376), of ILyn ILech Owen (p. 379)
and the Crymlyn (p. 191), also of the drowning of
Cantre'r Gwaelod (p. 383); not to mention that one
of my informants had something to say (p. 219) of the
submergence of Caer Arianrhod, a rock now visible
only at low water between Celynnog Fawr and Dinas
Dintte, on the coast of Arfon. But, to put it briefly, it
is an ancient belief in the Principality that its lakes
generally have swallowed up habitations of men, as in
the case of ILyn Syfadon (p. 73) and the Pool of Cor-
wrion (p. 57). To these I now proceed to add other
instances, to wit those of Bala Lake, Kenfig Pool,

RHYS D d

CEfSrmAL_RESERVE

402 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

ILynclys, and Helig ab Glannog's territory including
Traeth Lafan.

Perhaps it is best to begin with historical events,
namely those implied in the encroachment of the sea
and the sand on the. coast of Glamorganshire, from the
Mumbles, in GoweV-jto the;* fnplith of the Ogmore,
below Bridgend..* 'It 'is. belJeved'thaf formerly the shores
of Swansea ■ Bay'' were from three 'to* 'fiye miles further
out than the present strand, and "the oyster dredgers
point to tba^t'part of the bay which they call the
Green Grounds, while trawlers, hovering over these
sunken meadows of the Grove Island, declare that they
can sometimes sfife the foundation^ of the ancient home-
steads overwhehj7jed by a terrific storm which raged
some three centuries ago. The old people sometimes
talk of an extensive forest called Coed Avian, ' Silver
Wood,' stretching from the foreshore of the Mumbles
to Kenfig Burrows, and there is a tradition of a long-
lost bridle path used by many generations of Mansels,
Mowbrays, and Talbots, from Penrice Castle to Margam
Abbey. All this is said to be corroborated by the
fishing up every now and then in Swansea Bay of
stags' antlers, elks' horns, those of the wild ox, and wild
boars' tusks, together with the remains of other ancient
tenants of the submerged forest. Various references
in the registers of Swansea and Aberavon mark succes-
sive stages in the advance of the desolation from the
latter part of the fifteenth century down. Among others
a great sandstorm is mentioned, which overwhelmed
the borough of Cynffig or Kenfig, and encroached on
the coast generally : the series of catastrophes seems
to have culminated in an inundation caused by a terrible
tidal wave in the early part of the year 1607 \

' For most of my information on this subject I have to thank Mr. David
Davies, editor of the South Wales Daily Post, pubhshed at Swansea.

vn] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 403

To return to Kenfig, what remains of that old town
is near the sea, and it is on all sides surrounded by
hillocks of finely powdered sand and flanked by ridges
of the same fringing the coast. The ruins of several old
buildings half buried in the sand peep out of the
ground, and in the immediate neighbourhood is Kenfig
Pool, which is said to have a circumference of nearly
two miles. When the pool formed itself I have not
been able to discover : from such accounts as have come
in my way I should gather that it is older than the
growing spread of the sand, but the island now to be
seen in it is artificial and of modern make ^. The story
relating to the lake is given as follows in the volume of
the lolo Manuscripts, p. 194, and the original, from
which I translate, is crisp, compressed, and, as I fancy,
in lolo's own words : —

' A plebeian was in love with Earl Clare's daughter :
she would not have him as he was not wealthy. He
took to the highway, and watched the agent of the lord
of the dominion coming towards the castle from
collecting his lord's money. He killed him, took the
money, and produced the coin, and the lady married
him. A splendid banquet was held : the best men of
the country were invited, and they made as merry as
possible. On the second night the marriage was con-
summated, and when happiest one heard a voice : all
ear one listened and caught the words, " Vengeance
comes, vengeance comes, vengeance comes," three
times. One asked, " When ? " " In the ninth generation
(dch)," said the voice. " No reason for us to fear," said
the married pair ; " we shall be under the mould long
before." They lived on, however, and a goresgynnyd^,

' I am indebted for this information to Mr. J. Herbert James of Vaynor,
who visited Kenfig lately and has called my attention to an article headed
'The Borough of Kenfig,' in the Archaologia Cambrensis for 1898: see
more especially the maps at pp. 138-42.

D d 2

404

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

that is to say, a descendant of the sixth direct genera-
tion, was born to them, also to the murdered man a gor-
esgyTinydlwho, seeing that the time fixed was come, visited
Kenfig. This was a discreet youth of gentle manners,
and he looked at the city and its splendour, and noted
that nobody owned a furrow or a chamber there except
the offspring of the murderer: he and his wife were
still living. At cockcrow he heard a cry, "Vengeance
is come, is come, is come." It is asked, "On whom?"
and answered, " On him who murdered my father of
the ninth dch." He rises in terror : he goes towards
the city ; but there is nothing to see save a large lake
with three chimney tops above the surface emitting
smoke that formed a stinking . . . ^ On the face of the
waters the gloves of the murdered man float to the
young man's feet : he picks them up, and sees on them
the murdered man's name and arms ; and he hears at
dawn of day the sound of praise to God rendered by
myriads joining in heavenly music. And so the story
ends.'

On this coast is another piece of water in point,
namely Crymlyn, or ' Crumlin Pool,' now locally called
the Bog. It appears also to have been sometimes
called Pwtt Cynan, after the name of a son of Rhys ab
Tewdwr, who, in his flight after his father's defeat on
Hirwaen Wrgan, was drowned in its waters^. It lies

' Here the Welsh has a word edafwr, the exact meaning of which escapes
me, and I gather from the remarks of local etymologers that no such word is
now in use in Glamorgan.

^ See the Book of Aberpergwm, printed as Brut y Tywysogion, in the Myvy-
rian Archaiology, ii. 524 ; also Morgan's Aniiquarian Survey of East Gower,
p. 66, where the incident is given from ' Brut y Tywysogion, a. d. 1088.' It
is, however, not in what usually passes by the name oi Brut y Tywysogion,
but comes, as the author kindly informs me, from a volume entitled ' Brut y
Tywysogion, the Gwcntian Chronicle of Caradoc of ILancarvan, with a trans-
lation by the late Aneurin Owen, and printed for the Cambrian Archaeo-
logical Association, 1863 ' : see pp. 70-1.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 405

on Lord Jersey's estate, at a distance of about one mile
east of the mouth of the Tawe, and about a quarter of
a mile from high-water mark, from which it is separated
by a strip of ground known in the neighbourhood as
Crymlyn Burrows. The name Crymlyn means Crooked
Lake, which, I am told, describes the shape of this piece
of water. When the bog becomes a pool it encloses
an island consisting of a little rocky hillock showing
no trace of piles, or walling, or any other handiwork of
man ^. The story about this pool also is that it covers
a town buried beneath its waters. Mr. Wirt Sikes'
reference to it has already been mentioned, and I
have it on the evidence of a native of the immediate
neighbourhood, that he has often heard his father and
grandfather talk about the submerged town. Add to
this that Cadrawd, to whom I have had already (pp. 23,
376) to acknowledge my indebtedness, speaks in the
columns of the South Wales Daily News for February 15,
1899, of Crymlyn as follows : —

* It was said by the old people that on the site of this
bog once stood the old town of Swansea, and that in
clear and calm weather the chimneys and even the
church steeple could be seen at the bottom of the lake,
and in the loneliness of the night the bells were often
heard ringing in the lake. It was also said that should
any person happen to stand with his face towards the
lake when the wind is blowing across the lake, and if
any of the spray of that water should touch his clothes,
it would be only with the greatest difficulty he could
save himself from being attracted or sucked into the
water. The lake was at one time much larger than at
present. The efforts made to drain it have drawn a
good deal of the water from it, but only to convert it

^ For this also I have to thank Mr. Herbert James, who recently inspected
the spot with Mr. Glascodine of Swansea.

4o6 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

into a bog, which no one can venture to cross except in
exceptionally dry seasons or hard frost.'

On this I wish to remark in passing, that, while
common sense would lead one to suppose that the wind
blowing across the water would help the man facing it
to get away whenever he chose, the reasoning here is
of another order, one characteristic in fact of the ways
and means of sympathetic magic. For specimens in
point the reader may be conveniently referred to page
360, where he may compare the words quoted from
Mr. Hartland, especially as to the use there mentioned
of stones or pellets thrown from one's hands. In the
case of Crymlyn, the wind blowing off the face of the
water into the onlooker's face and carrying with it
some of the water in the form of spray which wets his
clothes, howsoever little, was evidently regarded as
establishing a link of connexion between him and the
body of the water — or shall I say rather, between him
and the divinity of the water?— and that this link was
believed to be so strong that it required the man's
utmost effort to break it and escape being drawn in and
drowned like Cynan. The statement, supremely silly
as it reads, is no modern invention ; for one finds that
Nennius — or somebody else — reasoned in precisely the
same way, except that for a single onlooker he sub-
stitutes a whole army of men and horses, and that he
points the antithesis by distinctly stating, that if they kept
their backs turned to the fascinating flood they would be
out of danger. The conditions which he had in view
were, doubtless, that the men should face the water and
have their clothing more or less wetted by the spray
from it. The passage (§ 69) to which I refer is in the
Mirahilia, and Geoffrey of Monmouth is found to
repeat it in a somewhat better style of Latin (ix. 7) : the
following is the Nennian version : —

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 407

Aliud miraculum est, id est Oper Linn Liguan. Ostium
flmninis illius Jlvtit in Sabrina et quando Sabrina inun-
datur ad sissam, et mare inundatur similiter in ostio
supra dicti Jluminis et in stagno ostii recipitur in modmn
voraginis et mare non vadit sursum et est litus juxta
flumen et quamdiu Sabrina inundatur ad sissam, istud litus
non tegitur et quando recedit mare et Sabrina, tunc Stag-
num Liuan eructat omne quod devoravit de mari et litus
istud tegitur et instar montis in una unda eructat et rumpit.
Et sifuerit exercitus totius regionis, in qua est, et direxerit
faciem contra undam, et exercitum trahit unda per vim hu-
more repletis vestibus et equi similiter trahuntur. Siautem
exercitus terga versus fuerit contra earn, non nocet ei unda.

* There is another wonder, to wit Aber ILyn ILiwan.
The water from the mouth of that river flows into the
Severn, and when the Severn is in flood up to its
banks, and when the sea is also in flood at the mouth
of the above-named river and is sucked in Hke a whirl-
pool into the pool of the Aber, the sea does not go on
rising : it leaves a margin of beach by the side of the
river, and all the time the Severn is in flood up to its
bank, that beach is not covered. And when the sea and
the Severn ebb, then ILyn ILiwan brings up all it had
swallowed from the sea, and that beach is covered
while ILyn ILiwan discharges its contents m one
mountain-like wave and vomits forth. Now if the army
of the whole district in which this wonder is, were to
be present with the men facing the wave, the force of
it would, once their clothes are drenched by the spray,
draw them in, and their horses would likewise be drawn.
But if the men should have their backs turned towards
the water, the wave would not harm them \'

' I do not know whether anybody has identified the spot which the
writer had in view, or whether the coast of the Severn still offers any feature
which corresponds in any way to the description.

4o8 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

One story about the formation of Bala Lake, or tt^yn
Tegid^ as it is called in Welsh, has been given at p. 376 :
here is another which I translate from a version in
Hugh Humphreys' Lyfr Gwybodaefh Gyffredinol (Car-
narvon), second series, vol. i, no. 2, p. i. I may
premise that the contributor, whose name is not given,
betrays a sort of literary ambition which has led him
to relate the story in a confused fashion ; and among
other things he uses the word edifeirwch^ ' repentance,'
throughout, instead of dial, 'vengeance.' With that
correction it runs somewhat as follows : — Tradition
relates that Bala Lake is but the watery tomb of the
palaces of iniquity ; and that some old boatmen can on
quiet moonlight nights in harvest see towers in ruins at
the bottom of its waters, and also hear at times a feeble
voice saying, Dial a daw, dial a daw, * Vengeance will
come ' ; and another voice inquiring. Pa bryd y daw,
' When will it come ? ' Then the first voice answers,
Yn y dryded genhedlaeth, ' In the third generation.'
Those voices were but a recollection over oblivion, for
in one of those palaces lived in days of yore an oppres-
sive and cruel prince, corresponding to the well-known
description of one of whom it is said, ' Whom he would
he slew ; and whom he would he kept alive.' The
oppression and cruelty practised by him on the poor
farmers were notorious far and near. This prince,
while enjoying the morning breezes of summer in his
garden, used frequently to hear a voice saying, 'Ven-
geance will come.' But he always laughed the threat
away with reckless contempt. One night a poor harper

' Supposed to be so called after a certain Tegid Foel, or ' Tegid the Bald,'
of Penttyn : the name Tegid is the phonetic spelling of what might be ex-
pected in writing as Tegyd — it is the Latin Tacitus borrowed, and comes with
other Latin names in Pedigree L of the Cuneda dynasty ; see the Cymmrodor,
xi. 170. In point of spelling one may compare Idris for what might be ex-
pected written Idrys, of the same pronunciation, for an earlier ludrys or ludris.

VII] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 409

from the neighbouring hills was ordered to come to
the prince's palace. On his way the harper was told
that there was great rejoicing at the palace at the birth
of the first child of the prince's son. When he had
reached the palace the harper was astonished at the
number of the guests, including among them noble
lords, princes, and princesses : never before had he seen
such splendour at any feast. When he had begun
playing the gentlemen and ladies dancing presented
a superb appearance. So the mirth and wine abounded,
nor did he love playing for them any more than they
loved dancing to the music of his harp. But about
midnight, when there was an interval in the dancing, and
the old harper had been left alone in a corner, he
suddenly heard a voice singing in a sort of a whisper in
his ear, 'Vengeance, vengeance! ' He turned at once,
and saw a little bird hovering above him and beckoning
him, as it were, to follow him. He followed the bird as
fast as he could, but after getting outside the palace he
began to hesitate. But the bird continued to invite him
on, and to sing in a plaintive and mournful voice the
word 'Vengeance, vengeance!' The old harper was
afraid of refusing to follow, and so they went on over
bogs and through thickets, whilst the bird was all the
time hovering in front of him and leading him along
the easiest and safest paths. But if he stopped for
a moment the same mournful note of ' Vengeance,
vengeance ! ' would be sung to him in a more and more
plaintive and heartbreaking fashion. They had by this
time reached the top of the hill, a considerable distance
from the palace. As the old harper felt rather fatigued
and weary, he ventured once more to stop and rest, but
he heard the bird's warning voice no more. He listened,
but he heard nothing save the murmuring of the little
burn hard by. He now began to think how foolish he

4IO CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

had been to allow himself to be led away from the feast
at the palace : he turned back in order to be there in
time for the next dance. As he wandered on the hill
he lost his way, and found himself forced to await the
break of day. In the morning, as he turned his eyes in
the direction of the palace, he could see no trace of it :
the whole tract below was one calm, large lake, with
his harp floating on the face of the waters.

Next comes the story of ILynclys Pool in the neigh-
bourhood of Oswestry. That piece of water is said to
be of extraordinary depth, and its name means the
' swallowed court.' The village of ILynclys is called
after it, and the legend concerning the pool is preserved
in verses printed among the compositions of the local
poet, John F. M. Dovaston, who published his works in
1825. The first stanza runs thus : —

Clerk Willin he sat at king Alaric's board,

And a cunning clerk was he ;
For he'd lived in the land of Oxenford

With the sons of Grammarie.

How much exactly of the poem comes from Dovaston's
own muse, and how much comes from the legend, I
cannot tell. Take for instance the king's name, this
I should say is not derived from the story ; but as to
the name of the clerk, that possibly is, for the poet
bases it on Croes- Willin, the Welsh form of which has
been given me as Croes- Wylan, that is Wylan's Cross,
the name of the base of what is supposed to have been
an old cross, a little way out of Oswestry on the north
side ; and I have been told that there is a farm in the
same neighbourhood called Tre' Wylan, 'Wylan's
Stead.' To return to the legend, Alaric's queen was
endowed with youth and beauty, but the king was not
happy ; and when he had lived with her nine years he
told Clerk Willin how he first met her when he was

vn] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 411

hunting 'fair Blodwell's rocks among.' He married
her on the condition that she should be allowed to leave
him one night in every seven, and this she did without
his once knowing whither she went on the night of her
absence. Clerk Willin promised to restore peace to
the king if he would resign the queen to him, and
a tithe annually of his cattle and of the wine in his
cellar to him and the monks of the White Minster.
The king consented, and the wily clerk hurried away
with his book late at night to the rocks by the Giant's
Grave, where there was an ogo' or cave which was sup-
posed to lead down to Faery. While the queen was
inside the cave, he began his spells and made it irrevo-
cable that she should be his, aifd that his fare should be
what fed on the king's meadow and what flowed in his
cellar. When the clerk's potent spells forced the queen
to meet him to consummate his bargain with the king,
what should he behold but a grim ogress, who told him
that their spells had clashed. She explained to him
how she had been the king's wife for thirty years, and
how the king began to be tired of her wrinkles and old
age. Then, on condition of returning to the Ogo to be
an ogress one night in seven, she was given youth and
beauty again, with which she attracted the king anew.
In fact, she had promised him happiness

Till within his hall the flag-reeds tall
And the long green rushes grow.

The ogress continued in words which made the clerk
see how completely he had been caught in his own net :

Then take thy bride to thy cloistered bed,

As by oath and spell decreed,
And nought be thy fare but the pike and the dare,

And the water in which they feed.

The clerk had succeeded in restoring peace at the

412 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

king's banqueting board, but it was the peace of the
dead ;

For down went the king, and his palace and all,

And the waters now o'er it flow,
And already in his hall do the flag-reeds tall

And the long green rushes grow.

But the visitor will, Dovaston says, find Willin's peace
relieved by the stories which the villagers have to tell
of that wily clerk, of Croes-Willin, and of 'the cave
called the Grim Ogo ' ; not to mention that when the
lake is clear, they will show you the towers of the palace
below, the ILynclys, which the Brython of ages gone
by believed to be there.

We now come to a different story about this pool,
namely, one which has fieen preserved in Latin by the
historian Humfrey Lhuyd, or Humphrey ILwyd, to the
following effect : —

' After the description of Gwynedh, let vs now come
to Powys, the seconde kyngedome of Wales, which in
the time of German Altisiodorensis [St. Germanus of
Auxerre], which preached sometime there, agaynst
Pelagius Heresie : was of power, as is gathered out
of his life. The kynge wherof, as^ is there read,
bycause he refused to heare that good man : by the
secret and terrible iudgement of God, with his Palace,
and all his householde : was swallowed vp into the
bowels of the Earth, in that place, whereas, not farre
from Oswastry, is now a standyng water, of an
vnknowne depth, called LJmnclys, that is to say : the
deuouryng of the Palace. And there are many
Churches founde in the same Province, dedicated to
the name of German ^'

' The translation was made by Thomas Twyne, and published in 1573
under the title of The Breniary of Britayne, where the passage here given
occurs, on fol. 69''. The original was entitled Comntentarioli BritanniccB
Descripiionis Fragmentum, published at Cologne in 1572. The original of
our passage, fol. 57", has Guynedhia and Lhinclis. The stem tiwnc oftiyncaf.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 413

I have not succeeded in finding the story in any of
the hves of St. Germanus, but Nennius, § 32, mentions
a certain Benli, whom he describes as rex iniquus atque
tyranmts valde, who, after refusing to admit St. Germanus
and his following into his city, was destroyed with all
his courtiers, not by water, however, but by fire from
heaven. But the name Benh, in modern Welsh spell-
ing Bentti \ points to the Moel Famau range of moun-
tains, one of which is known as Moel Fentti, between
Ruthin and Mold, rather than to any place near Oswestry.
In any case there is no reason to suppose that this story
with its Christian and ethical motive is anything like so
old as the substratum of Dovaston's verses.

The only version known to me in the Welsh language
of the ILynclys legend is to be found printed in the
Brython for 1863, p. 338, and it may be summarized as
follows : — The ILynclys family were notorious for their
riotous living, and at their feasts a voice used to be heard
proclaiming, ' Vengeance is coming, coming,' but nobody
took it much to heart. However, one day a reckless
maid asked the voice, ' When ? ' The prompt reply
was to the effect that it was in the sixth generation :
the voice was heard no more. So one night, when the
sixth heir in descent from the time of the warning last
heard was giving a great drinking feast, and music had
been vigorously contributing to the entertainment of
host and guest, the harper went outside for a breath of

' I swallow,' answers, according to Welsh idiom, to the use of what would be
in English or Latin a participle. Similarly, when a compound is not used,
the verbal noun (in the genitive) is used : thus ' a feigned illness,' in Welsh
' a made illness,' is saldra gwneyd, literally ' an indisposition or illness of
making.' So ' the deuouryng of the Palace ' is incorrect, and based on
ILwyd's vorago Palatij instead of Palatium voratum.

* For other occurrences of the name, see the Black Book, fol. 35* , 52*,
and Morris' Celfic Remains, where, s. v. Bentii, the Welsh name of Bardsey,
to wit, Ynys Entti, is treated by somebody, doubtless rightly, as a shortening
of Ynys Fentti.

414

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

air ; but when he turned to come back, lo and behold !
the whole court had disappeared. Its place was occu-
pied by a quiet piece of water, on whose waves he saw
his harp floating, nothing more.

Here must, lastly, be added one more legend of sub-
mergence, namely, that supposed to have taken place
some time or other on the north coast of Carnarvonshire.
In the Brython for 1863, pp. 393-4, we have what pur-
ports to be a quotation from Owen Jones' Aberconwy a'i
Chyffiniau, 'Conway and its Environs,' a work which
I have not been able to find. Here one reads of
a tract of country supposed to have once extended
from the Gogarth ^ ' the Great Orme,' to Bangor, and
from ILanfair Fechan to Ynys Seiriol, ' Priestholme
or Puffin Island/ and of its belonging to a wicked
prince named Helig ab Glannawc or Glannog^, from
whom it was called Tyno Helig, ' Helig's Hollow.'
Tradition, the writer says, fixes the spot where the
court stood about halfway between Penmaen Mawr and
Pen y Gogarth, * the Great Orme's Head,' over against
Trwyn yr Wylfa ; and the story relates that here a
calamity had been foretold four generations before it
came, namely as the vengeance of Heaven on Helig ab
Glannog for his nefarious impiety. As that ancient
prince rode through his fertile heritage one day at the
approach of night, he heard the voice of an invisible
follower warning him that ' Vengeance is coming,
coming.' The wicked old prince once asked excitedly,
* When ? ' The answer was, * In the time of thy grand-
children, great-grandchildren, and their children.' Per-

* The meaning of this name is not certain, but it seems to equate with the
Irish Fochard, anglicized Faughard, in County Louth : see O'Donovan's
Four Masters, a.d. 1595 ; also the Book of the Dun Cow, where it is Focherd,
genitive Focherda, dative Focheird, fo. 70'', 73'', 75*, 75'', 76", 77*.

' This is sometimes given as Glannach, which looks like the Goidelic form
of the name : witness GiraJdus' Enislannach in his Itin. Kambria, ii. 7 (p. 131 ).

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 415

adventure Helig calmed himself with the thought, that,
if such a thing came, it would not happen in his lifetime.
But on the occasion of a great feast held at the court,
and when the family down to the fifth generation
were present taking part in the festivities, one of the
servants noticed, when visiting the mead cellar to draw
more drink, that water was forcing its way in. He had
only time to warn the harper of the danger he was in,
when all the others, in the midst of their intoxication,
were overwhelmed by the flood.'

These inundation legends have many points of simi-
larity among themselves : thus in those of ILynclys,
Syfadon, ILyn Tegid, and Tyno Helig, though they
have a ring of austerity about them, the harper is a
favoured man, who always escapes when the banqueters
are all involved in the catastrophe. The story, more-
over, usually treats the submerged habitations as having
sunk intact, so that the ancient spires and church towers
may still at times be seen : nay the chimes of their bells
may be heard by those who have ears for such music.
In some cases there may have been, underlying the
legend, a trace of fact such as has been indicated to me
by Mr. Owen M, Edwards, of Lincoln College, in regard
to Bala Lake. When the surface of that water, he
says, is covered with broken ice, and a south-westerly
wind is blowing, the mass of fragments is driven towards
the north-eastern end near the town of Bala ; and he
has observed that the friction produces a somewhat
metallic noise which a quick imagination may convert
into something like a distant ringing of bells. Perhaps
the most remarkable instance remains to be mentioned :
I refer to Cantre'r Gwaelod, as the submerged country
of Gwydno Garanhir is termed, see p. 382 above. To
one portion of his fabled realm the nearest actual
centres of population are Aberdovey and Borth on

4i6 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

either side of the estuary of the Dovey. / r of

Jesus College I had business in 1892 in ttie uoiden
Valley of Herefordshire, and I stayed a day or two at
Dorstone enjoying the hospitality of the rectory, and
learning interesting facts from the rector, Mr. Prosser
Powell, and from Mrs. Powell in particular, as to the
folklore of the parish, which is still in several respects
very Welsh, Mrs. Powell, however, did not confine
herself to Dorstone or the Dore Valley, for she told me
as follows : — ' I was at Aberdovey in 1852, and I dis-
tinctly remember that my childish imagination was
much excited by the legend of the city beneath the sea,
and the bells which I was told might be heard at night.
I used to lie awake trying, but in vain, to catch the
echoes of the chime. I was only seven years old, and
cannot remember who told me the story, though I have
never forgotten it.' Mrs. Powell added that she has
since heard it said, that at a certain stage of the tide at
the mouth of the Dovey, the wa^^ in which the waves
move the pebbles makes them produce a sortof jinghng
noise which has been fancied to be the echo of distant
bells ringing.

These clues appeared too good to be dropped at
once, and the result of further inquiries led Mrs. Powell
afterwards to refer me to The Monthly Packet for the
year 1859, where I found an article headed ' Aberdovey
Legends,' and signed M. B., the initials, Mrs. Powell
thought, of Miss Bramston of Winchester. The writer
gives a sketch of the story of the country overflowed
by the neighbouring portion of Cardigan Bay, mention-
ing, p. 645, that once on a time there were great cities
on the banks of the Dovey and the Disynni, * Cities
with marble wharfs,' she says, ' busy factories, and
churches whose towers resounded with beautiful peals
and chimes of bells.' She goes on to say that ' Mausna

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 417

is the name of the city on the Dovey ; its eastern
suburb was at the sand-bank now called Borth, its
western stretched far out into the sea.' What the name
Mausna may be I have no idea, unless it is the result
of some confusion with that of the great turbary
behind Borth, namely Mochno, or Cors Fochno, ' Bog
of Mochno.' The name Borth stands for Y Borth,
'the Harbour,' which, more adequately described,
was once Porfk Wydno, 'Gwydno's Harbour.' The
writer, however, goes on with the story of the wicked
prince, who left open the sluices of the sea-wall pro-
tecting his country and its capital: we read on as
follows :— ' But though the sea will not give back that
fair city to light and air, it is keeping it as a trust but
for a time, and even now sometimes, though very
rarely, eyes gazing down through the green waters can
see not only the fluted glistering sand dotted here and
there with shells and tufts of waving sea-weed, but the
wide streets and costly buildings of that now silent city.
Yet not always silent, for now and then will come
chimes and peals of bells, sometimes near, sometimes
distant, sounding low and sweet hke a call to prayer, or
as rejoicing for a victory. Even by day these tones
arise, but more often they are heard in the long twilight
evenings, or by night. English ears have sometimes
heard these sounds even before they knew the tale,
and fancied that they must come from some church
among the hills, or on the other side of the water, but
no such church is there to give the call ; the sound and
its connexion is so pleasant, that one does not care to
break the spell by seeking for the origin of the legend,
as in the idler tales with which that neighbourhood
abounds.'

The dream about 'the wide streets and costly buildings
of that now silent city ' seems to have its counterpart on

RHYS E e

4i8 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

the western coast of Erin — somewhere, let us say, off
the cHffs of Moher \ in County Clare — witness Gerald
Griffin's lines, to which a passing allusion has already
been made, p. 205 : —

A story I heard on the cliffs of the West,
That oft, through the breakers dividing,

A city is seen on the ocean's wild breast,
In turreted majesty riding.

But brief is the glimpse of that phantom so bright :
Soon close the white waters to screen it.

The allusion to the submarine chimes would make
it unpardonable to pass by unnoticed the well-known
Welsh air called Clychau Aberdyft, ' The Bells of Aber-
dovey,' which I have always suspected of taking its
name from fairy bells'^. This popular tune is of
unknown origin, and the words to which it is usually
sung make the bells say tm, dau, in, pedwar, pump,
chwech, ' one, two, three, four, five, six ' ; and I have
heard a charming Welsh vocalist putting on saifh,
* seven,' in her rendering of the song. This is not to be
wondered at, as her instincts must have rebelled against
such a commonplace number as six in a song redolent
of old-world sentiment. But our fairy bells ought to
have stopped at five : this would seem to have been
forgotten when the melody and the present words were
wedded together. At any rate our stories seem to
suggest that fairy counting did not go be3'^ond the
fingering of one hand. The only Welsh fairy repre-
sented counting is made to do it all by fives : she counts
un, dau, tri, pedwar, pump ; un, dau, tri, pedwar, pump,
as hard as her tongue can go. For on the number of

' See Choice Notes, p. 92, and Gerald Gu&n's Poetical and Dramatic IVorks,
p. 106.

^ Failing to see this, various writers have tried to claim the honour of
owning the bells for Aberteifi, * Cardigan,' or for Abertawe, ' Swansea ' ; but
no arguments worthy of consideration have been urged on behalf of either
place: see Cyfaiti yr Aehvyd (or 1892, p. 184.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 419

times she can repeat the five numerals at a single breath
depends the number of the live stock of each kind,
which are to form her dowry : see p. 8 above, and as to
music in fairy tales, see pp. 202, 206, 292.

Now that a number of our inundation stories have
been passed in review in this and the previous chapter,
some room may be given to the question of their
original form. They separate themselves, as it will
have been seen, into at least two groups : (i) those in
which the cause of the catastrophe is ethical, the punish-
ment of the wicked and dissolute ; and (2) those in which
no very distinct suggestion of the kind is made. It is
needless to say that everything points to the comparative
lateness of the fully developed ethical motive ; and we
are not forced to rest content with this theoretical
distinction, for in more than one of the instances we
have the two kinds of story. In the case of ILyn Tegid,
the less known and presumably the older story connects
the formation of the lake with the neglect to keep the
stone door of the well shut, while the more popular
story makes the catastrophe a punishment for wicked
and riotous living : compare pp. 377, 408, above. So with
the older story of Cantre'r Gwaelod, on which we found
the later one of the tipsy Seithennin as it were grafted,
P- 395- The keeping of the wxll shut in the former
case, as also in that of Ffynnon Gywer, was a precaution,
but the neglect of it was not the cause of the ensuing
misfortune. Even if we had stories like the Irish
ones, which make the sacred well burst forth in pursuit
of the intruder who has gazed into its depths, it would
by no means be of a piece with the punishment of riotous
and lawless living. Our comparison should rather be
with the story of the Curse of Pantannas, where a man
incurred the wrath of the fairies by ploughing up
ground which they wished to retain as a green sward ;

E e 2

420

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

but the threatened vengeance for that act of culture did
not come to pass for a century, till the time of one, in
fact, who is not charged with having done anything to
deserve it. The ethics of that legend are, it is clear,
not easy to discover, and in our inundation stories one
may trace stages of development from a similarly low
level. The case may be represented thus : a divinity is
offended by a man, and for some reason or other the
former wreaks his vengeance, not on the offender, but
on his descendants. This minimum granted, it is easy
to see, that in time the popular conscience would fail to
rest satisfied with the cruel idea of a jealous divinity
visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children.
One may accordingly distinguish the following stages : —

1. The legend lays it down as a fact that the father
was very wicked.

2. It makes his descendants also wicked like him.

3. It represents the same punishment overtaking
father and sons, ancestor and descendants.

4. The simplest way to secure this kind of equal
justice was, no doubt, to let the offending ancestors live
on to see their descendants of the generation for whose
time the vengeance had been fixed, and to let them be
swept away with them in one and the same cataclysm,
as in the Welsh versions of the Syfadon and Kenfig
legends, possibly also in those of ILyn Tegid and Tyno
Helig, which are not explicit on this point.

Let us for a moment examine the indications of the
time to which the vengeance is put off. In the case of
the landed families of ancient Wales, every member
of them had his position and liabilities settled by his
pedigree, which had to be exactly recorded down to the
eighth generation or eighth lifetime in Gwyned, and to
the seventh in Gwent and Dyfed. Those generations
were reckoned the hmits of recognized family relation-

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 421

ship according to the Welsh Laws, and to keep any
practical reckoning of the kind, extending always back
some two centuries, must have employed a class of
professional men^. In any case the ninth generation,
called in Welsh y nawfed dch, which is a term in use
all over the Principality at the present day, is treated
as lying outside all recognized kinship. Thus if AB
wishes to say that he is no relation to CD, he will say
that he is not related o fewn y navofed dch, * within the
ninth degree,' or hyd y nawfed dch, ' up to the ninth
degree,' it being understood that in the ninth degree
and beyond it no relationship is reckoned. Folklore
stories, however, seem to suggest another interpretation
of the word dch, and fewer generations in the direct line
as indicated in the following table. For the sake of
simplicity the founder of the family is here assumed to
have at least two sons, A and B, and each succeeding
generation to consist of one son only ; and lastly the
women are omitted altogether : —

Tad I (Father)

Brother A

B Mab(Son)

i Cousin A*

III

B» W^yr (Grandson)

ii Cousin A*"

6"= Gorwyr (Great-Grandson)

4
iii Cousin A"

4
B<= Esgynny* (G.G.Grandson)

iv Cousin h.^

B^ Goresgynnyd"(G. G.G.Grandson)

In reckoning the relationships between the collateral
members of the family, one counts not generations or
begettings, not removes or degrees, but ancestry or the
number of ancestors, so that the father or founder of

' For some of the data as to the reckoning of the pedigrees and branching
of a family, see the first volume of Aneurin Owen's Ancient Laws — Gwyned",
III. i. 12-5 (pp. 222-7) ; Dyfed, II. i. 17-29 (pp. 408-ri); Gwent, II. viii.
i~7 (PP- 7oo~3) > ^Iso The Welsh People, pp. 230-1.

422 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

the family only counts once. Thus his descendants
A*^ and B'' in the sixth generation or lifetime, are fourth
cousins separated from one another by nine ancestors :
that is, they are related in the ninth dch. In other words,
A^ has five ancestors and B'* has also five, but as they
have one ancestor in common, the father of the family,
they are not separated by 5 + 5 ancestors, but by
5 + 5 — 1, that is by 9. Similarly, one being always
subtracted, the third cousins A° and B" are related
in the seventh dch^ and the second cousin in the fifth
dch : so with the others in odd numbers downwards, and
also with the relatives reckoned upwards to the seventh
or eighth generation, which would mean collaterals
separated by eleven or thirteen ancestors respectively.
This reckoning, which is purely conjectural, is based
chiefly on the Kenfig story, which foretold the ven-
geance to come in the ninth dch and otherwise in
the time of the goresgynnyd', that is to say in the sixth
lifetime. This works out all right if only by the ninth
dch we understand the generation or lifetime when the
collaterals are separated by nine ancestors, for that is
no other than the sixth from the founder of the family.
The Welsh version of the ILynclys legend fixes on the
same generation, as it says yjt oes wyrion, gorwyrion,
esgynnyd^ a goresgynnyd', ' in the lifetime of grandsons,
great-grandsons, ascensors, and their children,' for these
last's time is the sixth generation. In the case of the
Syfadon legend the time of the vengeance is the ninth
cenhedlaeth or generation, which must be regarded as
probably a careless way of indicating the generation
when the collaterals are separated by nine ancestors,
that is to say the sixth from the father of the family.
It can hardly have the other meaning, as the sinning
ancestors are represented as then still living. The case
of the Tyno Helig legend is different, as we have the

VI i] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 423

} time announced to the offending ancestor described as
amser dy wyrion, dy orzvyrioit, a dy esgynydion, * the time
of thy grandsons, thy great-grandsons, and thy ascen-
sors,' which would be only the fifth generation with
collaterals separated only by seven ancestors, and not
( I ine. But the probability is that goresgynydion has
\ been here accidentally omitted, and that the generation
\ indicated originally was the same as in the others. This,
however, will not explain the Bala legend, which fixes
the time for the third generation, namely, immediately
after the birth of the offending prince's first grandson.
If, however, as I am inclined to suppose, the sixth
generation with collaterals severed by nine ancestors
was the normal term in these stories, it is easy to
understand that the story-teller might wish to substitute
a generation nearer to the original offender, especially
if he was himself to be regarded as surviving to share
in the threatened punishment : his living to see the
birth of his first grandson postulated no extraordinary
longevity.

The question why fairy vengeance is so often repre-
sented deferred for a long time can no longer be
put off. Here three or four answers suggest them-
selves : —

1. The story of the Curse of Pantannas relates how
the offender was not the person punished, but one of
his descendants a hundred or more years after his time,
while the offender is represented escaping the fairies'
vengeance because he entreated them very hard to let
him go unpunished. All this seems to me but a sort
of protest against the inexorable character of the little
people, a protest, moreover, which was probably in-
vented comparatively late.

2. The next answer is the very antithesis of the Pan-
tannas one ; for it is, that the fairies delay in order to

424 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch. •

j
involve all the more men and women in the vengeanc( \

wreaked by them : I confess that I see no reason tc \

entertain so sinister an idea. i'

3. A better answer, perhaps, is that the fairies wer [
not always in a position to harm him who offende
them. This may well have been the belief as regard
any one who had at his command the dreaded potenc

of magic. Take for instance the Irish story of a kir
of Erin called Eochaid Airem, who, with the aid of his
magician or druid Dalan, defied the fairies, and dug into
the heart of their underground station, until, in fact, he
got possession of his queen, who had been carried
thither by a fairy chief named Mider. Eochaid, assisted
by his druid and the powerful Ogams which the latter
wrote on rods of yew, was too formidable for the
fairies, and their wrath was not executed till the time
of Eochaid's unoffending grandson, Conaire Mor, who
fell a victim to it, as related in the epic story of Bruden
Daderga, so called from the palace where Conaire was
slain ^

4. Lastly, it may be said that the fairies being sup-
posed deathless, there would be no reason why they
should hurry ; and even in case the delay meant a cen-
tury or two, that makes no perceptible approach to the
extravagant scale of time common enough in our fairy
tales, when, for instance, they make a man who has
whiled ages away in fairyland, deem it only so many
minutes ^.

' See the Book of the Dun Cow, fol. 99" & seq.

^ For instances, the reader may turn back to pp. 154 or 191, but there are
plenty more in the foregoing chapters ; and he may also consult Howells'
Cambrian Superstitions, pp. 123-8, 141-2, 146. In one case, p. 123, he
gives an instance of the contrary kind of imagination : the shepherd who
joined a fairy party on Frenni Fach was convinced, when his senses and his
memory returned, that, ' although he thought he had been absent so many
years, he had been only so many minutes.' The story has the ordinary
setting ; but can it be of popular origin ? The Frenni Fach is a part of the

VI i] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 425

Whatever the causes may have been which gave our
stories their form in regard of the delay in the fairy
revenge, it is clear that Welsh folklore could not
allow this delay to extend beyond the sixth generation
with its cousinship of nine ancestries, if, as I gather, it
counted kinship no further. Had one projected it on
the seventh or the eighth generation, both of which are
contemplated in the Laws, it would not be folklore. It
would more likely be the lore of the landed gentry and
of the powerful families whose pedigrees and ramifica-
tions of kinship were minutely known to the professional
men on whom it was incumbent to keep themselves,
and those on whom they depended, well informed in
such matters.

It remains for me to consider the non-ethical motive
of the other stories, such as those which ascribe negli-
gence and the consequent inundation to the woman who
has the charge of the door or lid of the threatening
well. Her negligence is not the cause of the cata-
strophe, but it leaves the way open for it. What then
can have been regarded the cause ? One may gather
something to the point from the Irish story where the
divinity of the well is offended because a woman has
gazed into its depths, and here probably, as already
suggested (p. 392), we come across an ancient tabu
directed against women, which may have applied only
to certain wells of peculiarly sacred character. It
serves, however, to suggest that the divinities of the

mountain known as the Frenni Fawr, in the north-east of Pembrokeshire ;
the names mean respectively the Little Brent, and the Great Breni. The
obsolete word breni meant, in Old Welsh, the prow of a ship ; local habit
tends, however, to the solecism of Brenin Fawr, with brenin, ' king,' qualified
by an adjective mutated feminine ; but people at a distance who call it
Frenni Fawr, pronounce the former vocable with nn. Lastly, Y Vrevi Va6r
occurs in Maxen's Dream in the Red Book (Oxford Mab. p. 89) ; but in the
White Book (in the Peniarth collection), col. 187, the proper name is written
Freni : for this information I have to thank Mr, Gwenogvryn Evans.

426

CELTIC FOLKLORE

[CH.

water-world were not disinclined to seize every oppor-
tunity of extending their domain on the earth's surface ;
and I am persuaded that this was once a universal creed
of some race or other in possession of these islands.
Besides the Irish legends already mentioned (pp. 382,
384) of the formation of Lough Neagh, Lough Ree, and
others, witness the legendary annals of early Ireland,
which, by the side of battles, the clearing of forests, and
the construction of causeways, mention the bursting
forth of lakes and rivers ; that is to say, the formation
or the coming into existence, or else the serious expan-
sion, of certain of the actual waters of the country. For
the present purpose the details given by 77?^ Four
Masters are sufficient, and I have hurriedly counted
their instances as follows : —

Anno

3 MUNDI 2532,

number of the lakes formec

, 2

2533,

,, ,, lakes

2535,

,, ,, lakes

2545,

„ ,, lakes

2546,

,, ,, lakes

2859,

„ ,, lakes

„ 2860,

„ „ lakes

3503,

,, ,, rivers

21.

3506,

,, „ lakes

3510,

,, ,, rivers

., 3520,

„ „ rivers

« 3581,

,, „ lakes

3656,

,, ,, rivers

» 3751,

„ „ lakes

» )>

,, „ rivers

» 3790,

„ ,, lakes

4169,

„ „ rivers

.. 4694,

,, ,, lakes

This makes an aggregate of thirty-five lakes and
forty-six rivers, that is to say a total of eighty-one erup-
tions. But I ought, perhaps, to explain that under the
head of lakes I have included not only separate pieces
of water, but also six inlets of the sea, such as Strang-
ford Lough and the like. Still more to the point is it

VI i] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 427

to mention that of the lakes two are said to have burst
forth at the digging of graves. Thus, a.m. 2535, The Four
Masters have the following : ' Laighlinne, son of Par-
thalon, died in this year. When his grave was dug, Loch
Laighlinne sprang forth in Ui Mac Uais, and from him
it is named \' O'Donovan, the editor and translator of
The Four Masters, supposes it to be somewhere to the
south-west of Tara, in Meath. Similarly, a.m. 4694, they
say of a certain Melghe Molbthach, ' When his grave
was digging, Loch Melghe burst forth over the land in
Cairbre, so that it was named from him.' This is said
to be now called Lough Melvin, on the confines of the
counties of Donegal, Leitrim, and Fermanagh. These
two instances are mentioned by The Four Masters ; and
here is one given by Stokes in the Rennes Dindsenchas:
see the Revue Celtique, xv. 428-9. It has to do with
Loch Garman, as Wexford Harbour was called in Irish,
and it runs thus : ' Loch Carman, whence is it ? Easy
to say. Garman Glas, son of Dega, was buried there,
and when his grave was dug then the lake burst
throughout the land. Whence Loch Garman.' It
matters not here that there are alternative accounts of
the name.

The meaning of all this seems to be that cutting
the green sward or disturbing the earth beneath was
believed in certain cases to give offence to some under-
ground divinity or other connected with the world of
waters. That divinity avenged the annoyance or
offence given him by causing water to burst forth
and form a lake forthwith. The nearness of such
divinities to the surface seems not a little remarkable,

' It is right to say that another account is given in the Rennes Dindsenchas,
published by Stokes in the Revue Celtique, xvi. 164, namely, that Laiglinne
with fifty warriors ' came to the well of Dera son of Scera. A wave burst
over them and drowned Laiglinne with his fifty warriors, and thereof a lake
was made. Hence we say Loch Laiglinni, Laiglinne's Lake.'

428 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

and it is shown not only in the folklore which has been
preserved for us by The Four Masters, but also by the
usual kind of story about a neglected well door. These
remarks suggest the question whether it was not one of
the notions which determined surface burials, that is,
burials in which no cutting of the ground took place,
the cists or chambers and the bodies placed in them
being covered over by the heaping on of earth
or stones brought from a more or less convenient
distance. It might perhaps be said that all this
only implied individuals of a character to desecrate the
ground and call forth the displeasure of the divinities
concerned ; and for that suggestion folklore parallels,
it is true, could be adduced. But it is hardly adequate :
the facts seem to indicate a more general objection on
the part of the powers in point ; and they remind one
rather of the clause said to be inserted in mining leases
in China with the object, if one may trust the news-
papers, of preventing shafts from being sunk below a
certain depth, for fear of offending the susceptibihties
of the demons or dragons ruling underground.

It is interesting to note the fact, that Celtic folklore
connects the underground divinities intimately with
water; for one may briefly say that they have access
wherever water can take them. With this qualifica-
tion the belief may be said to have lingered lately in
Wales, for instance, in connexion with ILyn Barfog,
near Aberdovey. ' It is believed to be very perilous,'
Mr. Pughe says, p. 142 above, ' to let the waters out of
the lake ' ; and not long before he wrote, in 1853, an aged
inhabitant of the district informed him ' that she recol-
lected this being done during a period of long drought,
in order to procure motive power for ILyn Pair Mill,
and that long-continued heavy rains followed.' Then
we have the story related to Mr. Reynolds as to ILyn y

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 429

Fan Fach, how there emerged from the water a huge
hairy fellow of hideous aspect, who stormed at the dis-
turbers of his peace, and uttered the threat that unless
they left him alone in his own place he would drown
a whole town. Thus the power of the water spirit is
represented as equal to producing excessive wet weather
and destructive floods. He is in all probability not to
be dissociated from the afanc in the Conwy story which'
has already been given (pp. 130-3). Now the local
belief is that the reason why the afanc had to be dragged
out of the river was that he caused floods in the river
and made it impossible for people to cross on their way
to market at ILanrwst. Some such a local legend has
been generalized into a sort of universal flood story in
the late Triad, iii. 97, as follows :— ' Three masterpieces
of the Isle of Prydain : the Ship of Nefyd Naf Neifion,
that carried in her male and female of every kind when
the Lake of ILion burst ; and Hu the Mighty's Ychen
Bannog dragging the afanc of the lake to land, so that
the lake burst no more; and the Stones of Gwydon
Ganhebon, on which one read all the arts and sciences
of the world.' A story similar to the Conwy one, but no
longer to be got so complete, as far as I know, seems to
have been current in various parts of the Principality,
especially around ILyn Syfadon and on the banks of
the Anglesey pool called ILyn yr Wyth Eidion, * the
Pool of the Eight Oxen/ for so many is Hu represented
here as requiring in dealing with the Anglesey afanc.
According to Mr. Pughe of Aberdovey, the same feat
was performed at ILyn Barfog, not, however, by Hu
and his oxen, but by Arthur and his horse. To be
more exact the task may be here considered as done
by Arthur superseding Hu : see p. 142 above. That,
however, is of no consequence here, and I return to
the afanc : the Fan Fach legend told to Mr. Reynolds

430 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

makes the lake ruler huge and hairy, hideous and
rough-spoken, but he expresses himself in human
speech, in fact in two lines of doggerel: see p. 19
above. On the other hand, the ILyn Cwm ILwch story,
which puts the same doggerel, p. 21, into the mouth of
the threatening figure in red who sits in a chair on the
face of that lake, suggests nothing abnormal about his
personal appearance. Then as to the Conwy afanc, he
is very heavy, it is true, but he also speaks the language
of the country. He is lured, be it noticed, out of his
home in the lake by the attractions of a young woman,
who lets him rest his head in her lap and fall asleep.
When he wakes to find himself in chains he takes a
cruel revenge on her. But with infinite toil and labour
he is dragged beyond the Conwy watershed into one of
the highest tarns on Snowdon ; for there is here no
question of killing him, but only of removing him where
he cannot harm the people of the Conwy Valley. It is
true that the story of Peredur represents that knight
cutting an afanc's head off, but so much the worse
for the compiler of that romance, as we have doubtless
in the afanc some kind of a deathless being. However,
the description which the Peredur story gives ^ of him
is interesting : he lives in a cave at the door of which is
a stone pillar: he sees everybody that comes without
anybody seeing him; and from behind the pillar he
kills all comers with a poisoned spear.

Hitherto we have the afanc described mostly from
a hostile point of view: let us change our position,
which some of the stories already given enable us to
do. Take for instance the first of the whole series,
where it describes, p. 7, the Fan Fach youth's despair
when the lake damsel, whose love he had gained,
suddenly dived to fetch her father and her sister.

' The Oxford Mabinogion, p. 224, and Guest's, i. 343.

VII] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 431

There emerged, it says, out of the lake two most
beautiful ladies, accompanied by a hoary-headed man
of noble mien and extraordinary stature, but having
otherwise all the force and strength of youth. This
hoary-headed man of noble mien owned herds of cattle
and flocks of sheep, a number of which were allowed
to come out of the lake to form his daughter's dowry,
as the narrative goes on to show. In the story of ILyn
Du'r Ardu, p. 32, he has a consort who appears with
him to join in giving the parental sanction to the marriage
which their daughter was about to make with the
Snowdon shepherd. In neither of these stories has
this extraordinary figure any name given him, and it
appears prima facie probable that the term afanc is
rather one of abuse in harmony with the unlovely
description of him supplied by the other stories. But
neither in them does the term yr afanc suit the monster
meant, for there can be no doubt that in the word afanc
we have the etymological equivalent of the Irish word
ahacc^ *a dwarf; and till further light is shed on these
words one may assume that at one time afanc also
meant a dwarf or pigmy in Welsh. In modern Welsh
it has been regarded as meaning a beaver, but as that
was too small an animal to suit the popular stories,
the word has been also gravely treated as meaning a
crocodile ^ : this is in the teeth of the unanimous
treatment of him as anthropomorphic in the legends
in point. If one is to abide by the meaning dwarf
or pigmy, one is bound to regard afanc as one of
the terms originally applied to the fairies in their
more unlovely aspects : compare the use of crimbil,
p. 263. Here may also be mentioned pcgor, ' a dwarf

' See Afanc in the Geiriadur of Silvan Evans, who cites instances in
point.

432

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

or pigmy,' which occurs in the Book of Taliessin, poem
vii. (p. 135) :—

GogSn py pegor I know what (sort of) pigmy

yssyd ydatt vor. There is beneath the sea.

Gogwtt eu heissor I know their kind,

pa6b yny oscord. Each in his troop.

Also the following lines in the twelfth-century manu-
script of the Black Book of Carmarthen : see Evans'
autotype facsimile, fo. 9*' : —

Ar gnyuer pegor And every dwarf

y ssit y dan mor. There is beneath the sea,

Ar gnyuer edeinauc And every winged thing

aoruc kynocthauc. The Mighty One hath made,

Ac vei. vet. pattp. And were there to each

tri irychant tauatid Thrice three hundred tongues —

Nyellynt ve traethaud. They could not relate

kyuoetheu \_y] trindaud The powers of the Trinity.

I should rather suppose, then, that the pigmies in the
water-world were believed to consist of many grades
or classes, and to be innumerable like the Luchorpain
of Irish legend, which were likewise regarded as diminu-
tive. With the Luchorpain were also associated^
Fomort or Fomoratg [modern Irish spelling Fomhoraigh),
and Goborchinn, ' Horse-heads.' The etymology of the
word Fomori has been indicated at p. 286 above, but
Irish legendary history has long associated it with muir,
* sea,' genitive mara, Welsh mor, and it has gone so far
as to see in them, as there suggested, not submarine
but transmarine enemies and invaders of Ireland. So
the singular fomor, now written fomhor, is treated in
O'Reilly's Irish Dictionary as meaning 'a pirate, a sea
robber, a giant,' while in Highland Gaelic, where it is
written fomhair or famhair, it is regularly used as the
word for giant. The Manx Gaelic corresponding to
Irish fomor and its derivative fomorach, is foawr, ' a
giant,' and foawragh, 'gigantic,' but also 'a pirate.'

' See the Revue Celtique, i. 257, and my Hibbert Lectures, pp. 92-3.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 433

I remember hearing, however, years ago, a mention
made of the Fomhoraigh, which, without conveying any
definite allusion to their stature, associated them with
subterranean places : — An undergraduate from the
neighbourhood of Killorglin, in Kerry, happened to
relate in my hearing, how, when he was exploring some
underground rdths near his home, he was warned by
his father's workmen to beware of the Fomhoraigh.
But on the borders of the counties of Mayo and Sligo I
have found the word used as in the Scottish Highlands,
namely, in the sense of giants, while Dr. Douglas Hyde
and others inform me that the Giant's Causeway is
called in Irish Clochdn na hh-Fomhorach.

The Goborchinns or Horse-heads have also an interest,
not only in connexion with the Fomori, as when we
read of a king of the latter called Eocha Eachcheann \
or Eochy Horse-head, but also as a link between the
Welsh afanc and the Highland water-horse, of whom
Campbell has a good deal to say in his Popular Tales of
the West Highlands. See more especially iv. 337, where
he remarks among other things, that ' the water-horse
assumes many shapes ; he often appears as a man,' he
adds, ' and sometimes as a large bird.' A page or two
earlier he gives a story which illustrates the statement,
at the same time that it vividly reminds one of that
part of the Conwy legend which (p. 130) represents the
afanc resting his head on the lap of the damsel forming
one of the dramatis personce. Here follows Campbell's
own story, omitting all about a marvellous bull, however,
that was in the end to checkmate the water-horse : —

'A long time after these things a servant girl went
with the farmer's herd of cattle to graze them at the side
of a loch, and she sat herself down near the bank.
There, in a little while, what should she see walking

' The Four Masters, a. m. 3530.

RHYS F f

434 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

towards her but a man, who asked her to fasg his hair
[Welsh iteua]. She said she was wilhng enough to do
him that service, and so he laid his head on her knee,
and she began to array his locks, as Neapolitan damsels
also do by their swains. But soon she got a great
fright, for growing amongst the man's hair, she found
a great quantity of liobhagach an locha, a certain slimy
green weed ^ that abounds in such lochs, fresh, salt, and
brackish. The girl knew that if she screamed there
was an end of her, so she kept her terror to herself, and
worked away till the man fell asleep as he was with his
head on her knee. Then she untied her apron strings,
and slid the apron quietly on to the ground with its
burden upon it, and then she took her feet home as fast
as it was in her heart 2. Now when she was getting
near the houses, she gave a glance behind her, and
there she saw her caraid (friend) coming after her in the
likeness of a horse.'

The equine form belongs also more or less constantly
to the kelpie of the Lowlands of Scotland and of the
Isle of Man, where we have him in the glashtyn, whose
amorous propensities are represented as more repulsive
than what appears in Welsh or Irish legend : see p. 289
above, and the Lioar Manninagh for 1897, p. 139.
Perhaps in Man and the Highlands the horsy nature of
this being has been reinforced by the influence of the
Norse Nykr^ a Northern Proteus or old Nick^ who takes
many forms, but with a decided preference for that of
* a gray water-horse ' : see Vigfusson's Icelandic- English
Dictionary. But the idea of associating the equine form
with the water divinity is by no means confined to the
Irish and the Northern nations : witness the Greek

' In another version Campbell had found it to be sand and nothing else.
' As to this incident of a girl and a supernatural, Campbell says that he
had heard it in the Isle of Man also, and elsewhere.

vTi] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 435

legend of the horse being of Poseidon's own creation,
and the beast whose form he sometimes assumed.

It is in this sort of a notion of a water-horse one is
probably to look for the key to the riddle of such con-
ceptions as that of March ab Meirchion, the king with
horse's ears, and the corresponding Irish figure of
Labraid Lore ^ In both of these the brute peculiarities
are reduced almost to a minimum : both are human in
form save their ears alone. The name Labraid Lore is
distinct enough from the Welsh March, but under this
latter name one detects traces of him with the horse's
ears in Wales, Cornwall, and Brittany I We have also
probably the same name in the More of Irish legend :
at any rate More, Mare, or Margg, seems to be the
same name as the Welsh Mareh, which is no other
word than mareh, 'a. steed or charger.' Now the Irish
More is not stated to have had horse's ears, but he and
another called Conaing are represented in the legendary
history of early Erin as the naval leaders of the Fomori,
a sort of position which would seem to fit the Brythonic
March also were he to be treated in earnest as an his-
torical character. But short of that another treatment
may be suspected of having been actually dealt out to
him, namely, that of resolving the water-horse into a
horse and his master. Of this we seem to have two
instances in the course of the story of the formation of
Lough Neagh in the Book of the Dun Cow, fo. 39-41 :—
There was once a good king named Maired reigning
over Munster, and he had two sons, Eochaid and Rib.

^ See the Revue Celttque, ii. 197. He was also called Labraid Longsech, and
Labraid Longsech Lore. The explanation of Labraid Lore is possibly that it
was originally Labraid More, and that the fondness for alliteration brought
it into line as Labraid Lore : compare E^M ILaweraint in Welsh for Niid^
ILaweraint. This is not disproved by the fact that Labraid Lores grand-
father is said to have been called Loegaire Lore: Loegaire Lore and Labraid
Lore are rather to be regarded perhaps as duplicates of the same original.

^ See my Arthurian Legend, p. 70; also Hibbert Lectures, p. 590.

F f 2

436 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

He married a wife named Ebliu (genitive Eblinde), who
fell in love with her stepson, Eochaid. The two brothers
make up their minds to leave their father and to take
Ebliu with them, together with all that was theirs, includ-
ing in all a thousand men. They proceed northwards,
but their druids persuade them that they cannot settle
down in the same district, so Rib goes westwards to
a plain known as Tir Chichi Midir acus Maic Oic, ' the
Play-ground of Mider and the Mac 6c,' so called after
the two great fairy chiefs of Ireland. Mider visits
Rib's camp and kills their horses, then he gives them
a big horse of his own ready harnessed with a pack-
saddle. They had to put all their baggage on the big
horse's back and go away, but after a while the nag lay
down and a well of water formed there, which eventu-
ally burst forth, drowning them all : this is Loch Ri,
' Rib's Loch, or Lough Ree,' on the Shannon. Eochaid,
the other brother, went with his party to the banks of
the Boyne near the Brug, where the fairy chief Mac
Oc or Mac ind Oc had his residence : he destroyed
Eochaid's horses the first night, and the next day he
threatened to destroy the men themselves unless they
went away. Thereupon Eochaid said that they could
not travel without horses, so the Mac Oc gave them
a big horse, on whose back they placed all they had.
The Mac Oc warned them not to unload the nag on the
way, and not to let him halt lest he should be their
death. However, when they had reached the middle
of Ulster, they thoughtlessly took all their property off
the horse's back, and nobody bethought him of turning
the animal's head back in the direction from which they
had come : so he also made a well ^ Over that well

' The original has in these passages respectively sei/rt/s afual corbo Ihipra,
' minxit urinam suam so that it was a spring' ; ar na siblad afual ar na bad
fochond bdis doib, ' ne mingat urinam suam lest it should be the cause of

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 437

Eochaid had a house built, and a lid put on the well,
which he set a woman to guard. In the sequel she
neglected it, and the well burst forth and formed Lough
Neagh, as already mentioned, p. 382 above. What
became of the big horses in these stories one is not
told, but most likely they were originally represented
as vanishing in a spring of water where each of them
stood. Compare the account of Undine at her un-
faithful husband's funeral. In the procession she mys-
teriously appeared as a snow-white figure deeply veiled,
but when one rose from kneeling at the grave, where
she had knelt nought was to be seen save a little silver
spring of limpid water bubbling out of the turf and
trickling on to surround the new grave : — Da man sich
aber wieder erhob, war die weisse Fremde verschwundeti ;
an der Stelle, wo sie geknieet hatte, quoll ein silherhelles
Brunnlein aus dem Rasen ; das rieselte und rieselte fort,
bis es den Grabhiigel des RitteKs fast ganz umzogen hatte;
dann rann esfurder und ergoss sich in einen Weiher, der
zur Seite des Gottesackers lag.

The late and grotesque story of the Gilla Decair may
be mentioned next : he was one of the Fomorach, and
had a wonderful kind of horse on whose back most of
Finn's chief warriors were induced to mount. Then
the Gilla Decair and his horse hurried towards Corka-
guiny, in Kerry, and took to the sea, for he and his horse
travelled equally well on sea and land. Thus Finn's
men, unable to dismount, were carried prisoners to an
island not named, on which Dermot in quest of them
afterwards landed, and from which, after great perils, he
made his way to Tir fo Thuinn, * Terra sub Unda,' and
brought his friends back to Erin \ Now the number

death to them' ; and silis, ' minxit,' fo. 39b. For a translation of the whole
story see Dr. O'Grady's Silva Gadelica, pp. 265-9 J also Joyce's Old CeUic
Romances, pp. 97-105.

' See the story in Dr. O'Grady's Silva Gadelica, pp. 292-311.

438 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

of Finn's men taken away by force by the Gilla Decair
was fifteen, fourteen on the back of his horse and one
clutching to the animal's tail, and the Welsh Triads, i.
93=^ ii. II, seem to re-echo some similar story, but they
give the number of persons not as fifteen but just one
half, and describe the horse as Du (y) Moroed, 'the
Black of (the) Seas,' steed of Elidyr Mwynfawr, that
carried seven human beings and a half from Pen ILech
Elidyr in the North to Pen ILech EHdyr in Mon,
'Anglesey.' It is explained that Du carried seven on
his back, and that one who swam with his hands on
that horse's crupper was reckoned the half man in this
case. Du Moroed is in the story of Kulhwch and Olwen
called Du March Moro, ' Black the Steed of Moro,' the
horse ridden in the hunt of Twrch Trwyth by Gwyn ab
Nud, king of the other world; and he appears as a
knight with his name unmistakably rendered into Brun
de Morois in the romance of Durmart le Galois, who
carries away Arthur's queen on his horse to his castle
in Morois ^ Lastly, here also might be mentioned the
incident in the story of Peredur or Perceval, which
relates how to that knight, when he was in the middle
of a forest much distressed for the want of a horse,
a lady brought a fine steed as black as a blackberry.
He mounted and he found his beast marvellously swift,
but on his making straight for a vast river the knight
made the sign of the cross, whereupon he was left on
the ground, and his horse plunged into the water, which
his touch seemed to set ablaze. The horse is interpreted
to have been the devil ^, and this is a fair specimen of
the way in which Celtic paganism is treated by the

' See Stengel's edition of U Romans de Durmart le Galois (Tubingen,
1873), lines 4185-340, and my Arthurian Legend, pp. 68-9.

^ See Williams' Seint Great, pp. 60-1, 474-5 ; Nutt's Holy Grail, p. 44 ;
and my Arthurian Legend, pp. 69-70.

vn] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 439

Grail writers when they feel in the humour to assume
an edifying attitude.

If one is right in setting Mon, * Anglesey,' over against
the anonymous isle to which the Gilla Decair hurries
Finn's men away, Anglesey would have to be treated as
having once been considered one of the Islands of the
Dead and the home of Other-world inhabitants. We
have a trace of this in a couplet in a poem by the
medieval poet, Dafydab Gwilym, who makes Blodeuwed
the Owl give a bit of her history as follows : —

Merch i arglwyd, ail Meirchion, Daughter to a lord, son of Meirchion,
Wyf i, myn Dewi ! o Fon '. Am I, by St. David ! from Mona.

This, it will be seen, connects March ab Meirchion, as
it were 'Steed son of Steeding,' with the Isle of Anglesey,
Add to this that the Irish for Anglesey or Mona was
Mdin Conaing, ' Conaing's Swamp,' so called apparently
after Conaing associated with More, a name which is
practically March in Welsh. Both were leaders of the
Fomori in Irish tales : see my Arthurian Legend, p. 356.
On the great place given to islands in Celtic legend
and myth it is needless here to expatiate : witness

* Barioniaeth D. ab Gwilym, poem 183. A similar descent of Blodeuwed's
appears implied in the following englyn — one of two — by Anthonj' Powel,
who died in 1618 : it is given by Taliesin ab lolo in his essay on the Neath
Valley, entitled Traethawd ar Gywreined, Hynafiaeth, a hen Bendefigion Glynn
AVff (Aberdare, 1886), p. 15 : —

Crug ael, cam gadam a godwyd yn fryn,

Yn hen fraenwaith bochlwyd;
Main at ti'ud man y iiadwyd,

Merch hoewen loer Meirchion Iwyd.
It refers, with six other englynion by other authors, to a remarkable rock
called Craig y ©inas, with which Taliesin associated a cave where Arthur
or Owen Lawgoch and his men are supposed, according to him, to enjoy a
secular sleep, and it implies that Blodeuwed", whose end in the Mabinogi
of Math was to be converted into an owl, was, according to another account,
overwhelmed by Craig y ©inas. It may be Englished somewhat as follows :
Heaped on a brow, a mighty cairn built like a hill,
Like ancient work rough with age, grey-cheeked ;
Stones that confine her where she was slain.
Grey Meirchion's daughter quick and bright as the moon.

440

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Brittia, to which Procopius describes the souls of the
departed being shipped from the shores of the Continent,
the Isle of Avallon in the Romances, that of Gwales
in the Mabmogion, Ynys Enlti or Bardsey, in which
Merlin and his retinue enter the Glass House \ and
the island of which we read in the pages of Plutarch, that
it contains Cronus held in the bonds of perennial sleep '-.
Let us return to the more anthropomorphic figure of
the afanc, and take as his more favoured representative
the virile personage described emerging from the Fan
Fach Lake to give his sanction to the marriage of his
daughter with the Mydfai shepherd. It is probable
that a divinity of the same order belonged to every
other lake of any considerable dimensions in the
country. But it will be remembered that in the case
of the story of ILyn Du'r Ardu two parents appeared
with the lake maiden — her father and her mother — and
we may suppose that they were divinities of the water-
world. The same thing also may be inferred from the
late Triad, iii. 13, which speaks of the bursting of the
lake of ILion, causing all the lands to be inundated so
that all the human race was drowned except Dwyfan
and Dwyfach, who escaped in a mastless ship : it was
from them that the island of Prydain was repeopled,
A similar Triad, iii. 97, but evidently of a different
origin, has already been mentioned as speaking of the
Ship of Nefyd Naf Neifion, that carried in it a male
and female of every kind when the lake of ILi'on burst.
This later Triad evidently supplies what had been for-
gotten in the previous one, namely, a pair of each kind
of animal life, and not of mankind alone. But from the

^ This comes from the late series of Triads, iii. lo, where Merlin's nine
companions are called uaw beird cylfeird : cylfeird should be the plural of
cylfard^ which must be the same word as the Irish ailbard, name of one
of the bardic grades in Ireland.

^ For some more remarks on this subject generally, see my Arthurian
Legend, chapter xv, on the ' Isles of the Dead.'

vn] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 441

names Dwyfan and Dwyfach I infer that the writer of
Triad iii. 13 has developed his universal deluge on the
basis of the scriptural account of it, for those names
belonged in all probability to wells and rivers : in other
terms, they were the names of water divinities. At any
rate there seems to be some evidence that two springs,
whose waters flow into Bala Lake, were at one time
called Dwyfan and Dwyfach, these names being borne
both by the springs themselves and the rivers flowing
from them. The Dwyfan and the Dwyfach were
regarded as uniting in the lake, while the water on
its issuing from the lake is called Dyfrdwy. Now
Dyfrdwy stands for an older Dyfr-dwyf, which in Old
Welsh was Dttbr diiiu, * the water of the divinity.' One
of the names of that divinity was Donwy, standing for
an early form Damivios or Damivia, according as it was
masculine or feminine. In either case it was practically
the same name as that of the Danube or Danuvios,
derived from a word which is represented in Irish by
the adjective ddna, 'audax, fortis, intrepidus.' The Dee
has in Welsh poetry still another name, Aerfen, which
seems to mean a martial goddess or the spirit of the
battlefield, which is corroborated and explained by
Giraldus^, who represents the river as the accredited
arbiter of the fortunes of the wars in its country between
the Welsh and the English. The name Dyfrdonwy
occurs in a poem by ILywarch Brydyd y Moch, a poet
who flourished towards the end of the twelfth century,
as follows ^ : —

Nid kywiw ^ a tiwfyr dwfyr dyfyr- With a coward Dyfrdonwy water ill

donwy agrees :

Kereist oth uebyd gwryd garwy. From thy boyhood hast thou loved

Garwy's valour.

' See his Itinerarium Kambrice, ii. ii (p. 139); also my Celtic Britain,
p. 68, and Arthurian Legend, p. 364.

^ From the Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales, i. 302.

^ I regard nid kywiw as a corruption of ni chywiw from cyf-yw, an instance

44^ CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

The prince praised was DLywelyn ab lorwerth, whom
the poet seems to identify here with the Dee, and it
looks as if the water of the Dee formed some sort of a
test which no coward could face : compare the case of
the discreet cauldron that would not boil meat for a
coward '.

The dwy, dwyf^ duiu^ of the river's Welsh name repre-
sent an early form deva or deiva, whence the Romans
called their station on its banks Deva, possibly as a
shortening of ad Devam ; but that Deva should have
simply and directly meant the river is rendered
probable by the fact that Ptolemy elsewhere gives
it as the name of the northern Dee, which enters the
sea near Aberdeen. From the same stem were formed
the names Dwyf-an and Dwyf-ach, which are treated in
the Triads as masculine and feminine respectively. In
its course the Welsh Dee receives a river Ceirw not
far above Corwen, and that river flows through farms
called Ar-dwyfan and Hendre' Ar-dwyfan, and adjoining
Ardwyfan is another farm called Foty Ardwyfan,
' Shielings of Ardwyfan/ while Hendre' Ardwyfan
means the old stead or winter abode of Ardwyfan.
Ardwyfan itself would seem to mean 'On Dwyfan,'
and Hendre' Ardwyfan, which may be supposed the
original homestead, stands near a burn which flows
into the Ceirw. That burn I should suppose to have
been the Dwyfan, and perhaps the name extended to the
Ceirw itself; but Dwyfan is not now known as the name

of the verb corresponding to cymod ( — cym-bod), ' peace, conciliation.' The
preterite has, in the Oxford Bntts, a. d. 1217 (p. 358), been printed kynm
for what one may read kymu : the words would then be y kymu reinald y
breSys ar brenhin, * that Reginald de Breos was reconciled with the king, or
settled matters with him.'

' See the ZJoo^q/'Jrtfessni, poem XXX, inS^Qne's Four Ancieiit Books, ii.i8i ;
also Guest's Mabinogion, ii. 354, and the Brython for i860, p. 372'', where
more than one article of similar capacity of distinguishing brave men from
cowards is mentioned.

vn] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 443

of any stream in the neighbourhood. Elsewhere we have
two rivers called Dwyfor or Dwyfawr and Dwyfach,
which unite a little below the village of ILan Ystumdwy ;
and from there to the sea, the stream is called Dwyfor,
the mouth of which is between Criccieth and Afon Wen,
in Carnarvonshire. Ystumdwy, commonly corrupted
into Stindwy, seems to mean Ystum-dwy, ' the bend of the
Dwy ' ; so that here also we have Dwyfach and Dwy,
as in the case of the Dee. Possibly Dwyfor was
previously called simply Dwy or even Dwyfan ; but
it is now explained as Dwy-fawr, ' great Dwy,' which
was most likely suggested by Dwyfach, as this latter
explains itself to the country people as Dwy-fach,
'little Dwy.' However, it is but right to say that in
ILywelyn ab Gruffyd's grant of lands to the monks
of Aber Conwy they seem to be called Dwyuech and
Dwyuaur ^

All these waters have in common the reputation of
being liable to sudden and dangerous floods, especially
the Dwyfor, which drains Cwm Strattyn and its lake
lying behind the great rocky barrier on the left as one
goes from Tremadoc towards Aber Glaslyn Bridge.
Still more so is this the case with the Dee and Bala
Lake, which is wont to rise at times from seven to nine
feet above its ordinary level. The inundation which
then invades the valley from Bala down presents a sight
more magnificent than comfortable to contemplate. In
fact nothing could have been more natural than for the
story elaborated by the writer of certain of the late
Triads to have connected the most remarkable inunda-
tions with the largest piece of water in the Principality,
and one liable to such sudden changes of level : in
other words, that one should treat ILyn ILion as merely

' See Dugdale's Monasticon, v. 672, where they are printed Dwyncch and
Dwynaur respectively.

444 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

one of the names of Bala Lake, now called in Welsh
ILyn Tegid, and formerly sometimes IL}^ Aerfen.

While touching at p. 286 on Gwaen ILifon with its
ILyn Pencraig as one of those claiming to be the ILyn
ILi'on of the Triads, it was hinted that Lion was but a
thinner form oiE^ifon. Here one might mention perhaps
another ILifon, for which, however, no case could be
made. I allude to the name of the residence of the
Wynns descended from Gilmin Troeddu, namely, Glyn
ILifon, which means the river ILifon's Glen; but one
could not feel surprised if the neighbouring ILyfni,
draining the lakes of Nanttte, should prove to have once
been also known as a ILifon, with the Nanttte waters
conforming by being called ILyn ILifon. But however
that may be, one may say as to the flood caused by
the bursting of any such lake, that the notion of the
universaHty of the catastrophe was probably contributed
by the author of Triad iii. 13, from a non-Welsh
source. He may have, however, not invented the
vessel in which he places Dwyfan and Dwyfach : at
all events, one version of the story of the Fan Fach
represents the Lake Lady arriving in a boat. As to the
writer of the other Triad, iii. 97, he says nothing about
Dwyfan and his wife, but borrows Nefyd Naf Neifion's
ship to save all that were to be saved ; and here one
may probably venture to identify iVr^^with Nemed^,
genitive Nemid, a name borne in Irish legend by a
rover who is represented as one of the early colonizers
of Erin. As to the rest, the name Neifion by itself is
used in Welsh for Neptune and the sea, as in the
following couplet of D. ab Gwilym's poem Iv :—

Nofiad a wnaeth hen Neifion It is old Neptune that has swam

O Drota fawr draw i Fon. From great Troy afar to Mona.

' See my Hibbert Lectures, pp. 649-50.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 445

In the same way Mor Neifion, * Sea of Neifion,' seems
to have signified the ocean, the high seas.

To return to the Triad about Dwyfan and Dwyfach,
not only does it make them from being water divinities
into a man and woman, but there is no certainty even
that both were not feminine. In modern Welsh all
rivers are treated as feminine, and even Dyfrdwyf has
usually to submit, though the modern bard Tegid,
analysing the word into Dwfr Dwyf, ' Water of the
Divinity or Divine Water,' where dw/r, 'water,' could
only be masculine, addressed ILyn Tegid thus, p. 78 :

Drwyot, er dydiaur Drywon, Through thee, from the days of the Druids,
Y rhwyf y Dyfrdwyf ei don. The Dwfr Dwyf impels his wave.

This question, however, of the gender of river names,
or rather the sex which personification ascribed them,
is a most difficult one. If we glance at Ptolemy's
Geography written in the second century, we find in
his account of the British Isles that he names more than
fifty of our river mouths and estuaries, and that he
divides their names almost equally into masculine and
feminine. The modern Welsh usage has, it is seen,
departed far from this, but not so far the folklore : the
afanc is a male, and we have a figure of the same sex
appearing as the father of the lake maiden in the Fan
Fach story, and in that of ILyn Du'r Ardu ; the same, too,
was the sex of the chief dweller of ILyn Cwm ILwch ;
the same remark is applicable also to the greatest
divinity of these islands— the greatest, at any rate, so far
as the scanty traces of his cult enable one to become
acquainted with him. As his name comes down into
legend it belongs here, as well as to the deities of
antiquity, just as much, in a sense, as the Dee. I refer
to Nudons or Nodons, the remains^ of whose sanctuary

' A full account of them will be found in a volume devoted to them, and
entitled Roman Antiquities at Lydncy Park, Gloucestershire , being a post-

446 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

were many years ago brought to light on a pleasant hill
in Lydney Park, on the western banks of the Severn.
In the mosaic floor of the god's temple there is a
coloured inscription showing the expense of that part
of the work to have been defrayed by the contributions
{ex stipibiis) of the faithful, and that it was carried out by
two men, of whom one appears to have been an officer
in command of a naval force guarding the coasts of the
Severn Sea. In the midst of the mosaic inscription is
a round opening in the floor of nine inches in diameter
and surrounded by a broad band of red enclosed in two
of blue. This has given rise to various speculations,
and among others that it was intended for libations.
The mosaics and the lettering of the inscriptions seem
to point to the third century as the time when the
sanctuary of Nudons was built under Roman auspices,
though the place was doubtless sacred to the god long
before. In any case it feH in exactly with the pohcy of
the more astute of Roman statesmen to encourage such
a native cult as we find traces of in Lydney Park.

One of the inscriptions began with D. M. Nodonti,
'to the great god Nudons,' and a httle bronze crescent
intended for the diadem of the god or of one of his
priests gives a representation of him as a crowned,
beardless personage driving a chariot with four horses ;
and on either side of him is a naked figure supposed to
represent the winds, and beyond them on each of the
two sides is a triton with the fore feet of a horse. The
god holds the reins in his left hand, and his right
uplifted grasps what may be a sceptre or possibly a
whip, while the whole equipment of the god recalls in

humous work of the Rev. W. Hiley Bathurst, with Notes by C. W. King,
London, 1879. See also an article entitled ' Das Heiligtum des Nodon,' by
Dr. Hiibner in the Jahrbiicher des Vereins von Alterthimtsfreunden im Rhein-
lande, Ixvii. pp. 29-46, where several things in Mr. King's book are
criticized.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 447

some measure the Chariot of the Sun. Another piece
of the bronze ornament shows another triton with an
anchor in one of his hands, and opposite him a fisher-
man in the act of hooking a fine salmon. Other things,
such as oars and shell trumpets, together with mosaic
representations of marine animals in the floor of the
temple, compel us to assimilate Nudons more closely
with Neptune than any other god of classical mythology.
The name of the god, as given in the inscriptions,
varies between Nudons and Nodens, the cases actually
occurring being the dative Nodonti, Nodenti, and Nu-
dente, and the genitive Nodentis, so I should regard o
or u as optional in the first syllable, and 0 as preferable,
perhaps, to e in the second, for there is no room for
reasonably doubting that we have here to do with the
same name as Irish Niiadu,gQmt\ve Nuadat, cons^icuoMs
in the legendary history of Ireland. Now the Nuadu
who naturally occurs to one first, was Nuadu Arget-
1am or Nuadu of the Silver Hand, from argaf, 'silver,
argentiun' and lam, ' hand.' Irish literature explains
how he came to have a hand made of silver, and we can
identify with him on Welsh ground a ILud ILawereint ;
for put back as it were into earlier Brythonic, this would
be Ludo{ns) Lam' -argentios : that is to say, a reversal
takes place in the order of the elements forming the
epithet out oiereint (for older ergeint), 'silvern, argenteus^
and ttaw, for earher lama, ' hand.' Then comes the alli-
terative instinct into play, forcing Nudo{ns) Ldmargen-
tio{s) to become Ludo{ns) Lamar gentio{s), whence the
later form, ILiid: ILawereint, derives regularly^ Thus we
have in Welsh the name ILiid, fashioned into that form
under the influence of the epithet, whereas elsewhere
jt is NuS, which occurs as a man's name in the pedi-
grees, while an intermediate form was probably Nudos

^ Se.e my Hibbeii Lectures, pp. 122, 125.

448 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

or Nudo, of which a genitive NVDI occurs in a post-
Roman inscription found near Yarrow Kirk in Selkirk-
shire. It is worthy of note that the modification of
Nudo into Liido must have taken place comparatively
early — not improbably while the language was still
Goidelic — as we seem to have a survival of the name
in that of Lydney itself.

It is very possible that we have Ludo, ILud, also in
Porthlud:, which Geoffrey of Monmouth gives, iii. 20, as
the Welsh for Ludesgata or Ludgate, in London, which
gate, according to him, was called after an ancient king
of Britain named Lud. He seems to have been using
an ancient tradition, and there would be nothing improb-
able in the conjecture that Geoffrey's Lud was our
ILud, and that the great water divinity of that name had
another sanctuary on the hill by the Thames, somewhere
near the present site of St. Paul's Cathedral, and occu-
pying a post as it were prophetic of Britain's rule of the
water-ways in later times.

Perhaps as one seems to find traces of Nudons
from the estuary of the Thames to that of the Severn
and thence to Ireland, one may conclude that the god
was one of the divinities worshipped by the Goidels.
With regard to the Brythonic Celts, there is nothing to
suggest that he belonged also to them except in the
sense of his having been probably adopted by them
from the Goidels. It might be further suggested that
the Goidels themselves had in the first instance adopted
him from the pre-Celtic natives, but in that case a god-
dess would have been rather more probable ^ In fact in
the case of the Severn we seem to have a trace of such
a goddess in the Sabrina, Old Welsh Habren, now
Hafren, so called after a princess whom Geoffrey, ii. 5,
represents drowned in the river: she may have been

' On this subject, see TJ,e Welsh People, especially pp. 54-61.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 449

the pre-Celtic goddess of the Severn, and the name
corresponding to Welsh Hafren occurs in Ireland in
the form of Sabrann, an old name of the river Lee that
flows through Cork. Similarly one now reads some-
times of Father Thames after the fashion of classic
phraseology, and in the Celtic period Nudons may have
been closely identified with that river, but the ancient
name Tamesa or Tamesis^ was decidedly feminine,
and it was, most likely, that of the river divinity from
times when the pre-Celtic natives held exclusive posses-
sion of these islands. On the whole it appears safer to
regard Nudons as belonging to a race that had developed
on a larger scale the idea of a patriarchal or kingly ruler
holding sway over a comparatively wide area. So
Nudons may here be treated as ruled out of the dis-
cussion as to the origin of the fairies, to which a few
paragraphs are now to be devoted.

Speaking of the rank and file of the fairies in rather
a promiscuous fashion, one may say that we have found
manifold proof of their close connexion with the water-
world. Not only have we found them supposed to
haunt places bordering on rivers, to live beneath the
lakes, or to inhabTt certain green isles capable of playing
hide-and-seek with the ancient mariner, and perhaps not
so very ancient either; but other considerations have
been suggested as also pointing unmistakably to the same
conclusion. Take for instance the indirect evidence

^ Why our dictionary makers have taken into their heads to treat it as
Tamesis I know not. The Welsh is Tafwys with a diphthong regularly
representing an earlier long e or ei in the second syllable. There is, as far
as I know, no reason to suppose Tafivys an invention, rather than a genuine
vocable of the same origin as the name of the Glamorganshire river Taff, in
Welsh Taf, which is also the name of the river emptying itself at Laugharne,
in Carmarthenshire. Tafwys, however, does not appear to occur in any old
Welsh document ; but no such weakness attaches to the testimony of the
French Tamise, which could hardly come from Tamesis : compare also the
place-name Tamise near the Scheldt in East Flanders ; this, however, may
be of a wholly different origin.

RHYS G g

450

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

afforded by the method of proceeding to recover an
infant stolen by the fairies. One account runs thus :
The mother who had lost her baby was to go with
a wizard and carry with her to a river the child left
her in exchange. The wizard would say, Crap ar y
wrach, ' Grip the hag,' and the woman would reply, Rhy
hwyr, gyfraglach, ' Too late, you urchin ^' Before she
uttered those words she had dropped the urchin into
the river, and she would then return to her house.
By that time the kidnapped child would be found to
have come back home^. The words here used have
not been quite forgotten in Carnarvonshire, but no
distinct meaning seems to be attached to them now ; at
any rate I have failed to find anybody who could explain
them. I should however guess that the wizard addressed
his words to the fairy urchin with the intention, pre-
sumably, that the fairies in the river should at the same
time hear and note what was about to be done. Another,
and a somewhat more intelligible version, is given in the
Gwyliedyd for 1837, p. 185, by a contributor who publishes
it from a manuscript which Lewis Morris began to write
in 1724 and finished apparently in 1729. He was a native
of Anglesey, and it is probably to that "county the story
belongs, which he gives to illustrate one of the phono-
logical aspects of certain kinds of Welsh. That account
differs from the one just cited in that it introduces no

* A more difficult version has been sent me by Dewi Glan Ffrydlas, of
Bethesda : Caffed y wrach, 'Let him seize the hag'; Methn'r cryfaglach,
' You have failed, urchin.' But he has not been able to get any explanation
of the words at the Penrhyn Quarries. Cryfaglach is also the form in Mur
y Cryfaglach, ' the Urchin's Wall,' in Jenkins' BedGelert, p. 249. He informs
me that this is the name of an old ruin on an elevated spot some twenty or
thirty yards from a swift brook, and not far in a south-south-easterly direction
from Sir Edward Watkin's chalet.

=" For this I am indebted to Mr. Wm. Davies (p. 147 above), who tells me
that he copied the original from Chwedlau a Thractodiadau Gwynect, ' Gwyned
Tales and Traditions,' published in a periodical, which I have not been able
to consult, called Y Gordofigion, for the year 1873.

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 451

wizard, but postulates two fairy urchins between whom
the dialogue occurs, which is not unusual in our change-
ling stories : see p. 62. After this explanation I trans-
late Morris' words thus : —

' But to return to the question of the words approach-
ing to the nature of the thing intended, there is an old
story current among us concerning a woman whose
children had been exchanged by the Tylwyth Teg.
Whether it is truth or falsehood does not much matter,
yet it shows what the men of that age thought concern-
ing the sound of words, and how they fancied that the
language of those sprites was of a ghastly and lumpy
kind. The story is as follows :— The woman whose two
children had been exchanged, chanced to overhear the
two fair heirs, whom she got instead of them, reasoning
with one another beyond what became their age and
persons. So she picked up the two sham children, one
under each arm, in order to go and throw them from
a bridge into a river, that they might be drowned as
she fancied. But hardly had the one in his fall reached
the bottom when he cried out to his comrade in the
following words : —

Grippiach greppiach Grippiach Greppiach,

Dal d'afel yn y wrach, Keep thy hold on the hag.

Hi aeth yn rhowyr 'faglach — It got too late, thou urchin —

Mi eis i ir mwthlach '.' I fell into the . . .

In spite of the obscurity of these words, it is quite clear
that it was thought the most natural thing in the world
to return the fairies to the river, and no sooner were

' The meaning of the word mwthlach is doubtful, as it is now current
in Gwyned" only in the sense of a soft, doughy, or puffy person who
is all of a heap, so to say. Pughe gives mwythlan and imvylhkn with
similar significations. But mwthlach would seem to have had some such
a meaning in the doggerel as that of rough ground or a place covered
with a scrubby, tangled growth. It is possibly the same word as the Irish
mothlach, ' rough, bushy, ragged, shaggy '; see the Vision of Laisre'n, edited
by Professor K. Meyer, in the Otia Mcrseiana, pp. 114, 117.

Gg2

452 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

they dropped there than the right infants were found to
have been sent home.

The same thing may be learned also from the story of
the Curse of Pantannas, pp. 187-8 above ; for when the
time of the fairies' revenge is approaching, the merry
party gathered together at Pantannas are frightened by
a piercing voice rising from a black and cauldron-like
pool in the river ; and after a while they hear it a second
time rising above the noise of the river as it cascades
over the shoulder of a neighbouring rock. Shortly
afterwards an ugly, diminutive woman appears on the
table near the window, and had it not been for the rude-
ness of one of those present she would have disclosed
the future to them, but, as it was, she said very little in
a vague way and went away offended ; but as long as
she was there the voice from the river was silent. Here
we have the Welsh counterpart of the ben side, pro-
nounced banshee in Anglo-Irish, and meaning a fairy
woman who is supposed to appear to certain Irish
families before deaths or other misfortunes about to
befall them. It is doubtless to some such fairy persons
the voices belong, which threaten vengeance on the
heir of Pantannas and on the wicked prince and his
descendants previous to the cataclysm which brings
a lake into the place of a doomed city : witness such
cases as those of ILynclys, Syfadon, and Kenfig.

The last mentioned deserves some further scrutiny ;
and I take this opportunity of referring the reader back
to pp. 403-4, in order to direct his attention to the fact
that the voice so closely identifies itself with the wronged
family that it speaks in the first person, as it cries, ' Ven-
geance is come on him who murdered my father of the
ninth generation ! ' Now it is worthy of remark that the
same personifying is also characteristic of the Cyhiraeth\

1 The account here given of the Cyhiraeth is taken partly from Choice

vii] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 453

This spectral female used to be oftener heard than seen ;
but her blood-freezing shriek was as a rule to be heard
when she came to a cross-road or to water, in which
she splashed with her hands. At the same time she
would make the most doleful noise and exclaim, in case
the frightened hearer happened to be a wife, Fy ngwr,
fy ngwr! ' my husband, my husband ! ' If it was the man
the exclamation would be, Fy ngwraig, fy ngwraig ! ' my
wife, my wife ! ' Or in either case it might be, Fy
mhlentyn, fy mhlenfyn, fy mhlentyn bach ! * my child, my
child, my little child ! ' These cries meant the approach-
ing death of the hearer's husband, wife, or child, as the
case might be ; but if the scream was inarticulate it was
reckoned probable that the hearer himself was the
person foremourned. Sometimes she was supposed to

Notes, pp. 31-2, and partly from Howells, pp. 31-4, 56-7, who appears to
have got uncertain in his narrative as to the sex of the Cyhiraeth ; but there
is no reason whatsoever for regarding it as either male or female — the latter
alone is warranted, as he might have gathered from her being called jy Gyhir-
aeth, 'the Cyhiraeth,' never ^ Cyhiraeth as far as I know. In North Car-
diganshire the spectre intended is known only by another name, that of
Gwrach y Rhibyn, but y Cyhiraeth or yr hen Cyhiraeth is a common term of
abuse applied to a lanky, cadaverous person, both there and in Gwynetf;
in books, however, it is found sometimes meaning a phantom funeral. The
word cyhiraeth would seem to have originally meant a skeleton with cyhyrau,
' sinews,' but no flesh. However, cyhyrau, singular cyhyr, would be more cor-
rectly written with an i\ for the words are pronounced — even in Gwyned" —
cyhir, cyhirau. The spelling cyhyraeth corresponds to no pronunciation I have
ever heard of the word ; but there is a third spelling, cyheuraeth, which
corresponds to an actual cyhoereth or cyhoyreth, the colloquial pronun-
ciation to be heard in parts of South Wales : I cannot account for this
variant. Cwrach y Rhibyn means the Hag of the Rhibyn, and rhibyn usually
means a row, streak, a line — ma' nhw'n myndyn un rhibyn, ' they are going
in a line.' But what exactly Cwrach y Rhibyn should connote I am unable
to say. I may mention, however, on the authority of Mr. Gwenogvryn
Evans, that in Mid-Cardiganshire the term Cwrach y Rhibyn means a long
roll or bustle of fern tied with ropes of straw and placed along the middle
of the top of a hayrick. This is to form a ridge over which and on which
the thatch is worked and supported : gwrach unqualified is, I am told,
used in this sense in Glamorganshire. Something about the Cwrach sprite
will be found in the Brython for i860, p. 23", while a different account is
given in Jenkins' Be^ Celert, pp. 80-1.

454 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

come, like the Irish banshee, in a dark mist to the
window of a person who has been long ailing, and to
flap her wings against the glass, while repeating aloud
his or her name, which was believed to mean that the
patient must die \ The picture usually given of the
Cyhiraeth is of the most repellent kind : tangled hair,
long black teeth, wretched, skinny, shrivelled arms of
unwonted length out of all proportion to the body.
Nevertheless it is, in my opinion, but another aspect of
the banshee-like female who intervenes in the story of
the Curse of Pantannas. One might perhaps treat both
as survivals of a belief in a sort of personification of, or
div^inity identified with, a family or tribe, but for the fact
that such language is emptied of most of its meaning by
the abstractions which it would connect with a primitive
state of society. So it is preferable, as coming probably
near the truth, to say that what we have here is a trace
of an ancestress. Such an idea of an ancestress as
against that of an ancestor is abundantly countenanced
by dim figures like that of the Don of the Mabinogion,
and of her counterpart, after whom the Tribes of the
goddess Donu or Danu ^ are known as Titatha De
Danann in Irish literature. But the one who most
provokes comparison is the Old Woman of Beare,
already mentioned, pp. 393-4: she figures largely in
Irish folklore as a hag surviving to see her descendants
reckoned by tribes and peoples. It may be only an
accident that a poetically wrought legend pictures her
not so much interested in the fortunes of her progeny
as engaged in bewailing the unattractive appearance of
her thin arms and shrivelled hands, together with the

' This statement I give from Choke Noks, p. 32 ; but I must confess that
1 am sceptical as to the 'wings of a leathery and bat-like substance/ or of
any other substance whatsoever.

' For more about her and similar ancestral personages, see The Welsh
People, pp. 54-61.

VII] TRIUMPHS OF THE WATER-WORLD 455

general wreck of the beauty which had been hers some
time or other centuries before.

However, the evidence of folklore is not of a kind
to warrant our building any heavy superstructure of
theory on the supposition, that the foundations are
firmly held together by a powerful sense of consistency
or homogeneity. So I should hesitate to do anything
so rash as to pronounce the fairies to be all of one and
the same origin : they may well be of several. For
instance, there may be those that have grown out of
traditions about an aboriginal pre-Celtic race, and some
may be the representatives of the ghosts of departed
men and women, regarded as one's ancestors ; but there
can hardly be any doubt that others, and those possibly
not the least interesting, have originated in the demons
and divinities — not all of ancestral origin — with which
the weird fancy of our remote forefathers peopled lakes
and streams, bays and creeks and estuaries. Perhaps
it is not too much to hope that the reader is convinced
that in the course of this chapter some interesting
specimens have, so to say, been caught in their native
element, or else in the enjoyment of an amphibious life
of mirth and frolic, largely spent hard by sequestered
lakes, near placid rivers or babbling brooks.

CHAPTER VIII

Welsh Cave Legends

•Ever fttvToi ix'iav thai vrjaov, ev p rov Kpovov KaetipxOai <ppovpovnevov vnci^
rov Bpiapicx) KaeevSovra' htap.ov yap avriS rov virvov tKixiixavrjaOai, ttoWovs bi
trepl avrdv thai Sai/xovas oiraSovs Kal OfpAnovTas. — Plutarch.

In previous chapters sundry allusions have been made
to treasure caves besides that of Marchlyn Mawr, which
has been given at length on pp. 234-7 above. Here
follow some more, illustrative of this kind of folklore
prevalent in Wales : they are difficult to classify, but
most of them mention treasure with or without sleeping
warriors guarding it. The others are so miscellaneous
as to bafQe any attempt to characterize them generally
and briefly. Take for instance a cave in the part of
Rhiwarth rock nearest to Cwm ILanhafan, in the neigh-
bourhood of ILangynog in Montgomeryshire. Into that,
according to Cyndelw in the Bryfhon for i860, p. 57,
some men penetrated as far as the pound of candles
lasted, with which they had provided themselves ; but
it appears to be tenanted by a hag who is always busily
washing clothes in a brass pan.

Or take the following, from J. H. Roberts' essay, as
given in Welsh in Edwards' Cymru for 1897, p. 190 : it
reminds one of an ordinary fairy tale, but it is not quite
like any other which I happen to know :— In the western
end of the Arennig Fawr there is a cave : in fact there

WELSH CAVE LEGENDS

457

are several caves there, and some of them are very large
too ; but there is one to which the finger of tradition
points as an ancient abode of the Tylwyth Teg.
About two generations ago, the shepherds of that
country used to be enchanted by one of them called
Mary, who was remarkable for her beauty. Many an
effort was made to catch her or to meet her face to face,
but without success, as she was too quick on her feet.
She used to show herself day after day, and she might
be seen, with her little harp, climbing the bare slopes of
the mountain. In misty weather when the days were
longest in summer, the music she made used to be
wafted by the breeze to the ears of the love-sick
shepherds. Many a time had the boys of the Filttir Gerrig
heard sweet singing when passing the cave in the full
light of day, but they were subject to some spell, so that
they never ventured to enter. But the shepherd of
Boch y Rhaiadr had a better view of the fairies one
Allhallows night {ryw noson Galangaeaf) when re-
turning home from a merry-making at Amnod. On
the sward in front of the cave what should he see but
scores of the Tylwyth Teg singing and dancing! He
never saw another assembly in his hfe so fair, and
great was the trouble he had to resist being drawn
into their circles.

Let us now come to the treasure caves, and begin
with Ogof Arthur, 'Arthur's Cave,' in the southern side
of Mynyd y Cnwc ^ in the parish of ILangwyfan, on the
south-western coast of Anglesey. The foot of Mynyd"
y Cnwc is washed by the sea, and the mouth of the cave
is closed by its waters at high tide, but the cave, which

> This seems to be the Goidelic word borrowed, which in Mod. Irish is
written cnocc or cnoc, 'a hill' : the native Welsh form is citwch, as in Cniich
Coch in Cardiganshire, Cmvch Deniog (corrupted into Clwcli Dentog) in
Anglesey, printed Kiiwgh Dernok in the Record of Carnarvon, p. 59, where
it is associated with other interesting names to be noticed later.

458 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

is spacious, has a vent-hole in the side of the mountain ^

So it is at any rate reported in the Brython for 1859,

p. 138, by a writer who explored the place, though not

to the end of the mile which it is said to measure in

length. He mentions a local tradition, that it contains

various treasures, and that it temporarily afforded Arthur

shelter in the course of his wars with the Gwydclod or

Goidels. But he describes also a cromlech on the top

of Mynyd y Cnwc, around which there was a circle of

stones, while within the latter there lies buried, it is

believed, an iron chest full of ancient gold. Various

attempts are said to have been made by the more greedy

of the neighbouring inhabitants to dig it up, but they

have always been frightened away by portents. Here

then the guardians of the treasure are creatures of

a supernatural kind, as in many other instances, and

especially that of Dinas Emrys to be mentioned

presently.

Next comes the first of a group of cave legends
involvmg treasure entrusted to the keeping of armed
warriors. It is taken from Elijah Waring's Recollections
and Anecdotes of Edward Williams, lolo Morgannwg
(London, 1850), pp. 95-8, where it is headed 'A popular
Tale in Glamorgan, by lolo Morgannwg ' ; a version of it
in Welsh will be found in the Brython for 1858, p. 162,
but Waring's version is in several respects better, and
I give it in his words:-' A Welshman walking over
London Bridge, with a neat hazel staff in his hand, was
accosted by an Englishman, who asked him whence he
came. " I am from my own country," answered the
Welshman, m a churlish tone. ''Do not take it amiss,

isllrfd'Lust'b''-^T'"",°' ^."^'"'^ '^""^ "^^'•^ ^"^ '"^""^--^ - their

Tl Uock? ■? .--^^-I naountam : they are apt to call a brook a river and
a h.liock a .ounta.n, though the n^ajestic heights of Arfon are within sght

vm] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 459

my friend," said the Englishman ; " if you will only
answer my questions, and take my advice, it will be of
greater benefit to you than you imagine. That stick in
your hand grew on a spot under which are hid vast
treasures of gold and silver; and if you remember
the place, and can conduct me to it, I will put you in
possession of those treasures."

' The Welshman soon understood that the stranger
was what he called a cunning man, or conjurer, and for
some time hesitated, not willing to go with him among
devils, from whom this magician must have derived his
knowledge ; but he was at length persuaded to accom-
pany him into Wales ; and going to Craig-3^-Dinas
[Rock of the Fortress], the Welshman pointed out the
spot whence he had cut the stick. It was from the
stock or root of a large old hazel : this they dug up, and
under it found a broad flat stone. This was found to
close up the entrance into a very large cavern, down into
which they both went. In the middle of the passage
hung a bell, and the conjurer earnestly cautioned the
Welshman not to touch it. They reached the lower
part of the cave, which was very wide, and there saw
many thousands of warriors lying down fast asleep
in a large circle, their heads outwards, every one
clad in bright armour, with their swords, shields, and
other weapons lying by them, ready to be laid hold
on in an instant, whenever the bell should ring and
awake them. All the arms were so highly polished
and bright, that they illumined the cavern, as with
the light of ten thousand flames of fire. They saw
amongst the warriors one greatly distinguished from
the rest by his arms, shield, battle-axe, and a crown
of gold set with the most precious stones, lying by
his side.

' In the midst of this circle of warriors they saw two

460 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

very large heaps, one of gold, the other of silver. The
magician told the Welshman that he might take as much
as he could carry away of either the one or the other,
but that he was not to take from both the heaps. The
Welshman loaded himself with gold : the conjurer took
none, saying that he did not want it, that gold was of no
use but to those who wanted knowledge, and that his
contempt of gold had enabled him to acquire that
superior knowledge and wisdom which he possessed.
In their way out he cautioned the Welshman again not
to touch the bell, but if unfortunately he should do so,
it might be of the most fatal consequence to him, as one
or more of the warriors would awake, lift up his head,
and ask if it was day. " Should this happen," said the
cunning man, "you must, without hesitation, answer
No, sleep thou on ; on hearing which he will again lay
down his head and sleep." In their way up, however,
the Welshman, overloaded with gold, was not able to
pass the bell without touching it— it rang— one of the
warriors raised up his head, and asked, "Is it day?"
"No," answered the Welshman promptly, "it is not,
sleep thou on ; " so they got out of the cave, laid down
the stone over its entrance, and replaced the hazel tree.
The cunning man, before he parted from his companion,
advised him to be economical in the use of his treasure ;
observing that he had, with prudence, enough for life :
but that if by unforeseen accidents he should be again
reduced to poverty, he might repair to the cave for
more; repeating the caution, not to touch the bell if
possible, but if he should, to give the proper answer,
that it was not day, as promptly as possible. He also
told him that the distinguished person they had seen
was Arthur, and the others his warriors; and they lay
there asleep with their arms ready at hand, for the
dawn of that day when the Black Eagle and the Golden

VIII] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 461

Eagle should go to war, the loud clamour of which
would make the earth tremble so much, that the bell
would ring loudly, and the warriors awake, take up their
arms, and destroy all the enemies of the Cymry, who
afterwards should repossess the Island of Britain, re-
establish their own king and government at Caertteon,
and be governed with justice, and blessed with peace so
long as the world endures.

* The time came when the Welshman's treasure was
all spent: he went to the cave, and as before over-
loaded himself. In his way out he touched the bell: it
rang : a warrior lifted up his head, asking if it was day,
but the Welshman, who had covetously overloaded him-
self, being quite out of breath with labouring under his
burden, and withal struck with terror, was not able to
give the necessary answer ; whereupon some of the
warriors got up, took the gold away from him, and beat
him dreadfully. They afterwards threw him out, and
drew the stone after them over the mouth of the cave.
The Welshman never recovered the effects of that beat-
ing, but remained almost a cripple as long as he lived,
and very poor. He often returned with some of his
friends to Craig-y-Dinas ; but they could never after-
wards find the spot, though they dug over, seemingly,
every inch of the hill.'

This story of lolo's closes with a moral, which I omit
in order to make room for what he says in a note to the
effect, that there are two hills in Glamorganshire called
Craig-y-Dinas— nowadays the more usual pronuncia-
tion in South Wales is Craig y Dinas— one in the parish
of ILantrissant and the other in Ystrad Dyfodwg. There
was also a hill so called, lolo says, in the Vale of Towy,
not far from Carmarthen. He adds that in Glamorgan
the tale is related of the Carmarthenshire hill, while in
Carmarthenshire the hill is said to be in Glamorgan.

462 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

According to lolo's son, Taliesin Williams ^ or Tali-
esin ab lolo, the Craig y Dinas with which the Cave of
Arthur (or Owen Lawgoch) is associated is the one on
the borders of Glamorgan and Brecknockshire. That
is also the opinion of my friend Mr. Reynolds, who
describes this cmig and dinas as a very bold rocky
eminence at the top of the Neath Valley, near Pont Ned"
Fechan. He adds that in this tale as related to his
mother ' in her very young days ' by a very old woman,
known as Mari Shencin y Clochyd, ' Jenkin the Sexton's
Mary,' the place of Arthur was taken by Owen Law-
goch, 'Owen of the Red Hand,' of whom more anon.

The next Arthurian story is not strictly in point, for
it makes no allusion to treasure ; but as it is otherwise
so similar to lolo's tale I cannot well avoid introducing
it here. It is included in the composite story of Bivca
'r Trwyn, ' the Bogie of the Nose,' written out for me in
Gwentian Welsh by Mr. Craigfryn Hughes. The cave
portion relates how a Monmouthshire farmer, whose
house was grievously troubled by the bogie, set out one
morning to call on a wizard who lived near Caerleon,
and how he on his way came up with a very strange
and odd man who wore a three-cornered hat. They
fell into conversation, and the strange man asked the
farmer if he should Hke to see something of a wonder.
He answered he would. 'Come with me then,' said
the wearer of the cocked hat, ' and you shall see what
nobody else alive to-day has seen.' When they had
reached the middle of a wood this spiritual guide sprang
from horseback and kicked a big stone near the road.
It instantly moved aside to disclose the mouth of a large
cave ; and now said he to the farmer, ' Dismount and
bring your horse in here : tie him up alongside of mine,

' See pp. 13-16 of his essay on the Neath Valley, referred to in a note at
p. 439 above, where Craig y ©inas is also mentioned.

vni] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 463

and follow me so that you may see something which the
eyes of man have not beheld for centuries.' The farmer,
having done as he was ordered, followed his guide for
a long distance : they came at length to the top of a
flight of stairs, where two huge bells were hanging.

* Now mind,' said the warning voice of the strange
guide, ' not to touch either of those bells.' At the
bottom of the stairs there was a vast chamber with
hundreds of men lying at full length on the floor, each
with his head reposing on the stock of his gun. ' Have
you any notion who these men are ? ' ' No,' replied the
farmer, ' I have not, nor have I any idea what they want
in such a place as this.' ' Well,' said the guide, ' these
are Arthur's thousand soldiers reposing and sleeping
till the Kymry have need of them. Now let us get out
as fast as our feet can carry us.' When they reached
the top of the stairs, the farmer somehow struck his
elbow against one of the bells so that it rang, and in the
twinkling of an eye all the sleeping host rose to their
feet shouting together, * Are the Kymry in straits ? '

* Not yet : sleep you on,' replied the wearer of the cocked
hat, whereupon they all dropped down on their guns to
resume their slumbers at once. ' These are the valiant
men,' he went on to say, ' who are to turn the scale in
favour of the Kymry when the time comes for them to
cast the Saxon yoke off their necks and to recover
possession of their country.' When the two had re-
turned to their horses at the mouth of the cave, his
guide said to the farmer, ' Now go in peace, and let me
warn you on the pain of death not to utter a syllable
about what you have seen for the space of a year
and a day : if you do, woe awaits you.' After he had
moved the stone back to its place the farmer lost sight
of him. When the year had lapsed the farmer happened
to pass again that way, but, though he made a long and

464 CELTIC FOLKLORE ]ch.

careful search, he failed completely to find the stone at
the mouth of the cave.

To return to lolo's yarn, one may say that there are
traces of his story as at one time current in Merioneth-
shire, but with the variation that the Welshman met the
wizard not on London Bridge but at a fair at Bala, and
that the cave was somewhere in Merioneth : the hero
was Arthur, and the cave was known as Ogof Arthur,
Whether any such cave is still known I cannot tell ;
but a third and interestingly told version is given in the
Brython for 1858, p. 179, by the late Gwynionyd, who
gives the story as the popular belief in his native parish
of Troed yr Aur, halfway between Newcastle Emlyn
and Aber Forth, in South Cardiganshire. In this last
version the hero is not Arthur, but the later man as
follows : — Not the least of the wonders of imagination
wont to exercise the minds of the old people was the
story of Owen Lawgoch. One sometimes hears sung
in our fairs the words : —

Yr Owain hwn yiv Harri V Nawfed This Owen is Henry the Ninth,
Syd yn trigo 'ngwlad estronied, &c. Who tarries in a foreign land, &c.

But this Owen Lawgoch, the national deliverer of our
ancient race of Brythons, did not, according to the Troed
yr Aur people, tarry in a foreign land, but somewhere in
Wales, not far from Offa's Dyke. They used to say that
one Dafyd Meirig of Bettws Bledrws, having quarrelled
with his father, left for ILoegr \ ' England.' When he
had got a considerable distance from home, he struck a
bargain with a cattle dealer to drive a herd of his beasts
to London. Somewhere at the corner of a vast moor
Dafyd cut a very remarkable hazel stick ; for a good
staff is as essential to the vocation of a good drover as

' This is an interesting word of obscure origin, to which I should like our
ingenious etymologists to direct their attention.

viii] WELSH CAJT LEGENDS 465

teeth are to a dog. So while his comrades had had
their sticks broken before reaching London, Dafyd's
remained as it was, and whilst they were conversing
together on London Bridge a stranger accosted Dafyd,
wishing to know where he had obtained that wonderful
stick. He replied that it was in Wales he had had it,
and on the stranger's assuring him that there were
wondrous things beneath the tree on which it had
grown, they both set out for Wales. When they reached
the spot and dug a little they found that there was a
great hollow place beneath. As night was spreading
out her sable mantle, and as they were getting deeper,
what should they find but stairs easy to step and great
lamps illumining the vast chamber ! They descended
slowly, with mixed emotions of dread and invincible
desire to see the place. When they reached the bottom
of the stairs, they found themselves near a large table,
at one end of which they beheld sitting a tall man of
about seven foot. He occupied an old-fashioned chair
and rested his head on his left hand, while the other
hand, all red, lay on the table and grasped a great
sword. He was withal enjoying a wondrously serene
sleep ; and at his feet on the floor lay a big dog. After
casting a glance at them, the wizard said to Dafyd:
'This is Owen Lawgoch, who is to sleep on till a
special time, when he will wake and reign over the
Brythons. That weapon in his hand is one of the
swords of the ancient kings of Prydain. No battle was
ever lost in which that sword was used.' Then they
moved slowly on, gazing at the wonders of that sub-
terranean chamber; and they beheld everywhere the
arms of ages long past, and on the table thousands of
gold pieces bearing the images of the different kings of
Prydain. They got to understand that it was permitted
them to take a handful of each, but not to put any in

RHYS II n

466 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

their purses. They both visited the cave several times,
but at last Dafyd put in his purse a little of the gold
bearing the image of one of the bravest of Owen's
ancestors. But after coming out again they were never
able any more to find Owen's subterranean palace.

Those are, says Gwynionyd, the ideas cherished by
the old people of Troed yr Aur in Keredigion, and the
editor adds a note that the same sort of story is current
among the peasantry of Cumberland, and perhaps of
other parts of Britain. This remark will at once recall
to the reader's mind the well-known verses ^ of the
Scottish poet, Leyden, as to Arthur asleep in a cave in
the Eildon Hills in the neighbourhood of Melrose Abbey.
But he will naturally ask why London Bridge is intro-
duced into this and lolo's story, and in answer I have
to say, firstly, that London Bridge formerly loomed
very large in the popular imagination as one of the chief
wonders of London, itself the most wonderful city in
the world. Such at any rate was the notion cherished
as to London and London Bridge by the country people
of Wales, even within my own memory. Secondly, the
fashion of selecting London Bridge as the opening
scene of a treasure legend had been set, perhaps, by a
widely spread English story to the following effect :—
A certain pedlar of Swaftham in Norfolk had a dream,
that if he went and stood on London Bridge he would
have very joyful news ; as the dream was doubled and
trebled he decided to go. So he stood on the bridge
two or three days, when at last a shopkeeper, observing
that he loitered there so long, neither offering anything
for sale nor asking for alms, inquired of him as to his
business. The pedlar told him his errand, and was
heartily laughed at by the shopkeeper, who said that he

'See the Poetical Works of John Leyden (Edinburgh, 1875), p. 36 {Scenes
of Infancy, part 11; ; also my Arthurian Legend, p. 18.

VIII] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 467

had dreamt that night that he was at a place called
Swaffham in Norfolk, and that if he only dug under
a great oak tree in an orchard behind a pedlar's house
there, he would find a vast treasure ; but the place was
utterly unknown to him, and he was not such a fool as
to follow a silly dream. No, he was wiser than that ;
so he advised the pedlar to go home to mind his
business. The pedlar very quietly took in the words
as to the dream, and hastened home to Swaffham,
where he found the treasure in his own orchard. The
rest of the story need not be related here, as it is quite
different from the Welsh ones, which the reader has
just had brought under his notice ^.

To return to Owen Lawgoch, for we have by no
means done with him : on the farm of Cil yr Ychen
there stands a remarkable limestone hill called jv -Dhias,
' the Fortress,' hardly a mile to the north of the village
of ILandybie, in Carmarthenshire. This dinas and the
lime-kilns that are gradually consuming it are to be
seen on the right from the railway as you go from
ILandeilo to ILandybie. It is a steep high rock which
forms a very good natural fortification, and in the level
area on the top is the mouth of a very long cavern,
known as Ogo'v -Dinas, * the Dinas Cave.' The entrance
into it is small and low, but it gradually widens out,
becoming in one place lofty and roomy with several
smaller branch caves leading out of it ; and it is believed
that some of them connect Ogo'r Dinas with smaller
caves at Pant y ILyn, ' the Lake Hollow,' where, as the

^ I am indebted for the English story to an article entitled ' The Two
Pedlar Legends of Lambeth and Swaffham,' contributed by Mr. Gomme to the
pages of the Antiquary, x. 202-5, '" which he gives local details and makes
valuable comparisons. I have to thank Mr. Gomme also for a cutting from the
weekly issue of the Leeds Mercury for Jan. 3, 1885, devoted to ' Local Notes
and Queries' (No. cccxii), where practically the same story is given at
greater length as located at Upsall Castle in Yorkshire.

H h 2

468 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

name indicates, there is a small lake a little higher up :
both Ogo'rDinas and Panty ILyn are within a mile of the
village of ILandybie \ Now I am informed, in a letter
written in 1893 by one native, that the local legend
about Ogo'r -Dinas is that Owen Lawgoch and his men
are lying asleep in it, while another native, Mr. Fisher,
writing in the same year, but on the authority of some-
what later hearsa}^, expresses himself as follows : — * I re-
member hearing two traditions respecting Ogo'r Dinas :
(i) that King Arthur and his warriors lie sleeping in it
with their right hands clasping the hilts of their drawn
swords ready to encounter anyone who may venture to
disturb their repose— is there not a dinas somewhere in
Carnarvonshire with a similar legend ? (2) That Owen
Lawgoch lived in it some time or other : that is all that
I remember having heard about him in connection with
this ogof' Mr. Fisher proceeds, moreover, to state that
it is said of an ogof-aH Pant y ILyn, that Owen Lawgoch
and his men on a certain occasion took refuge in it,
where they were shut up and starved to death. He
adds that, however this may be, it is a fact that in the
year 1813 ten or more human skeletons of unusual
stature were discovered in an ogof there 2.

' I have never been to the spot, and I owe these particulars partly to
Mr. J. P. Owen, of 72 Comeragh Road, Kensington, and partly to the Rev.
John Fisher, already quoted at p. 379. This is the parish where some would
locate the story of the sin-eater, which others stoutly deny, as certain
periodical outbursts of polemics in the pages of the Academy and elsewhere
have shown. Mr. Owen, writing to me in 1893, states, that, when he last
visited the dinas some thirty years previously, he found the mouth of th-
cave stopped up in order to prevent cattle and sheep straying into it.

' Mr. Fisher refers me to an account of the discovery published in the
Cambnan newspaper for Aug. 14, 1813.3 complete file of which exists, as he
informs me, 111 the library of the Royal Institution of South Wales at Swan-
sea Further, at the Cambrians' meeting in 1892 that account was discussed
and corrected by Mr. Stepney-Gulston : see the Archcologia Cambrensis for
1093, pp. 163-7. He also 'pointed out that on the opposite side of the
gap in the ndge the noted cave of Owain Law Goch was to be found. Near
the hant-y-nyn bone caves is a place called Craig Derwydon, and close by is

VIII] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 469

To this I may append a reference to the Geninen for
1896, p. 84, where Mr. ILeufer Thomas, who is also a
native of the district, alludes to the local belief that
Owen Lawgoch and his men are asleep, as already-
mentioned, in the cave of Pant y ILyn, and that they are
to go on sleeping there till a trumpet blast and the
clash of arms on Rhiw Goch rouse them to sally forth
to combat the Saxons and to conquer, as set forth by
Howells: see p. 381 above. It is needless to say that
there is no reason, as will be seen presently, to suppose
Owen Lawgoch to have ever been near any of the caves
to which allusion has here been made ; but that does
not appreciably detract from the fascination of the legend
which has gathered round his personality ; and in pass-
ing I may be allowed to express my surprise that in
such stories as these the earlier Owen has not been
eclipsed by Owen Glyndwr: there must be some his-
torical reason why that has not taken place. Can it be
that a habit of caution made Welshmen speak of Owen
Lawgoch when the other Owen was really meant ?

The passage I have cited from Mr, Fisher's letter
raises the question of a dinas in Carnarvonshire, which
that of his native parish recalled to his mind ; and this
is to be considered next. Doubtless he meant Dinas
Emrys formerly called Din Emreis ', ' the Fortress of
Ambrosius,' situated near Bedgelert, and known in the
neighbourhood simply as jj/ Dinas, 'the Fort.' It is
celebrated in the Vortigern legend as the place where
the dragons had been hidden, that frustrated the build-

the scene of the exploits of Owain Law Goch, a character who appears to
have absorbed some of the features of Arthurian romance. A cave in the
locality bears Owain's name.'

^ As in ILewelyn's charter to the Monks of Abcrconwy, where we have,
according to Dugdale's Moiiasticon, v. 673", a Sciibordynemreis, that is Scubor
Dyn Emms, ' Din-Emreis Barn,' supposed to be Hafod y Borth, near Bed-
gelert : see Jenkins' BeO^ Gelcrt, p. 198. In the Myvyrian, i. 195", it has been
printed Din Emrais.

470

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

ing of that king's castle ; and the spot is described in
Lewis' Topographical Dictionary of Wales, in the article
on Bethgelart {Bect-Celert), as an isolated rocky emi-
nence with an extensive top area, which is defended by
walls of loose stones, and accessible only on one side.
He adds that the entrance appears to have been guarded
by two towers, and that within the enclosed area are the
foundations of circular buildings of loose stones forming
walls of about five feet in thickness. Concerning that
Dinas we read in the Brython for 1861, p. 329, a legend
to the following effect : — Now after the departure of
Vortigern, Myrdin, or Merlin as he is called in English,
remained himself in the Dinas for a long time, until, in
fact, he went away with Emrys Ben-aur, ' Ambrosius the
Gold-headed ' — evidently Aurelius Ambrosius is meant.
When he was about to set out with the latter, he put all
his treasure and wealth into a crochan aitr, * a gold
cauldron,' and hid it in a cave in the Dinas, and on the
mouth of the cave he rolled a huge stone, which he
covered up with earth and sods, so that it was impossible
for any one to find it. He intended this wealth to be
the property of some special person in a future genera-
tion, and it is said that the heir to it is to be a youth with
yellow hair and blue eyes. When that one comes near
to the Dinas a bell will ring to invite him to the cave,
which will open of itself as soon as his foot touches it.
Now the fact that some such legend was once currently
believed about Bedgelert and Nanhwynain is proved by
the curious stories as to various attempts made to find
the treasure, and the thunderstorms and portents which
used to vanquish the local greed for gold. For several
instances in point see the Brython, pp. 329-30 ; and for
others, showing how hidden treasure is carefully re-
served for the right sort of heir, see p. 148 above. To
prove how widely this idea prevailed in Carnarvonshire,

VIII] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 471

I may add a short story which Mrs. WiUiams-Ellis of
Glasfryn got from the engineer who told her of the
sacred eel of ILangybi (p. 366) : — There was on Pentyrch,
the hill above ILangybi, he said, a large stone so heavy
and fixed so fast in the ground that no horses, no men
could move it : it had often been tried. One day,
however, a little girl happened to be playing by the
stone, and at the touch of her little hand the stone
moved. A hoard of coins was found under it, and that
at a time when the little girl's parents happened to be
in dire need of it. Search had long been made by
undeserving men for treasure supposed to be hidden at
that spot; but it was always unsuccessful until the
right person touched the stone to move. The failure
of the wrong person to secure the treasure, even when
discovered, is illustrated by a story given by Mr. Derfel
Hughes in his Antiquities of ILandegai and Lmtttechid,
pp. 35-6, to the effect that a servant man, somewhere
up among the mountains near Ogwen Lake, chanced to
come across the mouth of a cave with abundance of
vessels of brass {pres) of every shape and description
within it. He went at once and seized one of them, but,
alas ! it was too heavy for him to stir it. So he resolved
to go away and return early on the morrow with a friend
to help him ; but before going he closed the mouth of
the cave with stones and sods so as to leave it safe.
While thus engaged he remembered having heard how
others had like him found caves and failed to refind
them. He could procure nothing readily that would
satisfy him as a mark, so it occurred to him to dot his
path with the chippings of his stick, which he whittled
all the way as he went back until he came to a familiar
track : the chips were to guide him back to the cave.
So when the morning came he and his friend set out,
but when they reached the point where the chips should

472 CELTIC FOLKLORE [en.

begin, not one was to be seen : the Tyhvyfh Teg had
picked up every one of them. So that discovery of
articles of brass— more probably bronze— was in vain.
But, says the writer, it is not fated to be always in vain,
for there is a tradition in the valley that it is a Gwydel,
' Goidel, Irishman,' who is to have these treasures, and
that it will happen in this wise :— A Gwydel will come
to the neighbourhood to be a shepherd, and one day
when he goes up the mountain to see to the sheep, just
when it pleases the fates a black sheep with a speckled
head will run before him and make straight for the cave :
the sheep will go in, with the Gwydel in pursuit trying
to catch him. When the Gwydel enters he sees the
treasures, looks at them with surprise, and takes posses-
sion of them ; and thus, in some generation to come,
the Gwydyl will have their own restored to them.
That is the tradition which Derfel Hughes found in the
vale of the Ogwen, and he draws from it the inference
which it seems to warrant, in words to the following
effect :— Perhaps this shows us that the Gwydyl had
some time or other something to do with these parts,
and that we are not to regard as stories without founda-
tions all that is said of that nation ; and the sayings of
old people to this day show that there is always some
spite between our nation and the Gwydyl. Thus, for
instance, he goes on to say, if a man proves changeable,
he is said to have become a Gwydel ( Y mae wedi troi 'n
VVydel), or if one is very shameless and cheeky he is
called a Gwydel and told to hold his tongue {Taw yr
hen IVycfel) ; and a number of such locutions used by
our people proves, he thinks, the former prevalence of
much contention between the two sister-nations. Ex-
pressions of the kind mentioned by Mr. Hughes are
well known in all parts of the Principality, and it is
difficult to account for them except on the supposition

VIII] WELSH CAVE LEGEXDS 473

that Goidels and Brythons lived for a long time face
to face, so to say, with one another over large areas in
the west of our island.

The next story to be mentioned belongs to the same
Snowdonian neighbourhood, and brings us back to
Arthur and his Men. For a writer who has already
been quoted from the Brython for i86t, p. 331, makes
Arthur and his following set out from Dinas Emrys and
cross Hafod y Borth mountain for a place above the
upper reach of Cwmttan, called Tregalan, where they
found their antagonists. From Tregalan the latter were
pushed up the bwlch or pass, towards Cwm Dyli ; but
when the vanguard of the army with Arthur leading had
reached the top of the pass, the enemy discharged a
shower of arrows at them. There Arthur fell, and his
body was buried in the pass so that no enemy might
march that way so long as Arthur's dust rested there.
That, he says, is the story, and there to this day remains
in the pass, he asserts, the heap of stones called Carried
Arthur, 'Arthur's Cairn': the pass is called Bivlch y
Saethau, ' the Pass of the Arrows.' Then Ogof ILanciau
Eryri is the subject of the following story given at p. 371
of the same volume : — After Arthur's death on Bwlch
y Saethau, his men ascended to the ridge of the ILiwed
and descended thence into a vast cave called Ogof
Lanciaii Eryri, ' the young Men of Snowdonia's Cave,'
which is in the precipitous cliff on the left-hand side
near the top of ILyn ILydaw. This is in Cwm Dyli,
and there in that cave those warriors are said to be
still, sleeping in their armour and awaiting the second
coming of Arthur to restore the crown of Britain to the
Kymry. For the saying is : —

Rwanda' 'Ryri a'n gwyn gylt di hcitntti hi.

Snowdonia's youths with their white hazels will win it.

As the local shepherds were one day long ago collecting

474 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

their sheep on the ILiwed, one sheep fell down to a shelf
in this precipice, and when the Cwm Dyli shepherd
made his way to the spot he perceived that the ledge of
rock on which he stood led to the hidden cave of Lanciau
Eryri. There was light within : he looked in and beheld
a host of warriors without number all asleep, resting on
their arms and ready equipped for battle. Seeing that
they were all asleep, he felt a strong desire to explore the
whole place ; but as he was squeezing in he struck his
head against the bell hanging in the entrance. It rang
so that every corner of the immense cave rang again,
and all the warriors woke uttering a terrible shout,
which so frightened the shepherd that he never more
enjoyed a day's health ; nor has anybody since dared
as much as to approach the mouth of the cave.

Thus far the Brython, and I have only to remark that
this legend is somewhat remarkable for the fact of its
representing the Youths of Eryri sleeping away in their
cave without Arthur among them. In fact, that hero is
described as buried not very far off beneath a carnect or
cairn on Bwlch y Saethau. As to the exact situation
of that cairn, I may say that my attention was drawn
some time ago to the following lines by Mr. William
Owen, better known as Glaslyn, a living bard bred and
born in the district : —

GcrUaw Carnect Arthur ar ysgivyd y Wy^fa

Y gorwed gweditUon y caivr enwog Ricca.

Near Arthur's Cairn on the shoulder of Snowdon

Lie the remains of the famous giant Ricca.

These words recall an older couplet in a poem by Rhys
Goch Eryri, who is said to have died in the year 1420.
He was a native of the parish of Bedgelert, and his
words in point run thus :—

Ar y drum oer dramaivr, On the ridge cold and vast,

Yno gorwed Ricca Gawr. There the Giant Ricca lies.

viri] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 475

From this it is clear that Rhys Goch meant that the
cairn on the top of Snowdon covered the remains of the
giant whose name has been variously written Ricca,
Ritta, and Rhita. So I was impelled to ascertain from
Glaslyn whether I had correctly understood his lines,
and he has been good enough to help me out of some
of my difficulties, as I do not know Snowdon by heart,
especially the Nanhwynain and Bedgelert side of the
mountain : — The cairn on the summit of Snowdon was
the Giant's before it was demolished and made into a
sort of tower which existed before the hotel was made.
Glaslyn has not heard it called after Ricca's name, but
he states that old people used to call it Cantect y Cawr,
'the Giant's Cairn.' In 1850 CarneS Arthur, 'Arthur's
Cairn,' was to be seen on the top of Bwlch y Saethau,
but he does not know whether it is still so, as he has
not been up there since the building of the hotel.
Bwlch y Saethau is a lofty shoulder of Snowdon
extending in the direction of Nanhwynain, and the
distance from the top of Snowdon to it is not great;
it would take you half an hour or perhaps a httle more
to walk from the one carnettio the other. It is possible
to trace Arthur's march from Dinas Emrys up the slopes
of Hafod y Borth, over the shoulder of the Aran and
Braich yr Oen to Tregalan— or Cwm Tregalan, as it is
now called— but from Tregalan he would have to climb
in a north-easterly direction in order to reach Bwlch y
Saethau, where he is related to have fallen and to
have been interred beneath a cairn. This may be
regarded as an ordinary or commonplace account of his
death. But the scene suggests a far more romantic
picture; for down below was ILyn ILydaw with its
sequestered isle, connected then by means only of a
primitive canoe with a shore occupied by men engaged
in working the ore of Eryri. Nay with the eyes of

476 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Malory we seem to watch Bedivere making, with
Excalibur in his hands, his three reluctant journeys to
the lake ere he yielded it to the arm emerging from the
deep. We fancy we behold how ' euyn fast by the
banke houed a lytyl barge wyth many fayr ladyes in hit,'
which was to carry the wounded Arthur away to the
accompaniment of mourning and loud lamentation ; but
the legend of the Marchlyn bids us modify Malory's
language as to the barge containing many ladies all
wearing black hoods, and take our last look at the
warrior departing rather in a coracle with three won-
drously fair women attending to his wounds \

Some further notes on Snowdon, together with a
curious account of the Cave of ILanciau Eryri, have
been kindly placed at my disposal by Mr. EUis Pierce
(Elis^ o'r Nant) of Dolwydelan :— In the uppermost part
of the hollow called Cwmttan is Tregalan, and in the
middle of Cwm Tregalan is a green hill, or rather an
eminence which hardly forms a hill, but what is commonly
called a honcyn^ in Carnarvonshire, and between that
green boncyn and the Clogwyn Du, ' Black Precipice,'
IS a bog, the depth of which no one has ever succeeded
in ascertaining, and a town— inferred perhaps from fre

' See Somen's Malory's Mor/e Darthur, xxi. v ( = vol. i. p. 849), and as to
the Marchlyn story see p. 236 above. Lastly some details concerning ILyn
ILydaw will be found in the next chapter.

^ The oldest spellings known of this name occur in manuscript A of the
Annales Cambrice and in the Book of Han Ddv as EUzed and Elised, doubtless
pronounced EUssed until it became, by dropping the final dental, Elisse.
Ihis in time lost its identity by assimilation with the English name Ellis.
Thus, for example in Wynne's edition of Powell's Caradog of ILancarfan's
Hrstoryof Wales (London, 1774), PP- .., .4, Elised is reduced to Elis. In
for r ? T'"^ '•'" ^ '^^'"P^''" ^^'^ ^^«^'' ' St. David,' for Dewi^,

jLir^T" T^"^ '"" ^"^"^ ^'"^y'^ Descriptive Catalogue, i. 119

name i/1 h f T^ " ^"'^ ^^ '"^ "° ^"""^^''°" ^" f^^^- Can the English
name Elhs be itself derived from Eliseft'^

merelrthrFn'.'t'*' "^T '""' °' "^^^'^ ^^^ ^^'"^ ™-^-"g. ^nd bone is

wind used fn N 7ur 7' '°'"''°"^' = '" ^""^^ ^ales it is pronounced

and used m North Cardiganshire in the sense of hill or mountain.

VIII] WELSH CAFE LEGENDS 477

in Tregalan — is fabled to have been swallowed up there.
Another of my informants speaks of several hillocks or
boncyns as forming one side of this little cwm ; but he
has heard from geologists, that these green mounds re-
present moraines deposited there in the glacial period.
From the bottom of the Clogwyn Du it is about a mile
to Bwlch y Saethau. Then as to the cave of ILanciau
Eryri, which nobody can now find, the slope down to it
begins from the top of the ILiwed, but ordinarily speak-
ing one could not descend to where it is supposed to
have been without the help of ropes, which seems
incompatible with the story of the Cwm Dyli shepherd
following a sheep until he was at the mouth of the cave ;
not to mention the difficulty which the descent would
have offered to Arthur's men when they entered it.
Then Elis o'r Nant's story represents it shutting after
them, and only opening to the shepherd in consequence
of his having trodden on a particular sod or spot. He
then slid down unintentionally and touched the bell that
was hanging there, so that it rang and instantly woke
the sleeping warriors. No sooner had that happened
than those men of Arthur's took up their guns— never
mind the anachronism— and the shepherd made his way
out more dead than alive; and the frightened fellow
never recovered from the shock to the day of his death.
When these warriors take up their guns they fire away,
we are told, without mercy from where each man stands :
they are not to advance a single step till Arthur comes
to call them back to the world.

To swell the irrelevancies under which this chapter
labours already, and to avoid severing cognate questions
too rudely, I wish to add that Elis o'r Nant makes the
name of the giant buried on the top of Snowdon into
Rhitta or Rhita instead of Ricca. That is also the form
of the name with which Mrs. Rhys was familiar through-

478 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

out her childhood on the ILanberis side of the mountain.
She often heard of Rhita ^ Gawr having been buried on
the top of Snowdon, and of other warriors on other
parts of Snowdon such as Moel Gynghorion and the
Gist on that moel. But Elis o'r Nant goes further, and
adds that from Rhita the mountain was called Wydfa
Rhita, more correctly Givyctfa Rita, ' Rhita's Gwydfa.'
Fearing this might be merely an inference, I have tried
to cross-examine him so far as that is possible by letter.
He replies that his father was bred and born in the Httle
glen called Ewybrnant", between Bettws y Coed and
Pen Machno, and that his grandfather also lived there,
where he appears to have owned land not far from the
home of the celebrated Bishop Morgan, Now Elis'
father often talked, he says, in his hearing of * Gwydfa
Rhita,' Wishing to have some more definite evidence,
I wrote again, and he informs me that his father was
very fond of talking about his father, Ehs o'r Nant's
grandfather, who appears to have been a character and
a great supporter of Sir Robert Williams, especially
in a keenly contested political election in 1796, when
the latter was opposed by the then head of the Pen-
rhyn family. Sometimes the old man from Ewybrnant
would set out in his docs, 'clogs or wooden shoes,'
to visit Sir Robert Williams, who lived at Plas y
Nant, near Bedgelert. On starting he would say to his

* The name occurs twice in the story of Kulhwch and Olwen : see the
Mabinogion, p. 107, where the editors have read Ricca both times in ' Gor-
mant, son of Ricca.' This is, however, more than balanced by Rita in the
Book ofE^an Ddv, namely in Tref Rita, ' Rita's town or stead,' which occurs
five times as the name of a place in the diocese of ILandaff; see pp. 32, 43,
90, 272. The uncertainty is confined to the spelling, and it has arisen from
the difficulty of deciding in medieval manuscripts between ^ and c : there is
no reason to suppose the name was ever pronounced Ricca.

'' This can hardly be the real name of the place, as it is pronounced
Gwybrnant (and even Gwybrant), which reminds me of the Gwybrfynyd on
which Gwyn ab Nud wanders about with his hounds : see Evans' facsimile
of the Black Book of Carmarthen, p. 50^ where the words are, dy gruidir ar
wihir wtnit. 7

VIII] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS

479

family, Mi a'i hyibio troed Gwydfa Rhita ag mi db'n ol
rzvbrud cin iios, or sometimes font. That is, ' I'll go
round the foot of Rhita's Gwydfa and come back some
time before night': sometimes he would say 'to-morrow,'
Elis also states that his father used to relate how Rhita's
Gwydfa was built, namely by the simple process of
each of his soldiers taking a stone to place on Rhita's
tomb. However the story as to Rhita Gawr being buried
on the top of Snowdon came into existence, there can
be no doubt that it was current in comparatively recent
times, and that the Welsh name of y Wydfa, derived
from it, refers to the mountain as distinguished from the
district in which it is situated. In Welsh this latter is
Eryri, the habitat, as it were, of the eryr, ' eagle,' a bird
formerly at home there as many local names go to prove,
such as Carregyr Eryr'^, 'the Stone of the Eagle,' men-
tioned in the boundaries of the lands on Snowdon
granted to the Abbey of Aberconwy in ILewelyn's
charter, where also Snowdon mountain is called Wedua
vawr, ' the Great Gwydfa.' Now, as already suggested,
the word gwydfa takes us back to Rhita's Canted' or
Cairn, as it signified a monument, a tomb or barrow :
Dr. Davies gives it in his Welsh-Latin Dictionary
as Locus Sepultiirce, Mausoleum. This meaning of the
word may be illustrated by a reference in passing to the
mention in Brut y Tyivysogion of the burial of Madog
ab Maredyd. For under the year 1159 we are told that
he was interred at Meifod, as it was there his tomb or
the vault of his family, the one intended also for him
[y Sydua ^), happened to be.

' Dugdale has printed this (v. 673"') Carrecerereryr with one er too much,
and the other name forms part of the phrase ad capud Weddtia-Vaur, ' to the
top of the Great Gwydfa'; but I learn from Mr. Edward Owen, of Gray's
Inn, that the reading of the manuscript is IVcdua vawr a.nA Carrcccreryr.

^ The MSS. except B have^ Sylva, which is clearly not the right word, as
it could only mean * his place of watching.'

480 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Against the evidence just given, that tradition places
Rhita's grave on the top of Snowdon, a passing mention
by Derfel Hughes (p. 52) is of no avail, though to the
effect that it is on the top of the neighbouring mountain
called Carned: Lywelyn, 'ILewelyn's Cairn/ that Rhita's
Cairn was raised. He deserves more attention, however,
when he places Carned: Drystan, ' Tristan or Tristram's
Cairn,' on a spur of that mountain, to wit, towards the east
above Ffynnon y ILyffaint \ For it is worthy of note that
the name of Drystan, associated with Arthur in the later
romances, should figure with that of Arthur in the topo-
graphy of the same Snowdon district.

Before leaving Snowdon I may mention a cave near a
small stream not far from ILyn Gwynain, about a mile
and a half above Dinas Emrys. In the ILwyd letter
(printed in the Cambrian Journal for 1859, pp. 142, 209),

' See Derfel Hughes' ILmidegai and ILantlechid, p. 53. As to Drystan
it is the Pictish name Drostan, but a kindred form occurs in Cornwall on
a stone near Fowey, where years ago I guessed the ancient genitive Drus-
tagni; and after examining it recently I am able to confirm my original
guess. The name of Drystan recalls that of Essyttt, which offers some diffi-
culty. It first occurs in Welsh in the Nennian Genealogies in the Harleian
MS. 3859 : see Pedigree I in the Cymmrodor, ix. 169, where we read that
Mermin (Merfyn) was son of Etthil daughter of Cinnan (Cynan), who suc-
ceeded his father Rhodri Molwynog in the sovereignty of Gwyned" in 754.
The spelling Etthil is to be regarded like that of the Welsh names in Nennius,
for some instances of which see § 73 (quoted in the next chapter) and the
Old Welsh words calaur, noitel , patel, so spelt in the Juvencus Codex : see
Skene, ii. 2 : in all these I does duty for tt. So Etthil is to be treated as
pronounced Ethitt or Ethytt; but Jesus College MS. 20 gives a more ancient
pronunciation (at least as regards the consonants) when it calls Cynan's
daughter Ethetft: see the Cymmrodor, viii. 87. Powell, in his History of
Wales by Caradog of ILancarfan, as edited by Wynne, writes the name
Esylht; and the Medieval Welsh spelling has usually been Essyflt or Esyltt,
which agrees in its sibilant with the French Iselt or Iscnt ; but who made
the Breton-looking change from Eth to Es or Is in this name remains a
somewhat doubtful point. Professor Zimmer, in the Zeitschrift filr franzos-
isdie Sprache und Litteratiir, xiii. 73^5, points out that the name is an
Anglo-Saxon Ethylda borrowed, which he treats as a ' Kurzform fur Ethelhild' :
see also the Revue Celtique, xii. 397, xiii. 495. The adoption of this name in
Wales may be regarded as proof of intermarriage or alliance between an
English family and the royal house of Gwyned as early as the eighth
century.

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 481

on which I have already drawn, it is called Ogor Gwr
Blew, 'the Hairy Man's Cave'; and the story relates
how the Gwr Blew who lived in it was fatally wounded
by a woman who happened to be at home, alone, in one
of the nearest farm houses when the Gwr Blew came to
plunder it. Its sole interest here is that a later version ^
identifies the Hairy Man with Owen Lawgoch, after
modifying the former's designation y Gwr Blew, which
hterally meant 'the Hair Man,' intojv Gwr Bleivog, 'the
Hairy Man.' This doubtful instance of the presence of
Owen Lawgoch in the folklore of North Wales seems to
stand alone.

Some of these cave stories, it will have been seen,
reveal to us a hero who is expected to return to inter-
fere again in the affairs of this world, and it is needless
to say that Wales is by no means alone in the enjoy-
ment of imaginary prospects of this kind. The same
sort of poetic expectation has not been unknown, for
instance, in Ireland. In the summer of 1894, I spent
some sunny days in the neighbourhood of the Boyne,
and one morning I resolved to see the chief burial
mounds dotting the banks of that interesting river ; but
before leaving the hotel at Drogheda, my attention was
attracted by a book of railway advertisement of the
kind which forcibly impels one to ask two questions :
why will not the railway companies leave those people
alone who do not want to travel, and why will they
make it so tedious for those who do ? But on turning
the leaves of that booklet over I was inclined to a
suaver mood, as I came on a paragraph devoted to an
ancient stronghold called the Grianan of Aileach, or
Greenan-Ely, in the highlands of Donegal. Here I read
that a thousand armed men sit resting there on their

' See the Brython for 1861, pp. 331-2, also Cymrii Fu, p. 468, where
Glasynys was also inclined to regard the Hairy Fellow as being Owen.

RHYS I i

482 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

swords, and bound by magic sleep till they are to be
called forth to take their part in the struggle for the
restoration of Erin's freedom. At intervals they awake,
it is said, and looking up from their trance they ask
in tones which solemnly resound through the many
chambers of the Grianan : ' Is the time come ? ' A loud
voice, that of the spiritual caretaker, is heard to reply :
'The time is not yet.' They resume their former
posture and sink into their sleep again. That is the
substance of the words I read, and they called to my
mind the legend of such heroes of the past as Barba-
rossa, with his sleep interrupted only by his change of
posture once in seven years; of Dom Sebastian, for
centuries expected from Moslem lands to restore the
glories of Portugal ; of the Cid Rodrigo, expected back
to do likewise with the kingdom of Castile ; and last,
but not least, of the O'Donoghue who sleeps beneath
the Lakes of Killarney, ready to emerge to right the
wrongs of Erin. With my head full of these and the
like dreams of folklore, I was taken over the scene of
the Battle of the Boyne ; and the car-driver, having
vainly tried to interest me in it, gave me up in despair
as an uncultured savage who felt no interest in the his-
tory of Ireland. However he somewhat changed his
mind when, on reaching the first ancient burial mound,
he saw me disappear underground, fearless of the Fo-
mhoraigh ; and he began to wonder whether I should
ever return to pay him his fare. This in fact was the
sheet anchor of all my hopes ; for I thought that in
case I remained fast in a narrow passage, or lost my
way in the chambers of the prehistoric dead, the jarvey
must fetch me out again. So by the time I had visited
three of these ancient places, Dowth, Knowth, and New
Grange, I had risen considerably in his opinion ; and
he bethought him of stories older than the Battle of

vrii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 483

the Boyne. So he told me on the way back several
bits of something less drearily historical. Among other
things, he pointed in the direction of a place called
Ardee in the county of Louth, where, he said, there is
Garry Geerlaug's enchanted fort full of warriors in
magic sleep, with Garry Geerlaug himself in their midst.
Once on a time a herdsman is said to have strayed into
their hall, he said, and to have found the sleepers each
with his sword and his spear ready to hand. But as
the intruder could not keep his hands off the metal
wealth of the place, the owners of the spears began to
rouse themselves, and the intruder had to flee for his
life. But there that armed host is awaiting the eventful
call to arms, when they are to sally forth to restore
prosperity and glory to Ireland. That was his story,
and I became all attention as soon as I heard of Ardee,
which is in Irish Ath Fhir-dheadh, or the Ford of Fer-
deadh, so called from Fer-deadh, who fought a pro-
tracted duel with Cuchulainn in that ford, where at
the end, according to a well-known Irish story, he fell
by Cuchulainn's hand. I was still more exercised by
the name of Garry Geerlaug, as I recognized in Garry
an Anglo-Irish pronunciation of the Norse name Godh-
freydhr, later Godhroedh, sometimes rendered Godfrey
and sometimes Godred, while in Man and in Scotland
it has become Gorry, which may be heard also in Ireland.
I thought, further, that I recognized the latter part of
Garry Geerlaug's designation as the Norse female nam.e
Geirlaug. There was no complete lack ofGarries in that
part of Ireland in the tenth and eleventh centuries ; but I
have not yet found any historian to identify for me the
warrior named or nicknamed Garry Geerlaug, who is
to return blinking to this world of ours when his nap is
over. Leaving Ireland, I was told the other day of
a place called Tom na Hurich, near Inverness, where

I i 2

^84 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Finn and his following are resting, each on his left
elbow, enjoying a broken sleep while waiting for the
note to be sounded, which is to call them forth. What
they are then to do I have not been told : it may be that
they will proceed at once to solve the Crofter Question,
for there will doubtless be one.

It appears, to come back to Wales, that King Cad-
waladr, who waged an unsuccessful war with the Angles
of Northumbria in the seventh century, was long after
his death expected to return to restore the Brythons to
power. At any rate so one is led in some sort of a hazy
fashion to believe in reading several of the poems in the
manuscript known as the Book of Taliessin. One finds,
however, no trace of Cadwaladr in our cave legends :
the heroes of them are Arthur and Owen Lawgoch.
Now concerning Arthur one need at this point hardly
speak, except to say that the Welsh belief in the eventual
return of Arthur was at one time a powerful motive affect-
ing the behaviour of the people of Wales, as was felt, for
instance, by English statesmen in the reign of Henry II.
But by our time the expected return of Arthur — rexque
futnrns — has dissipated itself into a commonplace of
folklore fitted only to point an allegory, as when Elvet
Lewis, one of the sweetest of living Welsh poets,
sings in a poem entitled Arthur gy da ni, 'Arthur with
us':-

Mae Arthur Fawr yn cysgu, Great Arthur still is sleeping,

A'i detvrion syct o't deniu, His warriors all around him,

A^u gafael ar y cled : With grip upon the steel :

Pan daw yn dyd yn Nghymnt, When dawns the day on Cambry,

Daw Arthur Fawr i fynu Great Arthur forth will sally

Yn fyw^yn fyw oifed! Alive to work her weal!

Not so with regard to the hopes associated with the
name of Owen Lawgoch ; for we have it on Gwynionyd's
testimony, p. 464, that our old hakdwyr or ballad men used
to sing about him at Welsh fairs : it is not in the least

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 485

improbable that they still do so here and there, unless
the horrors of the ghastly murder last reported in the
newspapers have been found to pay better. At any rate
Mr. Fisher (p. 379) has known old people in his native
district in the ILychwr Valley who could repeat stanzas
or couplets from the ballads in question. He traces
these scraps to a booklet entitled Merlin's Prophecy^,
together with a brief history of his life, taken from the
Book of Prognosticatiofi. This little book bears no
date, but appears to have been published in the early
part of the nineteenth century. It is partly in prose,
dealing briefly with the history of Merlin the Wild
or Silvaticus, and the rest consists of two poems.
The first of these poems is entitled Dechren Dar-
ogan Myrd'in, 'the Beginning of Merhn's Prognostica-
tion,' and is made up of forty-nine verses, several of
which speak of Owen as king conquering all his foes
and driving out the Saxons : then in the forty-seventh
stanza comes the couplet which says, that this Owen is
Henry the Ninth, who is tarrying in a foreign land.
The other poem is of a more general character, and is
entitled the Second Song of Merlin's Prognostication,

' I have never seen a copy, but Mr. Fisher gives me the title as follows :
ProphwydoUaeth Myrdin Wyltt yn nghyda ber Hams di Fywyd, wedi en tynu
attan o Lyfr y Daroganan . . . Caerfyrdin . . , Pris dwy Geiniog. It has no
date, but Mr. Fisher once had a copy with the date 1847. Recently he has
come across another versified prophecy written in the same style as the
printed ones, and referring to an Owain who may have been Owen Law-
goch. The personage meant is compared to the most brilliant of pearls,
Owain glain golyaf. The prophecy is to be found at the Swansea Public
Library, and occurs in a seventeenth century manuscript manual of Roman
Catholic Devotion, Latin and Welsh. It gives 1440 as the year of the
deliverance of the Brytaniaid. It forms the first of two poems (fo. 37), the
second of which is ascribed to Taliessin. Such is Mr. Fisher's account of
it, and the lines which he has copied for me cling to the same theme of the
ultimate triumph of the Kymry. Quite recently I have received further
information as to these prophecies from Mr. J. H. Davies, of Lincoln's Inn
(P- 354)) who will, it is to be hoped, soon publish the results of his intimate
Study of their history in South Wales.

486 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

and consists of twenty-six stanzas of four lines each like
the previous one ; but the third stanza describes Arthur's
bell at Caerlleon, ' Caerleon,' ringing with great vigour
to herald the coming of Owen ; and the seventh stanza
begins with the following couplet: —

Ceir givehd Owen Law-goch yn d'od i Frydain Fawr,
Ceir gweled newyn ceiniog yn nhref Gaerlteon-gawr.
Owen Lawgoch one shall to Britain coming see,
And dearth of pennies find at Chester on the Dee.

It closes with the date in verse at the end, to wit, 1668,
which takes us back to very troublous times : 1668 was
the year of the Triple Alliance of England, Sweden,
and Holland against Eouis XIV ; and it was not long
after the Plague had raged, and London had had its
Great Fire. So it is a matter of no great surprise if
some people in Wales had a notion that the power of
England was fast nearing its end, and that the baledwyr
thought it opportune to refurbish and adapt some of
Merlin's prophecies as likely to be acceptable to the
peasantry of South Wales. At all events we have no
reason to suppose that the two poems which have here
been described from Mr. Fisher's data represented
either the gentry of Wales, whose ordinary speech was
probably for the most part English, or the bardic
fraternity, who would have looked with contempt at
the language and style of the Prognostication. For,
apart from careless printing, this kind of literature can
lay no claim to merit in point of diction or of metre.
Such productions represent probably the baledwyr and
the simple country people, such as still listen in rapt
attention to them doing at Welsh fairs and markets what
they are pleased to regard as singing. All this fits in
well enough with the folklore of the caves, such as the
foregoing stories represent it. Here I may add that I
am informed by Mr. Craigfryn Hughes of a tradition

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 487

that Arthur and his men are biding their time near
Caerleon on the Usk, to wit, in a cave resembling
generally those described in the foregoing legends.
He also mentions a tradition as to Owen Glyndwr — so
he calls him, though it is unmistakably the Owen of
the baledwyr who have been referred to by Mr. Fisher —
that he and his men are similarly slumbering in a cave
in Craig Gwrtheyrn, in Carmarthenshire. That is a
spot in the neighbourhood of ILandyssil, consisting of
an elevated field terminating on one side in a sharp
declivity, with the foot of the rock laved by the stream
of the Teifi. Craig Gwrtheyrn means Vortigern's
Rock, and it is one of the sites with which legend
associates the name of that disreputable old king. I am
not aware that it shows any traces of ancient works, but
it looks at a distance an ideal site for an old fortification.
An earlier prophecy about Owen Lawgoch than any
of these occurs, as kindly pointed out to me by
Mr. Gwenogvryn Evans, in the Peniarth MS. 94
(= Hengwrt MS. 412, p. 23), and points back possibly
to the last quarter of the fourteenth century. See also
one quoted by him, from the Mostyn MS. 133, in his
Report on MSS. in the Welsh Language, i. 106. Prob-
ably many more such prophecies might be discovered
if anybody undertook to make a systematic search for
them.

But who was Owen Lawgoch, if there ever was such
a man ? Such a man there was undoubtedly ; for we
read in one of the documents printed in the miscel-
laneous volume commonly known as the Record of
Carnarvon, that at a court held at Conway in the forty-
fourth year of Edward III a certain Gruffyd Says was
adjudged to forfeit all the lands which he held in
Anglesey to the Prince of Wales — who was at that time
no other than Edward the Black Prince— for the reason

488 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

that the said Gruffyd had been an adherent of Owen :
adherens fuisset Owino Lawegogh (or Lawgogh) inhnico
et proditori predicti domini Principis et de consilio predicti
Owyni ad mouendam guerram in Wallia contra predictum
dominiim Principem ^. How long previously it had been
attempted to begin a war on behalf of this Owen Law-
goch one cannot say, but it so happens that at this time
there was a captain called Yeuwains, Yewains, or Yvain
de Gales or Galles, ' Owen of Wales,' fighting on the
French side against the English in Edward's Continental
wars. Froissart in his Chronicles has a great deal to say
of him, for he distinguished himself greatly on various
critical occasions. From the historian's narrative one
finds that Owen had escaped when a boy to the court of
Philip VI of France, who received him with great favour
and had him educated with his own nephews. Frois-
sart's account of him is, that the king of England,
Edward III, had slain his father and given his
lordship and principality to his own son as Prince of
Wales ; and Froissart gives Owen's father's name as
Aymon, which should mean Edmond, unless the name
intended may have been rather Einion. However that
may have been, Owen was engaged in the Battle of
Poitiers in 1356, and when peace was made he went to
serve in Lombardy ; but when war between England and
France broke out again in 1369, he returned to France.
He sometimes fought on sea and sometimes on land,
but he was always entrusted by the French king, who
was now Charles V, with important commands \ Thus

' 7?.fo,^o/Car««r.o«, p. 133, to which attention was called by me in the
Report of the Welsh Land Commission, p. 648: see now The Welsh People,
PP- 343-4, 593-4.

therf w "^n ^'^f" ?' °"'^ Welshman in the king of France's service:
Lreatlv fn h m" ' "^"'^"^"' ^^° "" °"^ °^^^^'°" distinguished himself
editor ha, fH . ' " '"""' ^" ^'"^'^^^^''^ ^-^ D-^d House, but the
editor has found from other documents that the name was Honvel

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 489

in 1372 he was placed at the head of a flotilla with 3,000
men, and ordered to operate against the English : he
made a descent on the Isle of Guernsey \ and while there
besieging the castle of Cornet, he was charged by the
king of France to sail to Spain to invite the king of
Castile to send his fleet again to help in the attack on
La Rochelle, Whilst staying at Santander the earl of
Pembroke was brought thither, having been taken
prisoner in the course of the destruction of the English
fleet before La Rochelle. Owen, on seeing the earl of
Pembroke, asks him with bitterness if he is come there
to do him homage for his land, of which he had taken
possession in Wales. He threatens to avenge himself
on him as soon as he can, and also on the earl of
Hereford and Edward Spencer, for it was by the
fathers of these three men, he said, his own father had
been betrayed to death. Edward HI died in 1377, and
the Black Prince had died shortly before. Owen sur-
vived them both, and was actively engaged in the siege
of Mortagne sur Mer in Poitou, when he was assassi-
nated by one Lamb, who had insinuated himself into his
service and confidence, partly by pretending to bring

Flinc, which is doubtless Howel, whatever the second vocable may have
been : see Froissart, viii, pp. xxxviii, 69.

1 As to the original destination of the flotilla, see Kervyn de Lettenhove's
edition of Froissart (Brussels, 1870-7), viii. 435-7j where the editor has
brought together several notes, from which it appears that Owen tried
unsuccessfully to recruit an army in Spain, but that he readily got together
in France a considerable force. For Charles V, on May 8, 1372, ordered
the formation of an army, to be placed under Owen's command for the
reconquest of his ancestors' lands in Wales, and two days later Owen issued
a declaration as to his Welsh claims and his obligations to the French king;
but the flotilla stopped short with Guernsey. It is not improbable, however,
that the fear in England of a descent on Wales by Owen began at least as
early as 1369. In his declaration Owen calls himself Tt/rt/H de Gales, which
approaches the Welsh spelling £:w^/«, more frequently Yiuein, modern Ywatn,
except that all these forms tended to be supplanted by Ouain or Oivm.
This last is, strictly speaking, the colloquial form, just as Howel is the
colloquial form of Hywel, and bowyd of bywyd, ' life.'

^go CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

him news about his native land and teUing him that all
Wales was longing to have him back to be the lord of
his country—^/ liii fist acroire que toiite li terre de Gales
le desiroient mout a ravoir a seigneur. So Owen fell in
the year 1378, and was buried at the church of Saint-
Leger •, while Lamb returned to the English to receive his
stipulated pay. When this happened Owen's namesake,
Owen Glyndwr, was nearly thirty years of age. The
latter was eventually to assert with varying fortune on
several fields of battle in this country the claims of
his elder kinsman, who, by virtue of his memory in
France, would seem to have rendered it easy for the
later Owen to enter into friendly relations with the
French court of his day I

Now as to Yvain de Galles, the Rev. Thomas Price
(Carnhuanawc) in his Hanes Cymru, ' History of Wales,'
devotes a couple of pages, 735-7, to Froissart's ac-
count of him, and he points out that Angharad ILwyd,
in her edition of Sir John Wynne's History of the Gwydir
Family ^, had found Owen Lawgoch to have been Owen

' For the account of Owen's life see the Chroniques de J. Froissart publiees
pour la Societe de I'Histoire de France, edited with abstracts and notes by
Simeon Luce, more especially vols. viii. pp. 44-9, 64, 66-71, 84, 122,
190, and ix. pp. 74-9, where a summary is given of his life and a com-
plete account of his death. In Lord Berners' translation, published in
Henry VIII's time, Owen is called Yuan of Wales, as if anybody could even
glance at the romances without finding that Owen ab Urien, for instance,
became in French Ywains or Ivains le fils Urien in the nominative, and Ywain
or Ivaiti in regime. Thomas Johnes of Hafod, whose translation was
published in 1803-6, betrays still greater ignorance by giving him the modern
name Evan ; but he had the excuse of being himself a Welshman.

- For copies of some of the documents in point see Rymer's Fcedera, viii.
356, 365 > 382.

^ I have not been able to find a copy of this work, and for drawing my
attention to the passage in Hanes Cymru I have again to thank Mr. Fisher.
The pedigree in question will be found printed in Table I in Askew Roberts'
edition of Sir John Wynne's History of the Gwydir Family (Oswestry, 1878) ;
and a note, apparently copied from Miss ILwyd, states that it was in a
Hengwrt MS. she found the identification of Owen Lawgoch. The editor
surmises that to refer to p. 865 of Hengwrt MS. 351, which he represents as

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 491

ab Thomas ab Rhodri, brother to ILewelyn, the last
native prince of Wales. One of the names, however,
among other things, forms a difficulty: why did Froissart
call Yvain's father Aymon ? So it is clear that a more
searching study of Welsh pedigrees and other documents,
including those at the Record Office \ has to be made
before Owen can be satisfactorily placed in point of
succession. For that he was in the right line to succeed
the native princes of Wales is suggested both by the
eagerness with which all Wales was represented as
looking to his return to be the lord of the country, and
by the opening words of Froissart in describing what
he had been robbed of by Edward III, as being both
lordship and principality — la signovirie et princete. Be
that as it may, there is, it seems to me, little doubt that
Yvain de Galles was no other than the Owen Lawgoch,
whose adherent Gruffyd Says was deprived of his land
and property in the latter part of Edward's reign. In
the next place, there is hardly room for doubt that the
Owen Lawgoch here referred to was the same man
whom the baledwyr in their jumble of prophecies in-
tended to be Henry the Ninth, that is to say the Welsh
successor to the last Tudor king, Henry VIII, and that
he was at the same time the hero of the cave legends of

being a copy of Hengwrt MS. 96 in the handwriting of Robert Vaughan the
Antiquary.

' This has already been undertaken : on Feb. 7, 1900, a summary of this
chapter was read to a meeting of the Hon. Society of Cymmrodorion, and
six weeks later Mr. Edward Owen, of Gray's Inn, read an elaborate paper
in which he essayed to fix more exactly Yvain de Galles' place in the history
of Wales. It would be impossible here to do justice to his reasoning,
based as it was on a careful study of the records in point. Let it suffice for
the present, however, that the paper will in due course appear in the
Society's Transactions. Mr. J. H. Davies also informs me that he is
bringing together items of evidence, which tend, as he thinks, to show that
Miss ILwyd's information was practically correct. Before, however, the ques-
tion can be considered satisfactorily answered, some explanation will have
to be offered of Froissart's statement, that Yvain's father's name was Aymon.

492 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

divers parts of the Principality, especially South Wales,
as already indicated.

Now without being able to say why Owen and his
analogues should become the heroes of cave legends
contemplating a second advent, it is easy to point to
circumstances which facilitated their doing so. It is
useless to try to discuss the question of Arthur's dis-
appearance; but take Garry Geerlaug, for instance,
a roving Norseman, as we may suppose from his name,
who may have suddenly disappeared with his followers,
never more to be heard of in the east of Ireland. In the
absence of certain news of his death, it was all the
easier to imagine that he was dozing quietly away in
an enchanted fortress. Then as to King Cadwaladr,
who was also, perhaps, to have returned to this world,
so little is known concerning his end that historians
have no certainty to this day when or where he died.
So much the readier therefore would the story gain
currency that he was somewhere biding his time to
come back to retrieve his lost fortunes. Lastly, there
is Owen Lawgoch, the magic of whose name has only
been dissipated in our own day : he died in France in
the course of a protracted war with the kings of England.
It is not likely, then, that the peasantry of Wales could
have heard anything definite about his fate. So here
also the circumstances were favourable to the cave
legend and the dream that he was, whether at home or
abroad, only biding his time. Moreover, in all these
cases the hope-inspiring delusion gained currency
among a discontented people, probably, who felt the
sore need of a deliverer to save them from oppression
or other grievous hardships of their destiny.

The question can no longer be prevented from pre-
sentmg itself as to the origin of this idea of a second
advent of a hero of the past; but in that form it is too

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS 493

large for discussion here, and it would involve a review,
for instance, of one of the cardinal beliefs of the Latter-
day Saints as to the coming of Christ to reign on earth,
and other doctrines supposed to be derived from the
New Testament. On the other hand, there is no logical
necessity why the expected deliverer should have been
in the world before: witness the Jews, who are looking
forward not to the return but to the birth and first
coming of their Messiah. So the question here may be
confined more or less strictly to its cave-legend form ; and
though I cannot answer it, some advance in the direc-
tion whence the answer should come may perhaps be
made. In the first place, one will have noticed that
Arthur and Owen Lawgoch come more or less in one
another's way ; and the presumption is that Owen Law-
goch has been to a certain extent ousting Arthur, who
may be regarded as having the prior claim, not to men-
tion that in the case of the Gwr Blew cave, p. 481, Owen
is made by an apparently recent version of the story to
evict from his lair a commonplace robber of no special
interest. In other words, the Owen Lawgoch legend
is, so to say, detected spreading itself ^ That is very
possibly just what had happened at a remoter period in
the case of the Arthur legend itself. In other words,
Arthur has taken the place of some ancient divinity,
such as that dimly brought within our ken by Plutarch
in the words placed at the head of this chapter. He
reproduces the report of a certain Demetrius, sent by
the emperor of Rome to reconnoitre and inspect the
coasts of Britain. It was to the effect that around

^ We seem also to have an instance in point in Carmarthenshire, where
legend represents Owen and his men sleeping in Ogof Myrdin, the name of
which means Merlin's Cave, and seems to concede priority of tenancy to
the great magician : see the extinct periodical Golud yr 0« (for 1863), i. 253,
which I find to have been probably drawing on Eliezcr Williams' English
Works (London, 1840), p. 156.

494 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Britain lay many uninhabited islands, some of which
are named after deities and some after heroes ; and of
the islands inhabited, he visited the one nearest to the
uninhabited ones. Of this the dwellers were few, but
the people of Britain treated them as sacrosanct and
inviolable in their persons. Among other things, they
related to him how terrible storms, diseases, and por-
tents happened on the occasion of any one of the mighty
leaving this life. He adds : — * Moreover there is, they
said, an island in which Cronus is imprisoned, with
Briareus keeping guard over him as he sleeps ; for, as
they put it, sleep is the bond forged for Cronus. They
add that around him are many divinities, his henchmen
and attendants'.'

What divinity, Celtic or pre-Celtic, this may have
been who recalled Cronus or Saturn to the mind of
the Roman officer, it is impossible to say. It is to be
noticed that he sleeps and that his henchmen are with
him, but no allusion is made to treasure. No more is
there, however, in Mr. Fisher's version of the story of
Ogo'r ©inas, which, according to him, says that Arthur
and his warriors there lie sleeping with their right hands
clasping the hilts of their drawn swords, ready to en-
counter any one who may venture to disturb their
repose. On the other hand, legends about cave treasure
are probably very ancient, and in some at least of our
stories the safe keeping of such treasure must be re-
garded as the original object of the presence of the
armed host.

The permission supposed to be allowed an intruder
to take away a reasonable quantity of the cave gold.

For the Greek text of the entire passage see the Didot edition of
Plutarch, vol. iii. p. 511 {J)e Defedu Oraculorum, xviii) ; also my Arthurian
Legend, pp. 367-8. It is curious to note that storms have, in a way, been
associated in England with the death of her great men as recently as that
of the celebrated Duke of Wellington ; see Choice Notes, p. 270.

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS

495

I should look at in the light of a sort of protest on the
part of the story-teller against the niggardliness of the
cave powers. I cannot help suspecting in the same
way that the presence of a host of armed warriors to
guard some piles of gold and silver for unnumbered
ages must have struck the fancy of the story-tellers as
disproportionate, and that this began long ago to cause
a modification in the form of the legends. That is to
say, the treasure sank into a mere accessory of the
presence of the armed men, who are not guarding any
such thing so much as waiting for the destined hour
when they are to sally forth to make lost causes win.
Originally the armed warriors were in some instances
presumably the henchmen of a sleeping divinity, as in
the story told to Demetrius ; but perhaps oftener they
were the guardians of treasure, just as much as the
invisible agencies are, which bring on thunder and
lightning and portents when any one begins to dig at
Dinas Emrys or other spots where ancient treasure
lies hidden. There is, it must be admitted, no objec-
tion to regarding the attendants of a divinity as at the
same time the guardians of his treasure. In none,
however, of these cave stories probably may we sup-
pose the principal figure to have originally been that of
the hero expected to return among men : he, when
found in them, is presumably to be regarded as a com-
paratively late interloper. But it is, as already hinted,
not to be understood that the notion of a returning hero
is itself a late one. Quite the contrary ; and the ques-
tion then to be answered is. Where was that kind of
hero supposed to pass his time till his return ? There
is only one answer to which Welsh folklore points, and
that is. In fairyland. This is also the teaching of the
ancient legend about Arthur, who goes away to the Isle
of Avallon to be healed of his wounds by the fairy

496 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

maiden Morgen ; and, according to an anonymous
poet \ it is in her charms that one should look for the
reason why Arthur tarries so long : —

Iinntodice Icesus Arthurus tendit ad aulam
Regis Avallonis, ttbi virgo regia, vulnus
Illius tractans, sanati membra reservat
Ipsa sibi: vivuntqite simul, si credere fas est.

Avallon's court see suffering Arthur reach :
His wounds are healed, a royal maid the leech ;
His pains assuaged, he now with her must dwell,
If we hold true what ancient legends tell.

Here may be cited by way of comparison Walter
Mapes' statement as to the Trinio, concerning whom he
was quoted in the first chapter, p. 72 above. He says,
that as Trinio was never seen after the losing battle,
in which he and his friends had engaged with a neigh-
bouring chieftain, it was believed in the district around
ILyn Syfadon, that Trinio's fairy mother had rescued
him from the enemy and taken him away with her to
her home in the lake. In the case of Arthur it is, as
we have seen, a fairy also or a lake lady that intervenes ;
and there cannot be much room for doubt, that the
story representing him going to fairyland to be healed
is far older than any which pictures him sleeping in a
cave with his warriors and his gold all around him. As
for the gold, however, it is abundantly represented as
nowhere more common than in the home of the fairies:
so this metal treated as a test cannot greatly help us in
essaying the distinction here suggested. With regard
to Owen Lawgoch, however, one is not forced to sup-
pose that he was ever believed to have sojourned in
Faery: the legendary precedent of Arthur as a cave
sleeper would probably suffice to open the door for
him to enter the recesses of Craig y Dinas, as soon as

for rtdenLlf f'" ^'^"'^' ^^ ^^'^ ^ """ '"^^^^'^^ 'o Professor Morfill
lor rendering the hexameters into English verse.

viii] WELSH CAVE LEGENDS

497

the country folk began to grow weary of waiting for his
return. In other words, most of our cave legends have
combined together two sets of popular belief originally
distinct, the one referring to a hero gone to the world
of the fairies and expected some day to return, and the
other to a hero or god enjoying an enchanted sleep
with his retinue all around him. In some of our
legends, however, such as that of ILanciau Eryri, the
process of combining the two sets of story has been
left to this day incomplete.

j^ X^^Ko-b

901 U/cct n-,th -^T T

CHAPTER IX

Place-name Stories

The Dindsenchas is a collection of stories {senchasa), in Middle-Irish prose
and verse, about the names of noteworthy places (dind) in Ireland— plains^
mountains, ridges, cairns, lakes, rivers, fords, estuaries, islands, and so
forth. . . . But its value to students of Irish folklore, romance (sometimes
called history), and topography has long been recognized by competent
authorities, such as Petrie, O'Donovan, and Mr. Alfred Nutt.

Whitley Stokes.

In the previous chapters some folklore has been
produced in which we have swine figuring : see more
especially that concerned with the Hwch Du Gwta,
pp. 224-6 above. Now I wish to bring before the
reader certam other groups of swine legends not
vouched for by oral tradition so much as found in
manuscripts more or less ancient. The first three to
be mentioned occur in one of the Triads \ I give the
substance of it in the three best known versions, pre-

* They are produced here in their order as printed at the beginning
of the second volume of the Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales, and the
series or versions are indicated as i, ii, iii. Version ii will be found printed
in the third volume of the Cynmirodor, pp. 52-61, also in the Oxford
Mabinogion, pp. 297-308, from the Red Book of Hergest of the fourteenth
century. The letter (a, b, c) added is intended to indicate the order of the
three parts of the Triad, for it is not the same in all the series. Let me
here remark in a general way that the former fondness of the Welsh for
Triads was not peculiar to them. The Irish also must have been at one
time addicted to this grouping. Witness the Triad of Cleverest Count-
ings, in the Book of the Dun Cow, fol. 58", and the Triad of the Blemishes
of the Women of Ulster, ib. 43''.

PLACE-NAME STORIES 499

mising that the Triad is entitled that of the Three Stout
Swineherds of the Isle of Prydain : —

i. 30^: — Drystan^ son of Tattwch who guarded the
swine of March son of Meirchion while the swineherd
went to bid Essyttt come to meet him : at the same
time Arthur sought to have one sow by fraud or force,
and failed.

ii. 56^ : — Drystan son of TaHwch with the swine of
March ab Meirchion while the swineherd went on a
message to Essyttt. Arthur and March and Cai and
Bedwyr came all four to him, but obtained from Drystan
not even as much as a single porker, whether by force,
by fraud, or by theft.

iii. loi'' : — The third was Trystan son of Tattwch,
who guarded the swine of March son of Meirchion
while the swineherd had gone on a message to Essyttt
to bid her appoint a meeting with Trystan. Now
Arthur and Marchett and Cai and Bedwyr undertook
to go and make an attempt on him, but they proved
unable to get possession of as much as one porker
either as a gift or as a purchase, whether by fraud, by
force, or by theft.

In this story the well-known love of Drystan and
Essyttt is taken for granted ; but the whole setting is so
peculiar and so unlike that of the storj'- of Tristan and
Iselt or Iseut in the romances, that there is no reason
to suppose it in any way derived from the latter.
The next portion of the Triad runs thus :—
i. 20^ : — And Pryderi son of Pwytt of Annwvyn who
guarded the swine of Pendaran of Dyfed in the Glen of
the Cuch in Emlyn.

ii. 56=^ :— Pryderi son of Pwytt Head of Annwn with
the swine of Pendaran of Dyfed his foster father. The

» As to the names Drystan (also Trystan) and Essyttt, sec the footnote on
p. 480 above.

K k 2

500 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

swine were the seven brought away by Pwytt Head of
Annwn and given by him to Pendaran of Dyfed his
foster father ; and the Glen of the Cuch was the place
where they were kept. The reason why Pryderi is
called a mighty swineherd is that no one could prevail
over him either by fraud or by force ^

iii. loi^:— The first was Pryderi son of Pwytt of
Pendaran in Dyfed ^ who guarded his father's swine
while he was in Annwn, and it was in the Glen of the
Cuch that he guarded them.

The history of the pigs is given, so to say, in the
Mabinogion. Pwytt had been able to strike up a friend-
ship and even an alliance with Arawn king of Annwvyn^
or Annwn, which now means Hades or the other world ;
and they kept up their friendship partly by exchanging
presents of horses, greyhounds, falcons, and any other
things calculated to give gratification to the receiver of
them. Among other gifts which Pryderi appears to
have received from the king of Annwn were hobeii or
moch, ' pigs, swine,' which had never before been heard
of in the island of Prydain. The news about this new
race of animals, and that they formed sweeter food than
oxen, was not long before it reached Gwyned; and we
shall presently see that there was another story which

This was meant to explain the unusual term g6rdueichyat, also written
g6rdueichat, gSrueichyat, and gwrddfcichiad. This last comes in the modern
spelling of iii. lor, where this clause is not put in the middle of the Triad
but at the end.

* The editor of this version seems to have supposed Pendaran to have
been a place in Dyfed ! But his ignorance leaves us no evidence that he
had a difierent story before him.

' This word is found written in Mod. Welsh Annwfn, but it has been
mostly superseded by the curtailed form Annwn, which appears twice in the
Mabinogi of Math. These words have been studied by M. Gaidoz in Meyer
and Stern's ZeUschrift fiir Celtische Philologie, i. 29-34, where he equates
Annwfn with the Breton anauon, which is a plural used collectively for the
souls of the departed, the other world. His view, however, of these
interestmg words has since been mentioned in the same ZeUschrift, iii. 184-5,
and opposed in the Annales de Bretagne, xi. 488.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 501

flatly contradicts this part of the Triad, namely to the
effect that Gwydion, nephew of Math king of Gwyned
and a great magician, came to Pryderi's court at Rhudlan,
near Dolau Bach or Highmead on the Teifi in what is
now the county of Cardigan, and obtained some of the
swine by deceiving the king. But, to pass by that for
the present, I may say that Dyfed seems to have been
famous for rearing swine ; and at the present day one
affects to believe in the neighbouring districts that the
chief industry in Dyfed, more especially in South Car-
diganshire, consists in the rearing of parsons, carpenters,
and pigs. Perhaps it is also worth mentioning that the
people of the southern portion of Dyfed are nicknamed
by the men of Glamorgan to this day Moch Sir Beiifro,
' the Pigs of Pembrokeshire.'

But why so much importance attached to pigs?
I cannot well give a better answer than the reader can
himself supply if he will only consider what role the pig
plays in the domestic economy of modern Ireland.
But, to judge from old Irish literature, it was even more
so in ancient times, as pigs' meat was so highly ap-
preciated, that under some one or other of its various
names it usually takes its place at the head of all flesh
meats in Irish stories. This seems the case, for instance,
in the medieval story called the Vision of MacCon-
glinne ^ ; and, to go further back, to the Feast of Bricriu
for instance, one finds it decidedly the case with the
Champion's Portion ^ at that stormy banquet. Then
one may mention the story of the fatal feast on Mac-
Datho's great swine =*, where that beast would have
apparently sufficed for the braves both of Connaught

1 Edited by Professor Kuno Meyer (London, 1892): see for instance
pp. 76-8.

^ See Windisch's Irische Texte^ p. 256, and now the Irish Text Society's
Fled Bricrend, edited with a translation by George Henderson, pp. 8, 9.

^ Windisch, ibid. pp. 99-105,

;o2

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

and Ulster had Conall Cernach carved fair, and not
given more than their share to his own Ultonian friends
in order to insult the Connaught men by leaving them
nothing but the fore-legs. It is right, however, to point
out that most of the stories go to show, that the gour-
mands of ancient Erin laid great stress on the pig being
properly fed, chiefly on milk and the best kind of meal.
It cannot have been very different in ancient Wales ; for
we read in the story of Peredur that, when he sets out
from his mother's home full of his mother's counsel, he
comes by-and-by to a pavihon, in front of which he sees
food, some of which he proceeds to take according to
his mother's advice, though the gorgeously dressed lady
sitting near it has not the politeness to anticipate his
wish. It consisted, we are told, of two bottles of wine,
two loaves of white bread, and collops of a milk-fed pig's
flesh ^ The home of the fairies was imagined to be
a land of luxury and happiness with which nothing could
compare in this world. In this certain Welsh and Irish
stories agree ; and in one of the latter, where the king of
the fairies is trying to persuade the queen of Ireland to
elope with him, we find that among the many induce-
ments offered her are fresh pig, sweet milk, and ale^.
Conversely, as the fairies were considered to be always
living and to be a very old-fashioned and ancient people,

' See the Oxford Mabinogion, p. 196, and Guest's trans., i. 302, where the
Welsh words a gol6ython o gic mcluoch are rendered ' and collops of the
flesh of the wild boar,' which can hardly be correct ; for the melm tnel-uoch,
or mel-foch in the modern spelling, is the equivalent of the Irish ntelg,
' milk.' So the word must refer either to a pig that had been fed on cows'
milk or else a sucking pig. The former is the more probable meaning, but
one is not helped to decide by the fact, that the word is still sometimes used
in books by writers who imagine that they have here the word ntel, ' honey,'
and that the compound means pigs whose flesh is as sweet as honey : see
Dr. Pughe's Dictionary, where melfoch is rendered ' honey swine,' whatever
that may mean.

^ Windisch's Irische Tcxte, p. 133, where laiih kmnacht ^ Welsh ifaeth
ite/rith, ' sweet milk.'

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 503

it was but natural to suppose that they had the animals
which man found useful, such as horses, cattle, and sheep,
except that they were held to be of superior breeds, as
they are represented, for instance, in our lake legends.
Similarly, it is natural enough that other stories should
ascribe to them also the possession of herds of swine ;
and all this prior to man's having an3^ The next step
in the reasoning would be that man had obtained his
from the fairies. It is some tradition of this kind that
possibly suggested the line taken by the Pwytt story
in the matter of the derivation of the pig from Annwn :
see the last chapter.

The next story in the Triad is, if possible, wilder still :
it runs as follows : —

i. 20° : — CoH son of Cottfrewi^ who guarded Henwen^,
Dattweir Dattben's sow, which went burrowing as far
as the Headland of Awstin in Kernyw and then took to
the sea. It was at Aber Torogi in Gwent Is-coed that
she came to land, with Colt keeping his grip on her
bristles whatever way she went by sea or by land. Now
in Maes Gwenith, ' Wheat Field,' in Gwent she dropped
a grain of wheat and a bee, and thenceforth that has
been the best place for wheat. Then she went as far
as ILonwen in Penfro and there dropped a grain of
barley and a bee, and thenceforth ILonwen has been the
best place for barley. Then she proceeded to Rhiw
Gyferthwch in Eryri and dropped a wolf-cub and an
eagle-chick. These Cott gave away, the eagle to the

* Cotifrewi yva.s probably, like Gwenfrewi, a woman's name : this is a point
of some importance when taken in connexion with what was said at p. 326
above as to Gwydion and Cott's magic.

^ This reminds one of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Henvinus, whom he makes
into dux Conmbice and father of Cunedagitis or Ctomta : see ii. 12, 15. Pro-
bably Geoffrey's connecting such names as those of Cuneda and Dyfnwal
Moelmud (ii. 17) with Cornwall is due to the fact, that the name of the
Dumnonia of the North had been forgotten long before that of the Dumnonia
to be identified with Devon and Cornwall.

504 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Goidel Brynach from the North, and the wolf to Men-
waed of Arltechwed, and they came to be known as
Menwaed's Wolf and Brynach's Eagle. Then the sow
went as far as the Maen Du at ILanfair in Arfon, and
there she dropped a kitten, and that kitten Colt cast
into the Menai : that came later to be known as Cath
Paluc, ' Palug's Cat.'

ii_ 56°:— The third was CoH son of Kattureuy with
the swine of Dattwyr Datlben in Dattwyr's Glen in
Kernyw. Now one of the swine was with young- and
Henwen was her name; and it was foretold that the
Isle of Prydain would be the worse for her litter ; and
Arthur collected the host of Prydain and went about to
destroy it. Then one sow went burrowing, and at the
Headland of Hawstin in Kernyw she took to the sea
with the swineherd following her. And in Maes
Gwenith in Gwent she dropped a grain of wheat and
a bee, and ever since Maes Gwenith is the best place for
wheat and bees. And at ILonyon in Penfro she dropped
a grain of barley and another of wheat : therefore the
barley of ILonyon has passed into a proverb. And on
Rhiw Gyferthwch in Arfon she dropped a wolf-cub and
an eagle-chick. The wolf was given to Mergaed and the
eagle to Breat a prince from the North, and they were
the worse for having them. And at ILanfair in Arfon,
to wit below the Maen Du, she dropped a kitten, and
from the Maen Du the swmeherd cast it into the sea,
but the sons of Paluc reared it to their detriment.
It grew to be Cath Paluc, ' Palug's Cat,' and proved
one of the three chief molestations of Mona reared in
the island : the second was Daronwy and the third was
Edwin king of England.

iii. 101'' :— The second was Cott son of Cottfrewi who
guarded Daltwaran Dattben's sow, that came burrowing
as far as the Headland of Penwedic in Kernyw and

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 505

then took to the sea; and she came to land at Aber
Tarogi in Gwent Is-coed with Cott keeping his hold of
her bristles whithersoever she went on sea or land. At
Maes Gwenith in Gwent she dropped three grains of
wheat and three bees, and ever since Gwent has the
best wheat and bees. From Gwent she proceeded to
Dyfed and dropped a grain of barley and a porker, and
ever since Dyfed has the best barley and pigs : it was
in ILonnio ILonnwen these were dropped. Afterwards
she proceeded to Arfon {sic) and in ILeyn she dropped
the grain of rye, and ever since ILeyn and Eifionyd
have the best rye. And on the side of Rhiw Gyferthwch
she dropped a wolf-cub and an eagle-chick. Coll gave
the eagle to Brynach the Goidel of Dinas Affaraon, and
the wolf to Menwaed lord of Arttechwed, and one often
hears of Brynach's Wolf and Menwaed's Eagle [the
writer was careless : he has made the owners exchange
pests]. Then she went as far as the Maen Du in Arfon,
where she dropped a kitten and Colt cast it into the
Menai. That was the Cath Balwg [sic), * Palug's Cat ' :
it proved a molestation to the Isle of Mona subse-
quently.

Such are the versions we have of this story, and
a few notes on the names seem necessary before pro-
ceeding further. Cott is called Colt son of Cotlurewy
in i. 30, and Cott son of Kattureuy in ii. 56 : all that is
known of him comes from other Triads, i. 32-3, ii. 20,
and iii. 90. The first two tell us that he was one of
the Three chief Enchanters of the Isle of Prydain, and
that he was taught his magic by Rhudlwm the Giant;
while ii. 20 calls the latter a dwarf and adds that Cott
was nephew to him. The matter is differently put in
iii. 90, to the effect that Rhudlwm the Giant learnt his
magic from Eid[il]ig the Dwarf and from Colt son of
Cottfrewi. Nothing is known of Dattwyr's Glen in

5o6 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Kernyw, or of the person after whom it was named.
Kernyw is the Welsh for Cornwall, but if Penryn
Awstin or Hawstin is to be identified with Aust Cliff
on the Severn Sea in Gloucestershire, the story would
seem to indicate a time when Cornwall extended north-
eastwards as far as that point. The later Triad, iii. loi,
avoids Penryn Awstin and substitutes Penwed"ic, which
recalls some such a name as Pengwaed ^ or Penwith in
Cornwall : elsewhere Penwedic ^ is only given as the
name of the most northern hundred of Keredigion.
Gwent Is-coed means Gwent below the Wood or
Forest, and Aber Torogi or Tarogi — omitted, probably
by accident, in ii. 56 — is now Caldicot Pill, where the
small river Tarogi, now called Troggy, discharges itself
not very far from Portskewet. Maes Gwenith in the
same neighbourhood is still known by that name. The
correct spelling of the name of the place in Penfro was
probably ILonyon, but it is variously given as ILonwen,
ILonyon, and ILonion, not to mention the ILonnio
ILonnwen of the later form of the Triad : should this
last prove to be based on any authority one might
suggest ILonyon Henwen, so called after the sow, as
the original. The modern Welsh spelling of ILonyon
would be Lonion, and it is identified by Mr. Egerton
Phillimore with Lanion near Pembroke ^. Rhiw Gyfer-
thwch is guessed to have been one of the slopes of
Snowdon on the Bedgelert side; but I have failed to
discover anybody who has ever heard the name used
in that neighbourhood.
Arttechwed was, roughly speaking, that part of Car-

^ See the Oxford Mabinogion, p. 104, and the Oxford Bniis, p. 292.

^ See the Oxford Bruts, pp. 299, 317, 345-6, 348, 384. ' I learn from
Prof. Anwyl that Castett Penwedig is still remembered at ILanfihangel
Ge^nau'r Glyn as the old name of Castett Gwattter in that parish.

^ See his note in Owen's Pembrokeshire, p. 237, where he also notices
Aber Tarogi, and the editor's notes to p. 55.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 507

narvonshire which drains into the sea between Conway
and Bangor. Brynach and Menwaed or Mengwaed ^
seem to be the names underlying the misreadings in
ii. 56 ; but it is quite possible that Brynach, probably
for an Irish Bronach, has here superseded an earlier
Urnach or Eurnach also a Goidel, to whom I shall
have to return in another chapter. Dinas Affaraon - is
the place called Dinas Ffaraon Dande in the story of
Lud and ILevelys, where we are told that after ILud had
had the two dragons buried there, which had been dug
up at the centre of his realm, to wit at Oxford, Ffaraon,
after whom the place was called, died of grief. Later it
came to be called Dinas Emrys from Myrdin Emrys,
' Merhnus Ambrosius,' who induced Vortigern to go
away from there in quest of another pFace to build his
castled So the reader will see that the mention of this
Dinas brings us back to a weird spot with which he has
been familiarized in the previous chapter : see pp. 469,
495 above. ILanfair in Arfon is ILanfair Is-gaer near
Port Dinorwic on the Menai Straits, and the Maen Du
should be a black rock or black stone on the southern
side of those straits. Daronwy and Cath Paluc are
both personages on whom light is still wanted. Lastly,
by Edwin king of England is to be understood Edwin

^ Mergaed for Mengwaed hardly requires any explanation ; and as to
Breat or rather Vreat, as it occurs in mutation, we have only to suppose the
original carelessly written Vreac for Vreach, and we have the usual error of
neglecting the stroke indicating the ;/, and the very common one of confound-
ing c with ^. This first-mentioned name should possibly be analysed into
Mengw-aed or Menw-aed for an Irish Menb-acd, with the ynenb, ' little,' noticed
at p. 510 below; in that case one might compare such compounds of Aed
as Bco-aed &nA Lug-aed in the Martyrology of Gorman. Should this prove
well founded the Mod. Welsh transcription of Memmcd should be Memvaed.
I have had the use of other versions of the Triads from MSS. in the Pcniarth
collection ; but they contribute nothing of any great importance as regards
the proper names in the passages here in question.

^ See the Oxford Mabinogion, pp. 41, 98, and Guest's trans., iii. 313.

= See Geoffrey's Hisloria Rcgitiii Britannia', vi. 19, viii. 1,3; also Giraldus,
ItiHcrariuin Kambnce^ ii. 8 (p. 133).

5o8 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

king of the Angles of Deira and Bernicia, whom Welsh
tradition represents as having found refuge for a time
in Anglesey.

Now this story as a whole looks like a sort of device
for stringing together explanations of the origin of
certain place-names and of certain local characteristics.
Leaving entirely out of the reckoning the whole of Mid-
Wales, that is to say, the more Brythonic portion of the
country, it is remarkable as giving to South Wales credit
for certain resources, but to North Wales for pests alone
and scourges, except that the writer of the late version
bethought himself of ILeyn and Eifionydas having good
land for growing rye ; but he was very hazy as to the
geography of North Wales — both he and the redactors
of the other Triatds equally belonged doubtless to South
Wales. Among the place-names, Maes Gwenith, ' the
Wheat Field,' is clear; but hardly less so is the case
of Aber Torogi, * Mouth of the Troggy,' where torogi
is ' the pregnancy of animals/ from torrog, ' being with
young.' So with Rhiw Gyferthwch, * the Hillside or
Ascent of Cyferthwch,' where cyferthwch means * pant-
ings, pangs, labour.' The name Maen Du, ' Black
Rock,' is left to explain itself; and I am not sure that
the original story was not so put as also to explain
Lonion, to wit, as a sort of plural of ttawn, ' full,' in
reference, let us say, to the full ears of the barley grown
there. But the reference to the place-names seems to
have partly escaped the later tellers of the story or to
have failed to impress them as worth emphasizing.
They appear to have thought more of explaining the
origin of Menwaed's Wolf and Brynach's Eagle.
Whether this means in the former case that the district
of Arttechwed was more infested by wolves than any
other part of Wales, or that Menwaed, lord of Arttech-
wed, had a wolf as his symbol, it is impossible to say.

Tx] PLACE-NAME STORIES 509

In another Triad, however, i. 23 = ii. 57, he is reckoned
one of the Three Battle-knights who were favourites
at Arthur's court, the others being Caradog Freichfras
and ILyr ILuydog or ILud" ILurugog, while in iii. 29
Menwaed's place is taken by a son of his called Mael
Hir. Similarly with regard to Brynach's Eagle one
has nothing to say, except that common parlance some
time or other would seem to have associated the eagle
in some way with Brynach the Goidel. The former
prevalence of the eagle in the Snowdon district seems
to be the explanation of its Welsh name of Eryri — as
already suggested, p. 479 above — and the association of
the bird with the Goidelic chieftain who had his strong-
hold under the shadow of Snowdon seems to follow
naturally enough. But the details are conspicuous
by their scarcity in Welsh literature, though Brynach's
Eagle is probably to be identified with the Aquila Fabu-
losa of Eryri, of which Giraldus makes a curious men-
tion \ Perhaps the final disuse of Goidelic speech in
the district is to be, to some extent, regarded as ac-
counting for our dearth of data. A change of language
involved in all probability the shipwreck of many a
familiar mode of thought ; and many a homely ex-
pression must have been lost in the transition before
an equivalent acceptable to the Goidel was discovered
by him in his adopted idiom.

This question of linguistic change will be found
further illustrated by the story to which I wish now to
pass, namely that of the hunting of Twrch Trwyth. It
is one of those incorporated in the larger tale known as
that of Kulhwch and Olwen, the hero and heroine con-
cerned : see the Oxford Mabmogion, pp. 135-41, and
Guest's translation, iii. 306-16. Twrch Trwyth is pic-
tured as a formidable boar at the head of his offspring,

* Itinerarium Kanibrice, ii. 9 (p. 136).

5IO CELTIC FOLKLORE [cm

consisting of seven swine, and the Twrch himself is
represented as carrying between his ears a comb, a
razor, and a pair of shears. The plot of the Kulhwch
renders it necessary that these precious articles should
be procured ; so Kulhwch prevails on his cousin Arthur
to undertake the hunt. Arthur began by sending
one of his men, to wit, Menw ' son of Teirgwaed", to
see whether the three precious things mentioned were
really where they were said to be, namely, between
Twrch Trwyth's ears. Menw was a great magician
who usually formed one of any party of Arthur's men
about to visit a pagan country ; for it was his business
to subject the inhabitants to magic and enchantment, so
that they should not see Arthur's men, while the latter
saw them. Menw found Twrch Trwyth and his offspring
at a place in Ireland called Esgeir OerveP, and in order
to approach them he alighted in the form of a bird near
where they were. He tried to snatch one of the three
precious articles from Twrch Trwyth, but he only
succeeded in securing one of his bristles, whereupon
the Twrch stood up and shook himself so vigorously
that a drop of venom from his bristles fell on Menw,
who never enjoyed a day's health afterwards as long as
he lived. Menw now returned and assured Arthur
that the treasures were really about the Twrch's head
as it was reported. Arthur then crossed to Ireland
with a host and did not stop until he found Twrch

* Menw's name is to be equated with the Irish word menb, ' little, small,'
and connected with the Welsh derivative di-fenw-i, 'belittling or reviling' :
It will be seen that he takes the form of a bird, and his designation Menw
fab^ Tetrgivacd mxz\^i perhaps be rendered ' Little, son of Three-Cries.'

Identified by Professor Kuno Meyer in the Transactions of the Cymmro-
dcnon Soaeiy, ,895-6, p. 73, with a place in Leinster called Sescenn
Uatrbeo.l, 'the Marsh of Uairbhel,' where Uairbhel may possibly be a man's
name, but more likely that of a pass or gap described as Cold-mouth :

M'"^r'r!JM'''!' °' ^'°' '" '^^ ^^'^ °f '^^"' '^^"^d in Manx 'the big
Mouth of the Wmd.' The Irish name comes near in part to the Welsh Esgeir
Ocrvel or Oerfcl, which means ' the mountain Spur of cold Weather '

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 511

Trwyth and his swine at Esgeir Oervel. The hunt
began and was continued for several days, but it did
not prevent the Twrch from laying waste a fifth part of
Ireland, that is in Medieval Irish coked, a province
of the island. Arthur's men, however, succeeded in
killing one of the Twrch's offspring, and they asked
Arthur the history ^ of that swine. Arthur replied that
it had been a king before being transformed by God
into a swine on account of his sins. Here I should
remark by the way, that the narrator of the story forgets
the death of this young boar, and continues to reckon
the Twrch's herd as seven.

Arthur's next move was to send one of his men,
Gwrhyr, interpreter of tongues^, to parley with the
boars. Gwrhyr, in the form of a bird, alighted above
where Twrch Trwyth and his swine lay, and ad-
dressed them as follows : ' For the sake of Him
who fashioned you in this shape, if you can speak,
I ask one of you to come to converse with Arthur.'
Answer was made by one of the boars, called Grugyn
Gwrych Ereint, that is, Grugyn Silver-bristle ; for like
feathers of silver, we are told, were his bristles
wherever he went, and whether in woods or on plains,
one saw the gleam of his bristles. The following, then,
was Grugyn's answer: 'By Him who fashioned us in

' The word used in the text is ysfyt; which now means * meaning or
signification' ; but it is there used in the sense of 'history,' or of the Latin
' historia,' from which it is probably borrowed.

'^ In the original his designation is Gwrhyr Gtvalstawt leifhoeit, and the
man so called is in the Kulhwch credited with the mastery of all languages,
including those of certain birds and quadrupeds, Gwalstawt, found written
also gwalstot, is the Anglo-Saxon word weallistod, ' an interpreter,' borrowed.
The name Gwrhyr is possibly identical with that of Ferghoir, borne by the
Stentor of Fionn mac Cumhaill's following. Ferghoir's every shout is said
to have been audible over three cantreds. Naturally one who was to
parley with a savage host had good reason to cultivate a far-reaching voice,
if he wished to be certain of returning to his friends. For more about it see
the footnote at p. 489 of my Hibbcrt Lectures.

512 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

this shape, we shall not do so, and we shall not con-
verse with Arthur. Enough evil has God done to us
when He fashioned us in this shape, without your
coming to fight with us.' Gwrhyr replied : ' I tell you
that Arthur will fight for the comb, the razor, and the
shears that are between the ears of Twrch Trwyth.'
' Until his life has first been taken,' said Grugyn, ' those
trinkets shall not be taken, and to-morrow morning we
set out hence for Arthur's own country, and all the harm
we can, shall we do there.'

The boars accordingly set out for Wales, while Arthur
with his host, his horses, and his hounds, on board his
ship Prydwen, kept within sight of them. Twrch
Trwyth came to land at Forth Clais, a small creek south
of St. David's, but Arthur went that night to Myn3rw,
which seems to have been Menevia or St. David's.
The next day Arthur was told that the boars had gone
past, and he overtook them killing the herds of Kynnwas
Cwrvagyl, after they had destroyed all they could find
in Deugledyf, whether man or beast. Then the Twrch
went as far as Presseleu, a name which survives in that
of Preselly or Precelly, as in Preselly Top and Preselly
Mountains in North Pembrokeshire. Arthur and his
men began the hunt again, while his warriors were
ranged on both sides of the Nyfcr or the river Nevern.
The Twrch then left the Glen of the Nevern and made
his way to Cwm Kerwyn, the name of which survives
in that of Moel Cwm Kerwyn, one of the Preselly
heights. In the course of the hunt in that district the
Twrch killed Arthur's four champions and many of the
people of the country. He was next overtaken in a
district called Peuliniauc ^ or Peuliniog, which appears

1 The original has Pelumyawc, p. 138, and the name occurs in the {Red
Book) Bruts, p. 355, as Pelunyawc, and p. 411, as Pelunea(wc) between
the commots of Amgoed and Velfrey. The identification here suggested

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 513

to have occupied a central area between the mountains,
ILandewi Velfrey, Henttan Amgoed, and Laugharne :
it probably covered portions of the parish of Whitland
and of that of ILandysilio, the church of which is a httle
to the north of the railway station of Clyn Derwen on
the Great Western hne. Leaving Peuliniog for the
Laugharne Burrows, he crossed, as it seems, from Ginst
Point to Aber Towy or Towy Mouth \ which at low
water are separated mostly by tracts of sand interrupted
only by one or two channels of no very considerable
width ; for Aber Towy would seem to have been a little
south-east of St, Ishmael's, on the eastern bank of the
Towy. Thence the Twrch makes his way to Glynn
Ystii, more correctly perhaps Clyn Yshm, now written
Clyn Ystyn ^, the name of a farm between Carmarthen
and the junction of the Amman with the ILychwr, more
exactly about six miles from that junction and about

comes from Mr. Phillimore, who has seen that Peuliniawc must be a
derivative from the name Paulinus, that is of the Paulinus, probably, who
is mentioned in an ancient inscription at Landysilio. There are other
churches called after Tysilio, so this one used to be distinguished as ILandysilio
yii Nyfcd, that is, ILandysilio-in-Dyfed ; but the pronunciation was much the
same as if it had been written ILandysilio yn Y/cd, meaning ' Landysilio
a-drinking,' ' whereof arose a merrye jest,' as George Owen tells us in his
Pembrokeshire, p. 9. It is now sometimes called ILandysilio' r Gynffon, or
' ILandysilio of the Tail,' from the situation of a part of the parish on a strip,
as it were a tail, of Carmarthenshire land running into Pembrokeshire.

1 This Aber Towy appears to have been a town with a harbour in 1042,
for we read in Brut y Tywysogion of a cruel engagement fought there
between Gruffyd ab ILewelyn and Howel ab Edwin, who, with Irish
auxiliaries, tried to effect a landing. Not long ago a storm, carrying away
the accumulation of sand, laid bare a good deal of the site. It is to be
hoped that excavations will be made soon on the spot.

" See the Transactions of the Cymwrodorion, :894-5, pp. 146-7- There
are a good many clyyis about South Wales, but our etymologists are careful to
have them in most cases written glyn, ' a glen.' Our story, however, shows
that the word came under the influence of glyn long ago, for it should be,
when accented, clun, corresponding to Irish cluain, 'a meadow.' We have
it as clun in Clun Kein in the Black Book, p. 34'', where I guess it to mean
the place now called Cilcain, ' Kilken ' in Flintshire, which is accented on
the first syllable ; and we have had it in y Clun Ilir, ' the Long Meadow,'
mentioned above at p. 22.

RHYS L 1

514 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ca.

eight and a half from Carmarthen as the crow flies.
The hunt is resumed in the Valley of the ILychwr or
Loughor\ where Grugyn and another young boar, called
ILwydawc Gouynnyat^ committed terrible ravages
among the huntsmen. This brought Arthur and his
host to the rescue, and Twrch Trwyth, on his part,
came to help his boars ; but as a tremendous attack
was now made on him he moved away, leaving the
ILychwr, and making eastwards for Mynyd" Amanw, or
'the Mountain of Amman,' for Amanw is plentifully
preserved in that neighbourhood in the shortened form
of Aman or Amman '■. On Mynyd Amanw one of his
boars was killed, but he is not distinguished by any
proper name : he is simply called a banw, ' a young
boar.' The Twrch was again hard pressed, and lost
another called Twrch ILawin. Then a third of the
swine is killed, called Gwys, whereupon Twrch Trwyth
went to Dyffryn Amanw, or the Vale of Amman, where
he lost a baniv and a benwic, a ' boar ' and a * sow.' All
this evidently takes place in the same district, and
Mynyd Amanw was, if not Bryn Amman, probably one
of the mountains to the south or south-east of the river
Amman, so that Dyffryn Amanw may have been what
is still called Dyffryn Amman, or the Valley of the

^ Cas ILychwr, ' Loughor Castle,' is supposed to involve in its ILychwr,
K.wchwr, or Loughor, the name of the place in the A n/oninus Itinerary, <i84, i,
to wit Leucarum ; but the guttural spirant ch between vowels in E-ychwr
argues a phonetic process which was Goidelic rather than Brythonic.

'"■ ILwydawc Gouynnyat would seem to mean ILwydawc the Asker or
Demander, and the epithet occurs also in the Kulhwch in the. name Gatfcoyt
Gouytiynat {Mabinogion, io6), to be read doubtless G. Gouynnyat, ' G. who
asks or demands ': possibly one should rather compare with Go-uynnyat the
word tra-mynyat, 'a wild boar': see Williams' Seint Great, pp. 374, 381.
However, the epithets in the Twrch Trwyth story do not count so far as
concerns the place-names derived.

^ * Other^ instances of the like shortening occur in words like cefttder,
a cousin,' for cefnderw, and ardel, ' to own,' for antelw. As to Amman, it
enters, also, into a group of Glamorganshire place-names : witness Aber
Amman and Cwm Amman, near Aberdare.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 515

Amman from Bryn Amman to where the river Amman
falls into the ILychwr. From the Amman the Twrch
and the two remaining boars of his herd made their way
to ILwch Ewin, ' the lake or pool of Ewin,' which is
now represented by a bog mere above a farm house
called ILwch in the parish of Bettws, which covers the
southern slope of the Amman Valley. I have found this
bog called in a map Lwch is Awel, ' Pool below Breeze,'
whatever that may mean.

We find them next at JLwch Tawi, the position of
which is indicated by that of Ynys Pen Lwch, ' Pool's
End Isle/ some distance lower down the Tawe than
Pont ar Dawe. At this point the boars separate, and
Grugyn goes away to Din Tywi, 'Towy Fort,' an
unidentified position somewhere on the Towy, possibly
Grongar Hill near ILandeilo, and thence to a place
in Keredigion where he was killed, namely. Garth
Grugyn. I have not yet been able to identify the spot,
though it must have once had a castle, as we read of
a castle called Garthgrugyn being strengthened by
Maelgwn Vychan in the year 1242: the Bruts locate
it in Keredigion \ but this part of the story is obscured
by careless copying on the part of the scribe ^ of the

* It should perhaps be looked for near Brechfa, where there is a Hafod
Grugyn, and, as I am told, a Garth also which is, however, not further
defined. For it appears that both Brechfa and Cayo, though now in
Carmarthenshire, once belonged to Keredigion : see Owen's Pembrokeshire,
p. 216. But perhaps another spot should be considered : J. D. Rhys, the
grammarian (p. 22 above), gives in the Pcniarth MS. 118 a list of caers or
castles called after giants, and among them is that of Grugyn in the parish, he
says, of ' ILan Hilar.' I have, however, not been able to hear of any trace of
the name there, though I should guess the spot to have been Pen y Castelt.
called in English Castle Hill, the residence of Mr. Loxdale in the parish of
ILanilar, near Aberystwyth.

'' I have re-examined the passage, and I have no doubt that the editors were
wrong in printing Gregyn : the manuscript has Grugyn, which comes in the
last line of column 841. Now besides that the line is in part somewhat faint,
the scribe has evidently omitted something from the original story, and
I guess that the lacuna occurs in the first line of the next column after the
words J/ ttas, ' was killed,' which seem to end the story of Grugyn.

Ll2

5i6 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Red Book. After Grugyn's death we read of ILwydawc
having made his way to Ystrad Yw, and, after inflicting
slaughter on several of his assailants, he is himself
killed there. Now Ystrad Yw, which our mapsters
would have us call Ystrad Wy, as if it had been on the
Wye\ is supposed to have covered till Henry VIII's
time the same area approximately as the hundred
of Crickhowel has since, namely, the parishes of (i)
Crickhowel, (2) ILanbedr Ystrad Yw with Patrishow,
(3) ILanfihangel Cwm Du with Tretower and Pen-
myarth, (4) ILangattock with ILangenny, {5) ILanetty
with Brynmawr, and (6) ILangynidr. Of these ILanbedr
perpetuates the name of Ystrad Yw, although it is
situated near the junction of the Greater and Lesser
Grwyne and not in the Strath of the Yw, which Ystrad
Yw means. So one can only treat ILanbedr Ystrad Yw
as meaning that particular ILanbedr or St. Peter's
Church which belongs to the district comprehensively
called Ystrad Yw. Now if one glances at the Red
Book list of cantreds and cymwds, dating in the latter
part of the fourteenth century, one will find Ystrad Yw
and Cruc Howel existing as separate cymwds. So we
have to look for the former in the direction of the parish
of Cwm Du ; and on going back to the Taxatio of Pope
Nicholas IV dating about 1291, we find that practically
we have to identify with Cwm Du a name Stratden,
p. 273% which one is probably to treat as Strat d'Eue ^

^ Those who have discovered an independent Welsh appellative ivy
meaning virater are not to be reasoned with. The Welsh wy only means an
egg, while the meaning of Gwy as the name of the Wye has still to be
discovered.

' This name also occurs in a passage quoted in Jones' Brecknock, ii. 501,
from a Carte MS. which he treats as relating to the year 1234 = the MS. is
said to be at the Bodleian, though I have not succeeded in tracing it. But
Jones gives Villa de Ystraddewi, and speaks of a chapel of St. John's af
Stradtrw,, which must have been St. John's Church, at Tretower, one of the
ecc-lesiastical districts of Cwm Du : see also p. 497. The name is probably
to be treated as Sirad or Strat d'Ewe.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 517

or some similar Norman spelling ; for most of the other
parishes of the district are mentioned by the names
which they still bear. That is not all ; for from Cwm
Du a tributary of the Usk called the Rhiangott comes
down and receives at Tretower the waters of a smaller
stream called the Yw. The land on both sides of that
Yw burn forms the ystrad or strath of which we are in
quest. The chief source of this water is called Lygad
Yw, and gives its name to a house of some pretensions
bearing an inscription showing that it was built in
its present form about the middle of the seventeenth
century by a member of the Gunter family well known
in the history of the county. Near the house stands
a yew tree on the boundary line of the garden, and
close to its trunk, but at a lower level, is a spring
of bubbling water : this is Lygad Yw, ' the Eye of the
Yw.' For ILygad Yw is a succinct expression for the
source of the Yw burn \ and the stream retains
the name Yvo to its fall into the Rhiangott; but besides
the spring of Llygad Yw it has several other similar
sources in the fields near the house. There is nothing,
however, in this brook to account for the name of Ystrad

* A river may in Welsh be briefly called after anybody or anything. Thus
in North Cardiganshire there is a stream called Emon, that is to say
' Einion's river,' and the flat land on both sides of it is called Ystrad Einott,
which looks as if one might translate it Einion's Strath, but it means the
Strath of Einion's river, or of the stream called Einon, as one will at once
see from the upper course of the water being called Blacn Einon, which
can only mean the upper course of the Einon river. So here yiv is in
English 'yew,' but Ystrad Yw and K.ygad Yiv have to be rendered the Strath
of the Yew burn and the Eye of the Yew burn respectively. It is moreover
felt by the Welsh-speaking people of the district that_>w is the plural oi yiven,
' a single yew,' and as there is only one yew at the source somebody had
the brilliant idea of making the name right by calling it Yivcn, and this has
got into the maps as Ewyn, as though it were the Welsh word for foam. Who
began it I cannot say, but Theophilus Jones has it in his History of the
County of Brecknock, published in 1809. Nevertheless the name is still Yw,
not Ywen or Ewyn, in the Welsh of the district, though Lewis gives it as
Ywen in his article on E^anvihangel-Cwm-Dit.

5i8 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Yw having been extended to an important district; but
if one traces its short course one will at once guess the
explanation. For a few fields below ILygad Yw is the
hamlet of the Gaer or fortress, consisting of four farm
houses called the Upper, Middle, and Lower Gaer, and
Pen y Gaer : through this hamlet of the Gaer flows the
Yw. These, and more especially Pen y Gaer, are sup-
posed to have been the site of a Roman camp of con-
siderable importance, and close by it the Yw is supposed
to have been crossed by the Roman road proceeding
towards Brecon ^ The camp in the Strath of the Yw
was the head quarters of the ruling power in the district,
and hence the application of the name of Ystrad Yw to
a wider area. But for our story one has to regard the
name as confined to the land about the Yw burn, or at
most to a somewhat larger portion of the parish of Cwm
Du, to which the Yw and Tretower belong. The
position of the Gaer in Ystrad Yw at the foot of the
Bwlch or the gap in the difficult mountain spur stretch-
ing down towards the Usk is more likely to have been
selected by the Romans than by any of the Celtic
inhabitants, whose works are to be found on several of
the neighbouring hills, such as Myarth 2 between the
Yw and the Usk.

' For exact information as to the Gaer, the Yw, and ILygad Yw, I am
indebted chiefly to the courtesy of Lord Glanusk, the owner of that historic
strath, and to the Rector of ILansantffread, who made a special visit to
tt^ygad Yw for me ; also to Mr. Francis Evans, of the Farmers' Arms at the
Bwkh, who would be glad to change the name ILygad Yw into ILygad dan
yr Ywen 'the Source beneath the Yew-tree,' partly on account of the
position of the spring emanating under the but of the yew tree,' and
partly because there is only a single yew there. Theophilus Jones com-
p amed a century ago that the Gaer in Ystrad Yw had not attracted the

Sir "/T'T"* ' '"^ ^ ^'^" •''^" ^'""^^'y disappointed to find that the
Cambnan Archaeological Association has had nothing to say of it. At any

mention T-.tV^'J"''" "' ^'^ proceedings and found only a single

Kor: al' Normal '^^^ ''^^"^^ ^^ '''' ^° '^^ ^'^^ ^^^^ ^^^^^

■^ Theophilus Jones, in )^.^ Brecknockshire, ii. 502, describes Miarth or

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

519

We next find Twrch Trwyth, now the sole survivor,
making his way towards the Severn : so Arthur summons
Cornwall and Devon to meet him at Aber Hafren or
Severn mouth. Then a furious conflict with the Twrch
takes place in the very waters of that river, between
ILyn ILiwan (p. 407) and Aber Gwy or the mouth of
the Wye. After much trouble, Arthur's men succeed in
getting possession of two out of the three treasures of the
boar, but he escapes with the third, namely, the comb,
across the Severn ^ Then as soon as he gets ashore
he makes his way to Cornwall, where the comb is at
length snatched from him. Chased thence, he goes
straight into the sea, with the hounds Anet and Aethlem
after him, and nothing has ever been heard of any of the
three from that day to this.

That is the story of Twrch Trwyth, and Dr. Stokes
calls my attention to a somewhat similar hunt briefl}'
described in the Rennes Dind'senchas in the Revue
Celtiqide, xv. 474-5. Then as to the precious articles
carried by the Twrch about his head and ears, the comb,
the razor, and the shears, two oiit of the three — the comb
and the razor — belong to the regular stock of a certain
group of tales which recount how the hero elopes
with the daughter of a giant who loses his life in the
pursuit ^. In order to make sure of escaping from the

Myarth as a 'very extensive' camp, and proceeds as follows: — 'Another
British camp of less extent is seen on a knoll on Pentir hill, westward of
the Rhiangott and the parish church of Cwmdu, above a wood called Coed y
Gaer, and nearly opposite to the peak or summit called Cloch y Pibwr, or
the piper's call.' This would probably be more accurately rendered the
Piper's Rock or Stone, with cloch treated as the Goidclic word for a stone
rather than the Brythonic word for a bell : how many more clochs in our
place-names are Goidelic ?

* The Twrch would seem to have crossed somewhere opposite the mouth
of the Wye, let us say not very far from Aust ; but he escapes to Cornwall
without anything happening to him, so we are left without any indication
whether the story originally regarded Kernyw as including the Penrhyn
Awstin of the Cot! story given at p. 503.

" For this suggestion I am indebted to the Rev. Dr. Castor in the

520 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

infuriated giant, the daughter abstracts from her father's
keeping a comb, a razor, and another article. When
she and her lover fleeing on their horse are hard
pressed, the latter throws behind him the comb, which
at once becomes a rough impenetrable forest to detain
the giant for a while. When he is again on the point
of overtaking them, the lover throws behind him the
razor, which becomes a steep and sharp mountain ridge
through which the pursuing giant has to waste time
tunnelling his way. The third article is usually such
as, when thrown in the giant's way, becomes a lake in
which he is drowned while attempting to swim across.
In the Kulhwch story, however, as we have it, the
allusion to these objects is torn away from what might
be expected as its context. The giant is Yspadaden
Penkawr, whose death is effected in another way ; but
before the giant is finally disposed of he requires to be
shaved and to have his hair dressed. His hair, more-
over, is so rough that the dressing cannot be done
without the comb and shears in the possession of
Twrch Trwyth, whence the hunt ; and for the shaving
one would have expected the Twrch's razor to have
been requisite ; but not so, as the shaving had to be
done by means of another article, namely, the tusk of
Yskithynvytm Pennbeict, ' White-tusk chief of Boars,' for
the obtaining of which one is treated briefly to another
boar hunt. The Kulhwch story is in this respect very
mixed and disjointed, owing, it would seem, to the
determination of the narrator to multiply the number
of things difficult to procure, each involving a separate
feat to be described.

Let us now consider the hunt somewhat more in

Cymmrodorion's Transactions for 1894-5, P- 34, and also for references in
point to M. Cosquin's Contes Populaires de la Lorraine, i. 134, 141, 152.
Compare also such Gaelic stories as that of the Bodach Glas, translated
by Mrs. Mackellar, in the Celtic Magazine, xii. 12-6, 57-64

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 521

detail, with special reference to the names mentioned ;
and let us begin with that of Twrch Trwyth : the word
iwrch means the male of a beast of the swine kind, and
twrch coed, ' a wood pig,' is a wild boar, while twrch
daear, ' an earth pig,' is the word in North Wales for
a mole. In the next place we can practically equate
Twrch Trwyth with a name at the head of one of the
articles in Cormac's Irish Glossary. There the exact
form is Ore trc'ith, and the following is the first part of
the article itself as given in O'Donovan's translation
edited by Stokes : — ' Ore Treith, i. e. nomen for a king's
son, triath enim rex vocatur, imde dixit poeta Oinach
n-iiirc treith " fair of a king's son," i. e. food and precious
raiment, down and quilts, ale and flesh-meat, chessmen
and chessboards, horses and chariots, greyhounds and
playthings besides.' In this extract the word ore occurs
in the genitive as iiire, and it means a ' pig ' or ' boar ' ;
in fact it is, with the usual Celtic loss of the consonant
p, the exact Goidelic equivalent of the Latin porcus,
genitive porei. From another article in Cormac's
Glossary, we learn that Trc'ith is the genitive of Triath,
which has been explained to mean a king. Thus, Ore
Treith means Triath's Ore, Triath's Boar, or the King's
Boar ; so we take Twrch Trwyth in the same way to
mean ' Trwyth 's Boar.' But we have here a dis-
crepancy, which the reader will have noticed, for twrch
is not the same word as Irish ore, the nearest form to
be expected in Welsh being Wixh, not Tzvrch ; but
such a word as Wrch does not, so far as I know, exist.
Now did the Welsh render ore by a different word unre-
lated to the Goidelic one which they heard ? I think
not; for it is remarkable that Irish has besides ore a
word tore, meaning a 'boar,' and tore is exactly the
Welsh twrch. So there seems to be no objection to
our supposing that what Cormac calls Ore Treith was

^22 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

known in the Goidelic of Wales as Tore Treith, which
had the alUteration to recommend it to popular favour.
In that case one could say that the Goidelic name Tore
Treith appears in Welsh with a minimum of change
as Twreh Trwyth, and also with the stamp of popular
favour more especially in the retention of the Goidelic
//?, just as in the name of an ancient camp or fortification
on the Withy Bush Estate in Pembrokeshire: it is
called the Rath, or the Rath Ring. Here i'dth is
identical with the Irish word i^dth, ' a fortification or
earthworks,' and we seem to have it also in Cil Rath
Fawr, the name of a farm in the neighbourhood of Nar-
berth. Now the Goidelic word /mV// appears to have
come into Welsh as treth-i, the long vowel of which
must in Welsh have become oi or tii by about the end
of the sixth century ; and if the th had been treated on
etymological principles its proper equivalent in the
Welsh of that time would have been d or /. The re-
tention of the th is a proof, therefore, of oral transmis-
sion ; that is to say, the Goidelic word passed bodily
into Brythonic, to submit afterwards to the phonological
rules of that language.

A little scrutiny of the tale will, I think, convince the
reader that one of the objects of the original story-teller
was to account for certain place-names. Thus Grugyn
was meant to account for the name of Garth Grugyn,
where Grugyn was killed ; Gwys, to account similarly
for that of Gwys, a tributary of the Twrch, which gives
its name to a station on the line of railway between
Ystalyfera and Bryn Amman ; and Twrch ILawin to
account for the name of the river Twrch, which receives
the Gwys, and falls into the Tawe some distance below
Ystrad Gynlais, between the counties of Brecknock and
Glamorgan.

Besides Grugyn and Twrch ILawin, there was a third

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 523

brother to whom the story gives a special name, to wit,
ILwydawc Gouynnyat, and this was, I take it, meant
also to account for a place-name, which, however, is not
given : it should have been somewhere in Ystrad Yw, in
the county of Brecknock, Still greater interest attaches
to the swine that have not been favoured with names
of their own, those referred to simply as bmiw, 'a
young boar,' and benwic, 'a young sow.' Now bmiw
has its equivalent in Irish in the word banbh, which
O'Reilly explains as meaning a 'sucking pig,' and that
is the meaning also of the Manx bannoo; but formerly
the word may have had a somewhat wider meaning.
The Welsh appellative is introduced twice into the
story of Twrch Trwyth; once to account, as I take it, for
the name Mynyd" Amanw, 'Amman Mountain,' and once
for Dyffryn Amanw, 'Amman Valley.' In both instances
Amanw was meant, as I think, to be accounted for
by the banw killed at each of the places in question.
But how, you will ask, does the word banw account
for Amanw, or throw any light on it at all ? Very
simply, if you will just suppose the name to have been
Goidelic ; for then you have only to provide it with
the definite article and it makes m banbh, ' the pig or
the boar,' and that could not in Welsh yield anything
but ymmanw or ammanw \ which with the accent
shifted backwards, became Ammanw and Amman or
Ajfian.

Having premised these explanations let us, before
we proceed further, see to what our evidence exactly
amounts. Here, then, we have a mention of seven

1 In some native Welsh words we have an option between a prefix yin
and am, an option arising out of the fact that originally it was neither _>-»» nor
am, but m, for an earlier mbi, of the same origin as Latin anibi and Greek
an(pi, 'around, about.' The article, its meaning in the combination /;/ banbli
being forgotten, would fall under the influence of the analogy of the prefix,
now am or ym, so far as the pronunciation was concerned.

524 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

swine, but as two of them, a banw and a bemvic, are
killed at one and the same place, our figure is practi-
cally reduced to six ^ The question then is, in how
many of these six cases the story of the hunt accounts
for the names of the places of the deaths respectively,
that is to say, accounts for them in the ordinary way
with which one is familiar in other Welsh stories. They
may be enumerated as follows : —

1. A bamv is killed at Mynyd Amanw.

2. A hvrch is killed in the same neighbourhood, where
there is a river Twrch.

3. A swine called Gwys is killed in the same neigh-
bourhood still, where there is a river called Gwys, falling
into the Twrch.

4. A bmiw and a benwic are killed in Dyffryn Amanzv.

5. Grugyn is killed at a place called Garth Grugyn.

6. A swine called ILwydawc is killed at a spot, not
named, in Ystrad Yw or not far off ^.

Thus in five cases out of the six, the story accounts
for the place-name, and the question now is, can that be
a mere accident? Just think what the probabilities of
the case would be if you put them into numbers : South
Wales, from St. David's to the Vale of the Usk, would
supply hundreds of place-names as deserving of mention,
to say the least, as those in this story ; is it likely then
that out of a given six among them no less than five
should be accounted for or alluded to by any mere
accident in the course of a story of the brevity of that of

Possibly the benwic was thrown in to correct the reckoning when the
redactor discovered, as he thought, that he had one too many to account
for : it has been pointed out that he had forgotten that one had been killed
in Ireland.

"^ It is just possible, however, that in an older version it was named, and
that the place was no other than the rock just above Ystrad Yw, called
Cmig Lwyd or, as it is said to be pronounced, Craig ILwyd. If so, ILwyd
would seem to have been substituted for the dissyllable ILwydog : compare
the same person called Huyt and E^wydeu in the Mabinogion, pp. 57, 1 10, 136.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 525

Twrch Trwyth. To my thinking such an accident is
inconceivable, and I am forced, therefore, to suppose
that the narrative was originally so designed as to
account for them. I said * originally so designed,' for
the scribe of the Red Book, or let us say the last
redactor of the story as it stands in the Red Book,
shows no signs of having noticed any such design.
Had he detected the play on the names of the places
introduced, he would probably have been more in-
clined to develop that feature of the story than to
efface it.

What I mean may best be illustrated by another
swine story, namely, that which has already been re-
ferred to as occurring in the Mabinogi of Math. There
we find Pryderi, king of Dyfed, holding his court at
Rhudlan on the Teifi, but though he had become the
proud possessor of a new race of animals, given him as
a present by his friend Arawn, king of Annwn, he had
made a solemn promise to his people, that he should
give none of them away until they had doubled their
number in Dyfed : these animals were the hobeu or
pigs to which reference was made at p. 69 above. Now
Gwydion, having heard of them, visited Pryderi's court,
and by magic and enchantment deceived the king.
Successful in his quest, he sets out for Gwyned with
his hobeu, and this is how his journey is described in
the Mabinogi: ' And that evening they journeyed as far
as the upper end of Keredigion, to a place which is
still called, for that reason, Mochdref, " Swine-town or
Pigs' stead." On the morrow they went their way, and
came across the Elenyd mountains, and that night they
spent between Kerry and Arwystli, in the stead which
is also called for that reason Mochdref. Thence they
proceeded, and came the same evening as far as a
commot in Powys, which is for that reason called

526 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Mochnant \ " Swine-burn." Thence they journeyed to
the cantred of Rhos, and spent that night within the
town which is still called Mochdref ^' 'Ah, my men/
said Gwydion, ' let us make for the fastness of Gwyned
with these beasts : the country is being raised in pur-
suit of us.' So this is what they did : they made for the
highest town of Arttechwed", and there built a creu or
sty for the pigs, and for that reason the town was called
Creu-Wyn'on, that is, perhaps, ' Wyrion's Sty.' In this,
it is needless to state, we have the Corwrion of chap, i :
see pp. 47, 50-70 above — the name is variously pro-
nounced also Cyrwrion and Crwrion.

That is how a portion of the Math story is made to
account for a series of place-names, and had the editor
of the Kulhwch understood the play on the names of
places in question in the story of Twrch Trwyth, it
might be expected that he would have given it pro-
minence, as already suggested. Then comes the ques-
tion, how it came to pass that he did not understand it?
The first thing to suggest itself as an answer is, that he
may have been a stranger to the geography of the
country concerned. That, however, is a very inadequate
explanation ; for his being a stranger, though it might
account for his making blunders as to the localities,
would not be likely to deter him from venturing into
geography which he had not mastered.

What was it, then, that hid from him a portion of the
original in this instance ? In part, at least, it must have
been a difficulty of language. Let us take an illustra-
tion : Gwys has already been mentioned more than once
as a name apphed to one of Twrch Trwyth's offspring,

' The name is well known in that of ILanrhaiadr yn Mochnant, ' ILan-
rhaiadr in Mochnant,' in the north of Montgomeryshire.
^Between Colwyn Bay and ILandudno Junction, on the Chester and
Holyhead line of railway.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 527

and the words used are very brief, to the following
effect: — 'And then another of his swine was killed:
Gwys was its name.' As a matter of fact, the scribe
was labouring under a mistake, for he ought to have
said rather, 'And then another of his swine was killed :
it was a sow'; since givys was a word meaning a sow,
and not the name of any individual hog. The word
has, doubtless, long been obsolete in Welsh; but it
was known to the poet of the ' Little Pig's Lullaby ' in
the Black Book of Carmarthen, where one of the stanzas
begins, fo. 29 % with the line :

Otan aparchellan. aparchell. guin gut's.

The late Dr. Pughe translated it thus :

Listen, little porkling ! thou forward little white pig.

I fear I should be obliged to render it less elegantly :

Lullaby, little porker, white sow porker.

For the last four words Stokes suggests ' O pigling of a
white sow'; but perhaps the most natural rendering of
the words would be 'O white porker of a sow ! ' — which
does not recommend itself greatly on the score of sense,
I must admit. The word occurs, also, in Breton as
gwt's or gives, ' truie, femelle du pore,' and as gwys or
gm's in Old Cornish, while in Irish it was feis. Never-
theless, the editor of the Twrch Trwyth story did not
know it ; but it would be in no way surprising that
a Welshman, who knew his language fairly well, should
be bafQed by such a word in case it was not in use in
his own district in his own time. This, however, barely
touches the fringe of the question. The range of the
hunt, as already given, was mostly within the boundaries,
so to say, of the portion of South Wales where we find
Goidelic inscriptions in the Ogam character of the fifth
or sixth century ; and I am persuaded that the Goidelic

528 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

language must have lived down to the sixth or seventh
century in the south and in the north of Wales \ a tract
of Mid-Wales being then, probably, the only district
which can be assumed to have been completely Bry-
thonic in point of speech. In this very story, probably,
such a name as Garth Grugyn is but slightly modified
from a Goidelic Gort Gmcamd, ' the enclosure of
Grucand ^ or Grugan ' : compare Cuchulaind or Cuchu-
lainn made in Welsh into Cocholyn. But the capital
instance in the story of Twrch Trwyth as has already
been indicated is that of Amanw, which I detect also as
Ammann (probably to be read Ammanvi), in the Book
of ILan Ddv (or Liber Landavertsis), p. 199 : it is there
borne by a lay witness to a grant of land called Tir
Dimuner, which would appear to have been in what is
now Monmouthshire. Interpreted as standing for in
Banbli, ' the Boar,' it would make a man's name of the
same class as Ibleid, found elsewhere in the same manu-
script (pp. 178, 184), meaning evidently i Bleid', now
y Blaid:, ' the Wolf But observe that the latter was
Welsh and the former Goidelic, which makes all the
difference for our story. The Goidel relating the story
would say that a boar, banbh, was killed on the mountain
or hill of in Banbh or of 'the Boar'; and his Goidelic
hearer could not fail to associate the place-name with
the appellative. But a Brython could hardly understand
what the words in Banbh meant, and certainly not after
he had transformed them into Ammanw, with the nb
assimilated into mm, and the accent shifted to the first
syllable. It is needless to say that my remarks have no
meaning unless Goidelic was the original language of
the tale.

' I have discussed some of the traces of the Goidels in Wales in the
Arch. Canib. for 1895, pp. 18-39, 264-302 ; 1899, pp. 160-7.

■' In fact the genitive Grucind occurs in the Book of Leinster, fo. 359*.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

529

In the summary I have given of the hunt, I omitted
a number of proper names of the men who fell at the
different spots where the Twrch is represented brought
to bay. I wish now to return to them with the question,
why were their names inserted in the story at all? It
may be suspected that they also, or at any rate some of
them, were intended to explain place-names ; but I must
confess to having had little success in identifying traces
of them in the ordnance maps. Others, however, may
fare better, who have a better acquaintance with the
districts in point, and in that hope I append them in
their order in the story : —

1. Arthur sends to the hunt on the banks of the
Nevern, in Pembrokeshire, his men. Eh and Trachmyr,
Gwarthegyd son of Caw, and Bedwyr; also Tri nieib
Cledyv Divwlch, ' three Sons of the Gapless Sword.'
The dogs are also mentioned : Drudwyn, Greid son of
Eri's whelp, led by Arthur himself; Glythmyr Ledewig's
two dogs, led by Gwarthegyd son of Caw; and Arthur's
dog Cavatl, led by Bedwyr.

2. Twrch Trwyth makes for Cwm Kerwyn in the
Preselly Mountains, and turns to bay, killing the follow-
ing men, who are called Arthur's four rhyswyr ^ or
champions — Gwarthegyd son of Caw, Tarawg of Attt
Clwyd, Rheidwn son of Eli Atver, and Iscovan Hael.

3. He turns to bay a second time in Cwm Kerwyn,
and kills Gwydre son of Arthur, Garselid Wydel, Glew
son of Yscawt, and Iscawyn son of Bannon or Panon.

4. Next day he is overtaken in the same neighbour-

' The sort of question one would like to ask in that district is, whether
there is a spot there called BeS y Rhyswyr, Cam y Rhysivyr, or the like.
The word rliyswr is found applied to Arthur himself in the Life of Gruffy^}
ab Cynan, as the equivalent probably of the Latin AriJiur Miles (p. 538
below): see the Myvyrian Archaiology, ii. 590. Similarly the soldiers or
champions of Christ are called rys6yr crist in the-Wclsh Life of St. David :
see the Elucidarium and other Tracts (in the Anecdota Oxoniciisia), p. 118.

RHYS M m

530 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

hood, and he kills Glewlwyd Gavaelvawr's three men,
Huandaw, Gogigwr, and Penn Pingon, many of the
men of the country also, and Gwlydyn Saer, one of
Arthur's chief architects.

5. Arthur overtakes the Twrch next in Peuliniauc
(p. 512 above) ; and the Twrch there kills Madawc son
of Teithion, Gwyn son of Tringad son of Neued, and
Eiriawn Penttoran.

6. Twrch Trwyth next turns to bay at Aber Towy,
*Towy Mouth,' and kills Cynlas son of Cynan, and

Gwilenhin, king of Franc

7. The next occasion of his killing any men whose
names are given, is when he reaches ILwch Ewin
(p. 515), near which he killed Echel Vordwyd-twtt,
Arwyli eil Gwydawg Gwyr, and many men and dogs
besides,

8. Grugyn, one of the Twrch's offspring, goes to
Garth Grugyn in Keredigion with Eli and Trachmyr
pursuing him ; but what happened to them we are not
told in consequence of the omission mentioned above
(p. 515) as occurring in the manuscript.

9. ILwydawc at bay in an uncertain locality kills
Rudvyw Rys ^ and many others.

^ Rudvyw Rys would be in Modern Welsh Rhiiifyw Rys, and probably
means Rhudfyw the Champion or Fighter, as Rhys is likely to have been
synonymous with rhyswr. The corresponding Irish name was Russ or Ross,
genitive Rossa, and it appears to come from the same origin as Irish ross,
'a headland, a forest,' Welsh rkos, 'moorland, uncultivate'd ground.' The
original meaning was presumably ' exposed or open and untilled land ' ; and
Stokes supposes the word to stand for an early (pyo-sio- with sfo of the
same origin as Latin sto, ' I stand,' and as the English word sland itself. In
that case Ros, genitive Rossa, Welsh Rhys, would mean one who stands out
to fight, a TTpoaraTvs, so to say. But not only are these words of a different
declension implying a nominative Ro-s/iis, but the Welsh one must have
been once accented Ro-s/iis on the ending which is now lost, otherwise
there is no accounting for the change of the remaining vowel into j/. Other
instances postulating an early Welsh accentuation of the same kind are very
probably tfyg, 'a fieldmouse,' Irish luch, 'a mouse'; pryd, 'form,' Irish
crui/i; pryf, ' aworm,' Irish cruitn; so also with jj/c/i, 'an ox,' and nyth,

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

531

lo. ILwydawc goes to Ystrad Yw, where he is
met by the Men of ILydaw, and he kills Hirpeissawc,
king of ILydaw, also ILygatrud" Emys and Gwrbothu
Hen, maternal uncles to Arthur.

By way of notes on these items, I would begin with
the last by asking, what is one to make of these Men
of ILydaw ? First of all, one notices that their names
are singular : thus Hirpeissawc, * Long-coated or Long-
robed,' is a curious name for their king, as it sounds
more like an epithet than a name itself. Then Lygat-
ruct (also Lysgatnid^, which I cannot understand, except
as a scribal error) Emys is also unusual : one would
have rather expected Emys Lygatriid', ' Emys the
Red-eyed.' As it stands it looks as if it meant the
' Red-eyed One of Emys.' Moreover Emys reminds
one of the name of Emyr ILydaw, the ancestor in
Welsh hagiology of a number of Welsh saints. It
looks as if the redactor of the Red Book had mistaken
an r for an 5 in copying from a pre-Norman original.
That he had to work on such a manuscript is proved
by the remaining instance, Gwrbothu Hen, ' G. the
Ancient,' in which we have undoubtedly a pre-Norman
spelling of Gwrfodw : the same redactor having failed
to recognize the name, left it without being converted

' a nest,' Irish rtett^ genitive nitt, derived by Stokes from ntzdo-, which,
however, must have been oxytone, like the corresponding Sanskrit nidhd.
There is one very interesting compound of rhys, namely the saint's name
Rhivyd>ys, as it were Rcdo-rosttis to be compared with Gaulish Epotcdo-nx,
which is found in Irish analysed into rl Eocliratdlii, designating the fairy
king who was father to Etain : see Windisch's Irische Te.vte, p. 119.
Bledrws, Bledrus, as contrasted with Bledrys, Bledris, postulate Goidelic
accentuation, while one has to treat Blcdruis as a compromise between
Blednvs and Bledris, unless it be due to misreading a Blcdriiif {Book of
LLan Ddv, pp. 185, 221-2, and Arch. Comb, for 1875, P- 370^- The Goidelic
accent at an early date moved to first syllables, hence cmtli (with its vowel
influenced by the « of a stem qurt) under the stress accent, became, when
unstressed, cridh (from a simplified stem crt as in Noicridc (also Ndicrotliacli,
Windisch, ibid., pp. 259, 261, 266) and Liiicridh {Four Masters, a. d. 748),
Luccraid, genitive Luccraide (Book of Lcinsier, 359'), LuguqurU- in Ogam.

M m 2

532 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

into the spelling of his own school. In the Book of
Lan Ddv it will be found variously written Gtirbodu,
Giiontodii, and Gurviodu. Then the epithet hen^ ' old or
ancient/ reminds one of such instances as Math Hen
and Gofynion Hen, to be noticed a little later in this
chapter. Let us now direct the reader's attention for
a moment to the word Lydaw, in order to see whether
that may not suggest something. The etymology of it
is contested, so one has to infer its meaning, as well
as one can, from the way in which it is found used.
Now it is the ordinary Welsh word for Brittany or
Little Britain, and in Irish it becomes Letha, which is
found applied not only to Armorica but also to Latium.
Conversely one could not be surprised if a Goidel,
writing Latin, rendered his own Letha or the Welsh
Lydaw by Latium, even when no part of Italy was
meant. Now it so happens that ILydaw occurs in Wales
itself, to wit in the name of ILyn ILydaw, a Snowdonian
lake already mentioned, p. 475. It is thus described by
Pennant, ii. 339 :— ' We found, on arriving at the top, an
hollow a mile in length, filled with Kyn Lydaw, a fine
lake, winding beneath the rocks, and vastly indented by
rocky projections, here and there jutting into it. In it
was one little island, the haunt of black-backed gulls,
which breed here, and, alarmed by such unexpected
visitants, broke the silence of this sequestered place
by their deep screams.' But since Pennant's time
mining operations ^ have been carried on close to the

' These operations cannot have been the first of the kind in the district,
as a writer in ih& A rc!ia:ologia Cambrensis for 1862, pp. 159-60, in extracting
a note from the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries (series II, vol. i p 10)
re at.ve to the discovery of the canoe, adds a statement based on the same
volume, p. 161, to the effect that ' within half a mile of ILyn ILydaw there
are the remains of a British town, not marked in the ordnance map, com-
pnsmg the foundations of numerous circular dwellings. In some of them
quantities of the refuse of copper smeltings were found. This town should
be visited and examined with care by some of the members of our Associa-

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

533

margin of this lake ; and in tlie course of them the
level of the water is said to have been lowered to
the extent of sixteen feet, when, in the year 1856, an
ancient canoe was discovered there. According to the
late Mr. E. L. Barnwell, who has described it in the
Archccologia Cambrensis for 1874, pp. 150-1, it was in
the possession of Dr. Griffith Griffith of Tal y Treudyn,
near Harlech, who exhibited it at the Cambrian Archaeo-
logical Association's meeting at Machynlleth in 1866 ^
' It measures,' Mr. Barnwell says, ' nine feet nine
inches — a not uncommon length in the Scotch early
canoes, — and has been hollowed out of one piece of
wood, as is universally the case with these early boats.'
He goes on to surmise that ' this canoe may have been
used to reach the island, for the sake of birds or eggs ;
or what is not impossible, the island may have been
the residence of some one who had reasons for pre-
ferring so isolated an abode. It may, in fact, have been
a kind of small natural crannog, and, in one sense,
a veritable lake-dwelling, access to and from which was
easy by means of such a canoe.' Stokes conjectures
ILydaw to have meant coast-land, and Thurneysen con-
nects it with the Sanskrit />f//jm and Old S^.y.onfolda'^,
' earth ' : and, so far as I can see, one is at liberty to
assume a meaning that would satisfy Lydazv, ' Armorica,'
and the Lydaw of Kyn E^ydaw, ' the Lake of ILydaw,'
namely that it signified land which one had to reach
by boat, so that it was in fact applicable to a lake
settlement of any kind, in other words, that ILydaiv
on Snowdon was the name of the lake-dwelling. So

tion.' This was written not far short of forty years ago ; but I am not aware
that the Association has done anything positive as yet in this matter.

' According to Jenkins' Beet Gelert, p. 300, the catioe was subsequently
sold for a substantial price, and nobody seems to know what has eventually
become of it. It is to be hoped this is not correct.

' See Holder's Alt-celtischer Sprachschatz, s. v. Litavia.

534 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

I cannot help suggesting, with great deference, that
the place whence came the Men of ILydaw in the
story of the hunting of Twrch Trwyth was the settle-
ment in Syfadon lake (p. 73), and that the name
of that stronghold, whether it was a crannog or a
stockaded islet, was also ILydaw. For the power of
that settlement over the surrounding country to have
extended a few miles around would be but natural to
suppose — the distance between the Yw and ILyn
Syfadon is, I am told, under three miles. Should this
guess prove well founded, we should have to scan
with renewed care the allusions in our stories to
ILydaw, and not assume that they always refer us to
Brittany.

That the name ILydaw did on occasion refer to the
region of ILyn Syfadon admits of indirect proof as
follows : — The church of ELangorse on its banks is
dedicated to a Saint Paulinus, after whom also is called
Capel Peulin, in the upper course of the Towy, adjacent
to the Cardiganshire parish of ILandewi Brefi. More-
over, tradition makes Paulinus attend a synod in 519 at
ILandewi Brefi, where St. David distinguished himself
by his preaching against Pelagianism. Paulinus was
then an old man, and St. David had been one of his
pupils at the Ty Gwyn, ' Whitland,' on the Taf, where
Paulinus had established a religious house ^; and some
five miles up a tributary brook of the Taf is the
church of ILandysilio, where an ancient inscription
mentions a Pauhnus. These two places, Whitland
and ILandysilio, were probably in the cymwd of Peu-
liniog, which is called after a Paulinus, and through
which we have just followed the hunt of Twrch Trwyth

' For these notes I am indebted to Williams' Dictionary of Eminent Welsh-
men, and to Rees' Welsh Saints, pp. 187, 191 ; for our Paulinus is not yet
recognized in the Dictionary of Christian Biography. His day was Nov. 82.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 535

(p. 512). Now the inscription to which I have referred
reads \ with hgatures : —

CLVTORIGI
FILI PAVLINI
MARINILATIO

This probably means '(the Monument) of Clutorix, son
of Pauhnus from Latium in the Marsh ' ; unless one
ought rather to treat Marini as an epithet to Panlini.
In either case Za//o has probably to be construed ^ of
ox from Latium ' : compare a Roman inscription found
at Bath (Hubner's No. 48), which begins with C. Miir-
rius. I C. F. Arniensis \ Faro. luli. Modestus'^^ and
makes in English, according to Mr. Haverfield, ' Gaius
Murrius Modestus, son of Gaius, of the tribe Arniensis,
of the town Forum lulii.' The easiest way to explain
the last line as a whole is probably to treat it as a com-
pound with the qualifying word deriving its meaning,
not from mare, * the sea,' but from the Late Latin mara,
'a marsh or bog.' Thus Marini- Latium would mean
' Marshy Latium,' to distinguish it from Latium in Italy,
and from Letha or Lydaw in the sense of Brittany,
which was analogously termed in Medieval Irish Ar-
muirc Letha ^, that is the Armorica of Letha. This is

* There are two other inscriptions in South Wales which contain the
name Paulinus, one on a stone found in the neighbourhood of Port Talbot
in Glamorgan, reading Hie tacit Cantusus Pater Paulinus, which seems to
imply that Paulinus set up the stone to the memory of a son of his named
Cantusus. The other, found on the site of the extinct church of ILanwrthwl,
near Dolau Cothi in Carmarthenshire, is a remarkable one in a kind of
hexameter to the following effect : —

Servatur fidwi patrieque semper amator
Hie Paulinus iacit cidtor pientisiuius icqui.
Whether we have one or two or three Paulini in these inscriptions I cannot
sav. Welsh writers, however, have made the name sometimes into Paivl
Hen, ' Paul the Aged,' but, so far as I can see, without rhyme or reason.

^ Since I chanced on this inscription my friend Professor Lindsay of
St. Andrews has called my attention to Plautus' Asi>tana, 499 i^II. iv. 92),
where one reads, Periphancs Rliodo mercator dives, ' Pcriphancs a wealthy
merchant of Rhodes' ; he finds also ^sculapiits Epidauro (Arnobius, 278.
18), and elsewhere Nepos Philippis and Priscus Vienna.

^ See Stokes' Patrick, pp. 16, 412.

536 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

borne out by the name of the church of PauHnus,
which is in Welsh Lan y Gors, anghcized ILangorse,
' the Church of the Marsh or Bog/ and that is exactly
the meaning of the name given it in the Taxatio of Pope
Nicholas, which is that of Ecclesia de Mara. In other
terms, we have in the quahfied Latimn of the inscription
the Latium or Letha which came to be called in Welsh
E-ydaiv. It is, in my opinion, from that settlement as
their head quarters, that the Men of ILydaw sallied
forth to take part in the hunt in Ystrad Yw, where the
boar ILwydog was killed.

The idea that the story of Twrch Trwyth was more
or less topographical is not a new one. Lady Charlotte
Guest, in her Mabmogion, ii. 363-5, traces the hunt
through several places called after Arthur, such as
Bnarth Arthur, 'Arthur's Cattle-pen,' and Bwrd: Arthur,
' Arthur's Table,' besides others more miscellaneously
named, such as Twyny Moch, 'the Swine's Hill,' near
the source of the Amman, and ^wyji y Moch, ' the
Swine's Grove,' near the foot of the same eminence.
But one of the most remarkable statements in her note
is the following:— 'Another singular coincidence maybe
traced between the name of a brook in this neighbour-
hood, called Echel, and the Echel Fordwyttwtt who is
recorded in the tale as having been slain at this period
of the chase.' I have been unable to discover any clue
to a brook called Echel, but one called Egel occurs in
the right place ; so I take it that Lady Charlotte Guest's
mformants tacitly identified the name with that of Echel.
Substantially they were probably correct, as the Egel,
called Ecel in the dialect of the district, flows into the
upper Clydach, which in its turn falls into the Tawe
near Pont ar Dawe. As the next pool mentioned is
ILwch Tawe, I presume it was some water or other
which dramed into the Tawe in this same neighbour-

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 537

hood. The relative positions of ILwch Ewin, the Egel,
and ILwch Tawe as indicated above offer no apparent
difficulty. The Goidelic name underlying that of Echel
was probably some such a one as Eccel or Ecell ; and
Ecell occurs, for instance, in the Book of the Dun Cow,
fo. 80'', as the name of a noble or prince. In rendering
this name into Welsh as Echel, due regard was had for
the etymological equivalence of Goidelic cc or c to Welsh
ch, but the unbroken oral tradition of a people changing
its language by degrees from Goidelic to Welsh was
subject to no such influence, especially in the matter of
local names ; so the one here in question passed into
Welsh as Eccel, liable only to be modified into Egel.
In any case, one may assume that the death of the hero
Echel was introduced to account for the name of the
brook Egel. Indications of something similar in the
linguistic sense occur in the part of the narrative re-
lating the death of Grugyn, at Garth Grugyn. This
boar is pursued by two huntsmen called Eli and Trach-
myr, the name of the former of whom reminds one of
Garth Eli, in the parish of ILandewi Brefi. Possibly
the original story located at Garth Eli the death of Eli, or
some other incident in which Grugyn was concerned ;
but the difficulty here is that the exact position of Garth
Grugyn is still uncertain.

Lastly, our information as to the hunting of Twrch
Trwyth is not ex*clusively derived from the Kulhwch,
for besides an extremely obscure poem about the Twrch
in the Book of Aneurin, a manuscript of the thirteenth
century, we have one item given in the Mirahilia asso-
ciated with the Historia Brittontmi of Nennius, §73, and
this carries us back to the eighth century. It reads as
follows : —

Est aliiid mirahile in rcgione qitcc dicitiir Biielt. Est
ibi cumulus lapidum, et imus lapis superpositus super

538 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

congestum, cum vestigio canis in eo. Quando venatus est
porciim Troit, impressit Cabal, qui erat canis Arthuri
imlitis, vestigium in lapide, et Arthur postea congregavit
congestum lapidum sub lapide in quo erat vestigium canis
sui, et vocatur Cam Cabal. Et veniunt homines et tollunt
lapidem in manibus suis per spacium diei et noctis, et in
crastino die invenitur super congestum suum.

'Another wonder there is in the district called Buatlt:
there is there a heap of stones, and one stone is placed
on the top of the pile with the footmark of a dog in it.
CafaR, the dog of the warrior Arthur, when chasing the
pig Trwyd printed the mark of his foot on it, and
Arthur afterwards collected a heap of stones underneath
the stone in which was the footmark of his dog, and it
is called Cafatl's Cairn. And men come and take the
stone away in their hands for the space of a day and
a night, and on the following day the stone is found on
the top of its heap \'

Lady Charlotte Guest, in a note to the Kulhwch
story in her Mabinogion, ii. 360, appears to have been
astonished to find that Cam Cavatt', as she writes it, was
no fabulous mound but an actual ' mountain in the dis-
trict of Builth, to the south of Rhayader Gwy, and
within sight of that town.' She went so far as to per-
suade one of her friends to visit the summit, and he
begins his account of it to her with the words : 'Carn
Cavalt, or as it is generally pronounced Corn Cavatt, is
a lofty and rugged mountain.' On one of the cairns on
the mountain he discovered what may have been the
very stone to which the Mirabilia story refers ; but the
sketch with which he accompanied his communication
cannot be said to be convincing, and he must have been
drawing on his imagination when he spoke of this some-

Ax." Tu^'^ ^1^" give the reader some idea of the pre-Norman orthography of
Welsh, with I for the sound of ti and b for that off.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

539

what high hill as a lofty mountain. Moreover his
account of its name only goes just far enough to be
misleading : the name as pronounced in the neighbour-
hood of Rhayader is Corn Gafattt by Welsh-speaking
people, and Corn Gavalt by monoglot Englishmen. So
it is probable that at one time the pronunciation was
Cam Gavatt^. But to return to the incident recorded
by Nennius, one has to remark that it does not occur in
the Kulhwch ; nor, seeing the position of the hill, can
it have been visited by Arthur or his dog in the course
of the Twrch Trwyth hunt as described by the redactor
of the story in its present form. This suggests the
reflection not only that the Twrch story is very old, but
that it was put together by selecting certain incidents
out of an indefinite number, which, taken all together,
would probably have formed a network covering the
whole of South Wales as far north as the boundary of the
portion of Mid- Wales occupied by the Brythons before
the Roman occupation. In other words, the Goidels of
this country had stories current among them to explain
the names of the places with which they were familiar ;
and it is known that was the case with the Goidels of
Ireland. Witness the place-name legends known in
Medieval Irish as Dindsenchas, with which the old

' The softening o{ Cafatl to Gafatt could not take place after the masculine
corn, 'a horn' ; but it was just right after the feminine earn, 'a cairn.' So
here corn is doubtless a colloquial corruption ; and so is probably the / at
the end, for as U't has frequently been reduced to ti\ as in cyfaiti, • a friend,'
from the older cyfaitit, in Medieval Irish contalia, ' a foster brother or sister,'
the language has sometimes reversed the process, as when one hears /lo/ft
ioT holt, 'all,' or reads fferyl/t, 'alchemist, chemist,' ior ffoyti from I'crgilius.
The Nennian orthography does not much trouble itself to distinguish
between /and tt, and even when Cam Cabal was written the pronunciation
was probably Cam Gavatf, the mutation being ignored in the spelling, which
frequently happens in the case even of Welsh people who never fail to
mutate their consonants in speaking. Lastly, though it was a dog that
was called Cafatl, it is remarkable that the word has exactly the form taken
by caballus in Welsh : for cafaft, as meaning some sort of a horse, see
Silvan Evans' Geiriadur.

540 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

literature of Ireland abounds. On what principle the
narrator of the Kulhwch made his selection from the
repertoire I cannot say; but one cannot help seeing
that he takes little interest in the details, and that he
shows still less insight into the etymological motif of
the incidents which he mentions. However, this should
be laid mainly to the charge, perhaps, of the early
medieval redactor.

Among the reasons which have been suggested for
the latter overlooking and effacing the play on the place-
names, I have hinted that he did not always understand
them, as they sometimes involved a language which
may not have been his. This raises the question of
translation : if the story was originally in Goidelic,
what was the process by which it passed into Brythonic?
Two answers suggest themselves, and the first comes to
this : if the story was in writing, we may suppose a
literar}^ man to have sat down to translate it word for
word from Goidelic to Brythonic, or else to adapt it in
a looser fashion. In either case, one should suppose him
a master of both languages, and capable of doing justice
to the play on the place-names. But it is readily con-
ceivable that the fact of his understanding both languages
might lead him to miscalculate what was exactly neces-
sary to enable a monoglot Brython to grasp his meaning
clearly. Moreover, if the translator had ideas of his
own as to style, he might object on principle to anything
like an explanation of words being interpolated in the
narrative. In short, one could see several loopholes
through which a Httle confusion might force itself in,
and prevent the monoglot reader or hearer of the trans-
lation from correctly grasping the story at all points as
It was in the original. The other view, and the more
natural one, as I think, is that we should postulate the
interference of no special translator, but suppose the

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

541

Story, or rather a congeries of stories, to have been
current among the natives of a certain part of South
Wales, say the Loughor Valley, at a time when their
language was still Goidelic, and that, as they gradually
gave up Goidelic and adopted Brythonic, they retained
their stories and translated the narrative, while they did
not always translate the place-names occurring in that
narrative. Thus, for instance, would arise the dis-
crepancy between banw and Amanw, the latter of
which to be Welsh should have been rendered ji^ Banw,
' the Boar.' If this is approximately what took place, it
is easy to conceive the possibility of many points of
nicety being completely effaced in the course of such
a rough process of transformation. In one or two small
matters it happens that we can contrast the community
as translator with the literary individual at work : I
allude to the word Trwyth. That vocable was not
translated, not metaphoned, if I may so term it, at all at
the time : it passed, when it was still Trcth-i, from
Goidelic into Brythonic, and continued in use without
a break ; for the changes whereby Treth-i has become
Trwyth have been such as other words have undergone
in the course of ages, as already stated. On the other
hand, the literary man who knew something of the two
languages seems to have reasoned, that where a Goidelic
th occurred between vowels, the correct etymological
equivalent in Brythonic was /, subject to be mutated
to d. So when he took the name over he metaphoned
Treth-i into Tret-i, whence we have the Porous Troit of
Nennius, and Twrch Trwyd^ in Welsh poetry: these
Troit and Trwyd were the literary forms as contrasted
with the popular Trwyth. Now, if my surmises as to
Echel and Egel are near the truth, their history must be

1 An instance or two of Trwyd will be found in a note by Silvan Evans in
Skene's Four Ancient Books of Wales, ii. 393.

542 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

similar ; that is to say, Echel would be the literary form
and Eccl, Egel the popular one respectively of the
Goidelic Ecell. A third parallel offers itself in the case of
the personal name Arwyli, borne by one of Echel's com-
panions : the Arwyl of that name has its etymological
equivalent in the Arwystl- of Arwystli, the name of
a district comprising the eastern slopes of Phnlimmon,
and represented now by the Deanery of Arwystli. So
Arwystli challenges comparison with the Irish Airgialla
or Airgeill^ anglicized Oriel^ which denotes, roughly
speaking, the modern counties of Armagh, Louth, and
Monaghan. For here we have the same prefix ar
placed in front of one and the same vocable, which in
Welsh is gwystl, ' a hostage,' and in Irish giall, of the
same meaning and origin. The reader will at once
think of the same word in German asgeisel, ' a hostage,'
Old High German gJsal. But the divergence of sound
between Arwystl-i and Arwyl-i arises out of the differ-
ence of treatment of si in Welsh and Irish. In the
Brythonic district of Mid- Wales we have Arwystli with
si treated in the Brythonic way, while in Arwyli we
have the combination treated in the Goidelic way, the
result being left standing when the speakers of Goidehc
in South Wales learnt Brythonic ^.

Careful observation may be expected to add to the
number of these instructive instances. It is, however,
not to be supposed that all double forms of the names
in these stories are to be explained in exactly the same
way. Thus, for instance, corresponding to Lug, geni-
tive Loga, we have the two forms ILeu and ILew, of
which the former alone matches the Irish. But it is to
be observed that ILeu remains in some verses ' in the

1 For more about these names and kindred ones, see a note of mine in the
Jirch. Lambrensis, 1898, pp. 61-3.

= See my Hibbcrt Lccittrcs, pp. 398-401,

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

543

story of Math, whereas in the prose he appears to be
called ILew. It is not improbable that the editing which
introduced ILew dates comparatively late, and that it
was done by a man who was not familiar with the
Venedotian place-names of which ILeu formed part,
namely, Dintteu and Nmittteu, now Dintte and Nanttte.
Similarly the two brothers, Gofannon and Amaethon,
as they are called in the Mahmogi of Math and in the
Kulhwch story, are found also called Gofynyon and
Amathaon. The former agrees with the Irish form
Goibniu, genitive Goibnenn, whereas Gofannon does
not. As to Amaethon or Amathaon the Irish counter-
part has, unfortunately, not been identified. Gofannon
and Amaethon have the appearance of being etymologi-
cally transparent in Welsh, and they have probably
been remodelled by the hand of a literary redactor.
There were also two forms of the name of Manawydan
in Welsh ; for by the side of that there was another,
namely, Manawydan, liable to be shortened to Manawyd :
both occur in old Welsh poetry ^ But manawyd or
mynawyd is the Welsh word for an aid^ which is signifi-
cant here, as the Mabinogi called after Manawydan
makes him become a shoemaker on two occasions,
whence the Triads style him one of the Three golden
Shoemakers of the Isle of Prydain : see the Oxford
Mabinogion^ p. 308.

What has happened in the way of linguistic change
in one of our stories, the Kulhwch, may have happened
in others, say in the four branches of the Mabinogi,
namely, Pwytt, prince of D}^ed ; Branwen, daughter of
ILyr; Math, son of Mathonwy ; and Manawydan, son
of ILyr. Some time ago I endeavoured to show that

1 See the Black Book of Carmarthen in Evans' facsimile, p. 47'' ; Thomas
Stephens' Gododtn, p. 146; Dent's Malory, preface, p. xxvi ; and Skene's
Four Ancient Books of Wales, ii. 51, 63, 155.

544 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

the principal characters in the Mabinogi of Math,
namely, the sons and daughters of Don, are to be
identified as a group with the Tuatha De Danann,
' Tribes of the Goddess Danu or Donu,' of Irish legend.
I called attention to the identity of our Welsh Don with
the Irish Donu, genitive Donann, Gofynion or Gofannon
with Goibniu, genitive Goibnenn, and of ILeu or ILew
with Lug. Since then Professor Zimmer has gone
further, and suggested that the Mabinogion are of Irish
origin ; but that I cannot quite admit. They are of
GoideHc origin, but they do not come from the Irish or
the Goidels of Ireland : they come rather, as I think,
from this country's Goidels, who never migrated to the
sister island, but remained here eventually to adopt
Brythonic speech. There is no objection, however,
so far as this argument is concerned, to their being
regarded as this country's Goidels descended either
from native Goidels or from early Goidelic invaders
from Ireland, or else partly from the one origin
and partly from the other. This last is perhaps the
safest view to accept as a working hypothesis.
Now Professor Zimmer fixes on that of Mathonwy^
among other names, as probably the Welsh adap-
tation of some such an Irish name as the genitive
Mathgamnai^, now anglicized Mahony. This I am
also prepared to accept in the sense that the Welsh
form is a loan from a Goidelic one current some
time or other in this country, and represented in Irish
by Mathgamnai. The preservation of Goidelic th in
Mathonwy stamps it as ranking with Trwytli, Egel, and
Arwyli, as contrasted with a form etymologically more
correct, of which we seem to have an echo in the
Breton names Madganoe and Madgone^.

' See the Gbtthigische gdehrte Anzeigen for 1890, p. 512.

^ See De Courson's Cariulaire de I'abbaye de Redon, pp. 163, 186.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES 545

Another name which I am incHned to regard as
brought in from Goidelic is that of Gilvaethwy, son of
Don : it would seem to involve some such a word as
the Irish gilla, 'a youth, an attendant or servant,' and
some form of the Goidelic name Maughteus or Mochta,
so that the name Gilla-mochtai meant the attendant of
Mochta. This last vocable appears in Irish as the name
of several saints, but previously it was probably that of
some pagan god of the Goidels, and its meaning was
most likely the same as that of the Irish participial
mochta, which Stokes explains as * magnified, glorified':
see his Calendar of Oengus, p. ccxiv, and compare the
name Macl-mochta. Adamnan, in his Vita S. Colitnibce,
writes the name Maudeus in the following passage,
pref. ii. p. 6 : —

Nam qiiidam. proselytus Brito, homo saitcfits, sandi
Patricii episcopi discipiUus, Maudeus nomine, ita de nostra
prophetizavit Patrono, siciiti nobis ab antiquis traditum
expertis compertum habetur.

This saint, who is said to have prophesied of St.
Columba and died in the year 534, is described in his
Life (Aug. 19) as ortus ex Britannia ^, which, coupled
with Adamnan's Brito, probably refers him to Wales ;
but it is remarkable that nevertheless he bore the very
un-Brythonic name of Mochta or Maiichta ^.

' See Reeves' note to the passage just cited in his edition of Adamnan's
Vita, pp. 6, 7.

"^ Here possibly one might mention likewise Gilmin Troetu or Troeddu,
' Gilmin of the Black Foot,' the legendary ancestor (p. 444) of the Wynns of
Glyn ILifon, in Carnarvonshire. So the name might be a shortening of some
such a combination as Gilla-min, 'the attendant o( Miit or Men,' a name we
have also in Mocn-Min. ' Min's Kin,' a family or sept so called more than
once by Adamnan. Perhaps one wrould also be right in regarding as of
similar origin the name of Gilberd or Gilbert, son of CadgyfTro, who is men-
tioned in the Kulhwch, and in the Black Book, fo. 14'' : at any rate I am not
convinced that the name is to be identified with the Gillebert of the Normans,
unless that was itself derived from Celtic. But there is a discrepancy
between Gilmin, Gilbert, with unmutated nt and b, and Gilvact/iwy with its
mutation consonant v. In all three, however, Gil, had it been Welsh, would

RHYS N n

546 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

To return to the Mabmogion: I have long been
incHned to identify ILwyd, son of Kilcoed, with the
Irish Liath, son of Celtchar, of Cualu in the present
county of Wicklow. Liath, whose name means * grey,'
is described as the comehest youth of noble rank among
the fairies of Erin ; and the only time the Welsh ILwyd,
whose name also means ' grey,' appears in the Mabino-
gion he is ascribed, not the comeliest figure, it is true,
or the greatest personal beauty, but the most imposing
disguise of a bishop attended by his suite : he was
a great magician. The name of his father, Kil-coet,
seems to me merely an inexact popular rendering of
Celtchar, the name of Liath's father: at any rate one
fails here to detect the touch of the skilled translator or
literary redactor But the Mabinogi of Manawydan,
in which ILwyd figures, is also the one in which Pryderi
king of Dyfed's wife is called Kiciia or Cigfa, a name
which has no claim to be regarded as Brythonic. It
occurs early, however, in the legendary history of
Ireland : the Four Masters, under the year a.m. 2520,
mention a Ciocbha as wife of a son of Parthalon ; and

probably have appeared as Gitf, as indicated by the name Giiia in the
Kulhwch (Oxford Mabinogion, p. no), in which we seem to have the later
form of the old name Gildas. Compare such Irish instances as Fiachna
and Gra, which seem to imply stems originally ending in -asa-s (masculine)
and -asd (feminine) ; and see the Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries
0/ Ireland, 1899, p. 402.

' An article in the Rennes Dindsenchas is devoted to Liath : see the Rev.
Celtique, xvi. 78-9. As to Celtchar, genitive Celtchair, the name would seem
to have meant ' him who is fond of concealment.' The Mabinogi form of
the Welsh name is ILivyt uab kil coet, which literally meant ' IL. son of (him
of) the Retreat of the Wood.' But in the Twrch Trwyth story, under a
slightly different form of designation, we appear to have the same person as
E^wydeu mab kelcoet and K.wydcu mab kel coet, which would seem to mean
' IL. son of (him of) the Hidden Wood.' It looks as if the bilingual story-
teller of the language transition had not been able to give up the eel of Celt-
char at the same time that he rendered celt by coet, ' wood or trees,' as if
identifying it with cailt : witness the Medieval Irish caill, ' a wood or forest,'
dative plural cailiib, derivative adjective caillteamhuil, ' Silvester ' ; and see
Windisch's Irische Texte, p. 410, s.v. caill.

IX] PLACE-NAME STORIES 547

the name seems to be related to that of a man called
Cioccal, A.M. 2530. Lastly, Manawydan, from whom
the Mabinogi takes its name, is called mab ILyr, 'son
of ILyr,' in Welsh, and Mananndn mac Lir in Irish.
Similarly with his brother Bran, and his sister Branwen,
except that she has not been identified in Irish story.
But in Irish literature the genitive Lir, as in mac Lir,
' son of Ler,' is so common, and the nominative so rare,
that Lir came to be treated in late Irish as the nomina-
tive too ; but a genitive of the form Lir suggests a
nominative-accusative Ler, and as a matter of fact it
occurs, for instance, in the couplet : —

Fer CO n-ilur gtiint dar ler
Labraid Luath Lam ar Claideb '.
A man of many feats beyond sea,
Labraid swift of Hand on Sword is he.

So it seems probable that the Welsh ILyr^ is no
other word than the Goidelic genitive Lir, retained in
use with its pronunciation modified according to the
habits of the Welsh language ; and in that case ^ it
forms comprehensive evidence, that the stories about

' Windisch's Insche Texte, p. 217, and the Book of the Dun Coiv, fo. 47''.

* There has been a good deal of confusion as to the name ILyr : thus for
instance, the Welsh translations of Geoffrey of Monmouth make the Leir of
his Latin into ILyr, and the personage intended is represented as the father
of three daughters named Gonerilla, Regan, and Cordeilla or Cordelia. But
Cordelia is probably the Creurdilad of the Black Book, p. 49'', and the Crei-
dylat of the Kulhwch story (the Oxford Mabinogion, pp. 113, 134), and her
father was ILud ILawereint ( = Irish Nuada Airgetlam) and not ILyr. Then
as to the Leir of GeoflTrey's Latin, that name looks as if given its form
on the strength of the legr- of Legraceasfer, the Anglo-Saxon name of
the town now called Leicester, of which William of Malmesbury {Gesia
Pontificwn, § 176) says, Legrecestra est civitas auiiqua in Mcditcrraneis Avglis,
a Legra flitvio praierjlnente sic vocata. Mr. Stevenson regards Lcgra as an
old name of the Soar, and as surviving in that of the village of Leire, spelled
Legre in Domesday. It seems to point back to a Legere or Ligere, which
recalls Liger, ' the Loire.'

' I say in that case, as this is not quite conclusive ; for Welsh has an
appellative Ityr, ' mare, aequor,' which may be a generalizing oflLyr ; or else
it may represent an early len'o-s from Icro-s (see p. 549 below), and our
E-yr may possibly be this and not the Irish genitive Lir retained as ILyr.
That, however, seems to me improbable on the whole.

N n 2

548 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

the ILyr family in Welsh legend were Goidelic before
they put on a Brythonic garb.

As to the Mabinogion generally, one may say that
they are devoted to the fortunes chiefly of three power-
ful houses or groups, the children of Don, the children
of ILyr, and Pwytt's family. This last is brought into
contact with the ILyr group, which takes practically the
position of superiority. Pwytt's family belonged chiefly
to Dyfed ; but the power and influence of the sons of
ILyr had a far wider range : we find them in Anglesey,
at Harlech, in Gwales or the Isle of Grasholm off
Pembrokeshire, at Aber Henvelen somewhere south of
the Severn Sea, and in Ireland. But the expedition to
Ireland under Bran, usually called Bendigeituran, ' Bran ^
the Blessed,' proved so disastrous that the ILyr group,
as a whole, disappears, making way for the children of
Don. These last came into collision with Pwytt's son,
Pryderi, in whose country Manawydan, son of ILyr, had
ended his days. Pryderi, in consequence of Gwydion's
deceit (pp. 69, 501, 525), makes war on Math and the
children of Don : he falls in it, and his army gives
hostages to Math. Thus after the disappearance of the
sons of ILyr, the children of Don are found in power in
their stead in North Wales 2, and that state of things
corresponds closely enough to the relation between the
Tuatha De Danann and the Lir family in Irish legend.
There Lir and his family are reckoned in the number

^ Here it is relevant to direct the reader's attention to Nutt's Legend of
the Holy Grail, p. 28, where, in giving an abstract of the Petit saint Gmal, he
speaks of the Bran of that romance, in French Bron, nominative Brons, as
having the keeping of the Grail and dwelling 'in these isles of Ireland.'

' The Don and ILyr groups are not brought into conflict or even placed in
contact with one another ; and the reason seems to be that the story-teller
wanted to introduce the sons of Beli as supreme in Britain after the death of
Bran. Beli and his sons are also represented in Maxen's Dream as ruling
over Britain when the Roman conqueror arrives. What is to be made of
Beli may be learnt from The Welsh People, pp. 41-3.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

549

of the Tuatha De Danann, but within that community
Lir was so powerful that it was considered but natural
that he should resent a rival candidate being elected
king in preference to him. So the Tuatha De took
pains to conciliate Lir, as did also their king, who gave
his daughter to Lir to wife, and when she died he gave
him another of his daughters ^ ; and with the treatment
of her stepchildren by that deceased wife's sister begins
one of the three Sorrowful Tales of Erin, known to
English readers as the Fate of the Children of Lir.
But the reader should observe the relative position :
the Tuatha De remain in power, while the children of
Lir belong to the past, which is also the sequence in
the Mabinogion. Possibly this is not to be considered
as having any significance, but it is to be borne in mind
that the Lir-lLyr group is strikingly elemental in its
patronymic Lir, ILyr. The nominative, as already
stated, was ler^ ' sea,' and so Cormac renders mac Lir
by filius maris. How far we may venture to consider
the sea to have been personified in this context, and
how early, it is impossible to say. In any case it is
deserving of notice that one group of Goidels to this
day do not say mac Lir, ' son of Lir,' filium maris, but
always ' son of the lir ' : I allude to the Gaels of the
Isle of Man, in whose language Mananndn mac Lir is
always Mannanan mac y Lir, or as they spell it, Lear ;
that is to say * Mannanan, son of the ler.' Manxmen
have been used to consider Manannan their eponymous
hero, and first king of their island : they call him more
familiarly Mannanan beg macy Lear, ' Little Mannanan,
son of the ler.' This we may, though no Manxman of

1 These things one learns about Lir from the story mentioned in the text
as the ' Fate of the Children of Lir,' as to which it is right, however, to say
that no ancient manuscript version is known : see M. d'Arbois de Jubain-
ville's Essai ci'un Catalogue de la Lilterature epique de I'lilatide, p. 8.

550 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

the present day attaches any meaning to the word liv
or lear, interpret as * Little Mannanan, son of the Sea.'
The wanderings at large of the children of Lir before
being eclipsed by the Danann-Don group, remind one
of the story of the labours of Hercules, where it relates
that hero's adventures on his return from robbing Geryon
of his cattle. Pomponius Mela, ii. 5 (p. 50), makes
Hercules on that journey fight in the neighbourhood of
Aries with two sons of Poseidon or Neptune, whom he
calls (in the accusative) Albiona and Bergyon. To us,
with our more adequate knowledge of geography, the
locaHty and the men cannot appear the most congruous,
but there can hardly be any mistake as to the two
personal names being echoes of those of Albion and
Iverion, Britain and Ireland.

The whole cycle of the Mahinogion must have ap-
peared strange to the story-teller and the poet of
medieval Wales, and far removed from the world in
which they lived. We have possibly a trace of this
feeling in the epithet hen, ' old, ancient,' given to Math
in a poem in the Red Book of Hergest, where we meet
with the line ^ :—

Gan nath hen gan gouannon.

With Math the ancient, with Gofannon.

Similarly in the confused list of heroes which the story-

» See Skene's Four Ancient Books of Wales, ii. 303, also 108-9, where
the fragment of the poem as given in the Book of Taliessin is printed. The
hne here quoted has been rendered in vol. i. 286, 'With Matheu and
Govannon,' which places the old pagan Gofannon in rather unexpected
company. A few lines later in the poem mention is made of a Kaer Go-
fannon : where was that ? Skene, in a note on it (ii. 452), says that ' In an
old hst of the churches of Linlithgow, printed by Theiner, appears Vicaria
de Gumanyn The place meant is probably Dalmeny, on the Firth of Forth,
formerly called Dumanyn.' This is interesting only as showing that Gu-
manyn^s probably to be construed Dumanyn, and that Dalmeny represents
an ancent Z)h;. Manann in a neighbourhood where one already has C/ac/.
Manann, 'the stone of Manau,' and Sliabh Manann, ' Mountain of Manau '

IX] PLACE-NAME STORIES

551

teller of the Kulhwch {Mabinogion, p. 108) was able to
put together, we seem to have Gofannon, Math's rela-
tive, referred to under the designation of Gouynyon
Hen, ' Gofynion the Ancient.' To these might be
added others, such as Gwrbothu Hen, mentioned above,
p. 531, and from another source /Leii Hen \ ' ILew the
Ancient.' So strange, probably, and so obscure did some
of the contents of the stories themselves seem to the
story-tellers, that they may be now and then suspected
of having effaced some of the features which it would
have interested us to find preserved. This state of
things brings back to my mind words of Matthew
Arnold's, to which I had the pleasure of listening more
years ago than I care to remember. He was lecturing
at Oxford on Celtic literature, and observing * how evi-
dently the mediaeval story-teller is pillaging an antiquity
of which he does not fully possess the secret ; he is like
a peasant,' Matthew Arnold went on to say, ' building his
hut on the site of Halicarnassus or Ephesus ; he builds,
but what he builds is full of materials of which he knows
not the history, or knows by a glimmering tradition
merely — stones " not of this building," but of an older
architecture, greater, cunninger, more majestical. In
the mediaeval stories of no Latin or Teutonic people
does this strike one as in those of the Welsh.' This
becomes intelligible only on the theory of the stories
having been in Goidelic before they put on a Welsh
dress.

When saying that the Mabmogion and some of the

* This occurred unrecognized and, therefore, unaltered by the scribe
of the Nennian Pedigree no. xvi in the Cymmrodor, ix. 176, as he found it
written in an old spelling, Louhen. map. Gitid gen. map. Caratnuc. map. Cin-
belin, where Caradog is made father of Gwydion ; for in Gnid-ge>i we seem
to have the compound name which suggested Givydion. This agrees with
the fact that the Mabinogi of Math treats Gwydion as the father of ILew
ILawgyfTes ; but the pedigree itself seems to have been strangely put
together.

552 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

stories contained in the Kulhwch, such as the Hunting
of Twrch Trwyth, were GoideHc before they became
Brythonic, I wish to be understood to use the word
Goidelic in a quahfied sense. For till the Brythons
came, the Goidels were, I take it, the ruHng race in
most of the southern half of Britain, with the natives
as their subjects, except in so far as that statement
has to be limited by the fact, that we do not know
how far they and the natives had been amalgamating
together. In any case, the hostile advent of another
race, the Brythons, would probably tend to hasten the
process of amalgamation. That being so, the stories
which I have loosely called Goidelic may have been
largely aboriginal in point of origin, and by that I mean
native, pre-Celtic and non-Aryan. It comes to this,
then : we cannot say for certain whose creation Bran,
for instance, should be considered to have been — that
of Goidels or of non-Aryan natives. He sat, as the
Mabinogi of Branwen describes him, on the rock of
Harlech, a figure too colossal for any house to contain
or any ship to carry. This would seem to challenge
comparison with Cernunnos, the squatting god of
ancient Gaul, around whom the other gods appear as
mere striplings, as proved by the monumental repre-
sentations in point. In these ^ he sometimes appears
antlered like a stag; sometimes he is provided either
with three normal heads or with one head furnished
with three faces; and sometimes he is reduced to a
head provided with no body, which reminds one of
Bran, who, when he had been rid of his body in conse-
quence of a poisoned wound inflicted on him in his
foot in the slaughter of the Meal-bag Pavilion, was
reduced to the UrSawl Ben, 'Venerable or Dignified

» See Bertrand's Religion des Gaidois, pp. 314-9, 343-5, and especially
tlie plates.

ix] PLACE-NAME STORIES

553

Head/ mentioned in the Mabinogi of Branwen '. The
Mabinogi goes on to relate how Bran's companions
began to enjoy, subject to certain conditions, his * Ven-
erable Head's' society, which involved banquets of
a fabulous duration and of a nature not readily to be
surpassed by those around the Holy Grail. In fact
here we have beyond all doubt one of the heathen
originals of which the Grail is a Christian version.
But the multipHcity of faces or heads of the Gaulish
divinity find their analogues in a direction hitherto
unnoticed as far as I know, namely, among the Letto-
Slavic peoples of the Baltic sea-board. Thus the image
of Svatovit in the island of Riigen is said to have had
four faces " ; and the life of Otto of Bamberg relates ^
how that high-handed evangelist proceeded to convert
the ancient Prussians to Christianity. Among other
things we are told how he found at Stettin an idol
called Triglaus, a word referring to the three heads
for which the god was remarkable. The saint took
possession of the image and hewed away the body,
reserving for himself the three heads, which are repre-
sented adhering together, forming one piece. This he
sent as a trophy to Rome, and in Rome it may be still.
Were it perchance to be found, it might be expected to
show a close resemblance to the tricephal of the Gaulish
altar found at Beaune in Burgundy.

Before closing this chapter a word may be permitted
as to the Goidelic element in the history of Wales : it
will come again before the reader in a later chapter,

* The Oxford Mabinogion, pp. 40-3 ; Guest's Mabiiiogion, iii. 124-8.

* See Louis Leger's Cyrille et M^thode (^ Paris, 1868), p. 22.

' See Pertz, Monumenta Gcnnania Hisiorica Scri/>ion(»i, xii. 794. The
whole passage is worth quoting ; it runs thus : Eml aiitem simnlacnim
triceps, quod in yno corporc iria capita Itabcns Triglaus vocabatur ; quod solum
accipiens, ipsa capitella sibi coharentia, corpore continimtto, semin mde quasi
pro tropheo aspoiiavit, et postea Roniam pro argumento conversionis illomm
transmisit.

554

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

but what has already been advanced or imphed con-
cerning it may here be recapitulated as follows : —

It has been suggested that the hereditary dislike
of the Brython for the Goidel argues their having
formerly lived in close proximity to one another : see
p. 473 above.

The tradition that the cave treasures of the Snow-
don district belong by right to the Goidels, means
that they were formerly supposed to have hidden
them away when hard pressed by the Brythons : see
pp. 471-2 above.

The sundry instances of a pair of names for a
single person or place, one Goidelic (Brythonicized)
still in use, and the other Brythonic (suggested by the
Goidelic one), literary mostly and obsolete, go to prove
that the Goidels were not expelled, but allowed to
remain to adopt Brythonic speech.

Evidence of the indebtedness of story-tellers in
Wales to their brethren of the same profession in Ire-
land is comparatively scarce ; and almost in every
instance of recent research establishing a connexion
between topics or incidents in the Arthurian romances
and the native literature of Ireland, the direct contact
may be assumed to have been with the folklore and
legend of the Goidelic inhabitants of Wales, whether
before or after their change of language.

Probably the folklore and mythology of the Goidels
of Wales and of Ireland were in the mass much the
same, though in some instances they reach us in
different stages of development: thus in such a case
as that of Don and Danu (genitive Danann) the Welsh
allusions in point refer to Don at a conspicuously
earlier stage of her role than that represented by the
Irish literature touching the Tuatha De Danann \

* See The Welsh People, pp. 56-7.

IX] PLACE-NAME STORIES

555

The common point of view from which our ances-
tors Hked to look at the scenery around them is well
illustrated by the fondness of the Goidel, in Wales and
Ireland alike, for incidents to explain his place-names.
He required the topography — indeed he requires it
still, and hence the activity of the local etymologist — to
connote story or history : he must have something that
will impart the cold light of physical nature, river and
lake, moor and mountain, a warmer tint, a dash of the
pathetic element, a touch of the human, borrowed from
the light and shade of the world of imagination and
fancy in which he lives and dreams.

CHAPTER X

Difficulties of the Folklorist

For priests, with prayers and other godly gear,
Have made the merry goblins disappear;
And, where they played their merry pranks before,
Have sprinkled holy water on the floor. — Dryden.

The attitude of the Kymry towards folklore and
popular superstitions varies according to their training
and religious views ; and I distinguish two classes of
them in this respect. First of all, there are those who
appear to regret the ebb of the tide of ancient beliefs.
They maintain that people must have been far more
interesting when they believed in the fairies ; and they
rave against Sunday schools and all other schools for
having undermined the ancient superstitions of the
peasantry : it all comes, they say, of over-educating the
working classes. Of course one may occasionally wish
servant maids still believed that they might get pre-
sents from the fairies for being neat and tidy ; and that,
in the contrary case of their being sluts, they would
be pinched black and blue during their sleep by the
little people : there may have been some utility in
beliefs of that kind. But, if one takes an impartial
view of the surroundings in which this kind of mental
condition was possible, no sane man could say that the
superstitious beliefs of our ancestors conduced on the
whole to their happiness. Fancy a state of mind in
which this sort of thing is possible :— A member of

DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR 1ST 557

the family is absent, let us say, from home in the
evening an hour later than usual, and the whole house-
hold is thrown into a panic because they imagine that
he has strayed on fairy ground, and has been spirited
away to the land of fairy twilight, whence he may
never return ; or at any rate only to visit his home
years, or maybe ages, afterwards, and then only to
fall into a heap of dust just as he has found out that
nobody expects or even knows him. Or take another
instance : — A man sets out in the morning on an im-
portant journey, but he happens to sneeze, or he sees an
ill-omened bird, or some other dreaded creature, crossing
his path : he expects nothing that day but misfortune,
and the feeling of alarm possibly makes him turn back
home, allowing the object of his journey to be sacri-
ficed. That was not a satisfactory state of things or
a happy one, and the unhappiness might be wholly pro-
duced by causes over which the patient had absolutely
no control, so long at any rate as the birds of the air
have wings, and so long as sneezing does not belong
to the category of voluntary actions. Then I might
point to the terrors of magic ; but I take it to be un-
necessary to dwell on such things, as most people have
heard about them or read of them in books. On the
whole it is but charitable to suppose that those who
regret the passing away of the ages of belief and
credulity have not seriously attempted to analyse the
notions which they are pleased to cherish.

Now, as to the other class of people, namely, those
who object to folklore in every shape and form, they
may be roughly distinguished into different groups,
such as those to whom folklore is an abomination,
because they hold that it is opposed to the Bible, and
those who regard it as too trivial to demand the atten-
tion of any serious person. I have no occasion for

558 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

many words with the former, since nearly everything
that is harmful in popular superstition has ceased in
Wales to be a living force influencing one's conduct ;
or if this be not already the case, it is fast becoming so.
Those therefore who condemn superstitions have really
no reason to set their faces against the student of
folklore : it would be just as if historians were to be
boycotted because they have, in writing history — fre-
quently, the more the pity — to deal with dark intrigues,
cruel murders, and sanguinary wars. Besides, those
who study folklore do not thereby help to strengthen the
hold of superstition on the people. I have noticed that
any local peculiarity of fashion, the moment it becomes
known to attract the attention of strangers, is, one may
say, doomed : a Celt, like anybody else, does not like
to be photographed in a light which may perchance
show him at a disadvantage. It is much the same,
I think, with him as the subject of the studies of the
folklorist : hence the latter has to proceed with his
work very quietly and very warily. If, then, I pre-
tended to be a folklorist, which I can hardly claim to be,
I should say that I had absolutely no quarrel with
him who condemns superstition on principle. On the
other hand, I should not consider it fair of him to
regard me as opposed to the progress of the race in
happiness and civilization, just because I am curious to
understand its history.

With regard to him, however, who looks at the
collecting and the studying of folklore as trivial work
and a waste of time, I should gather that he regards
it so on account, first perhaps, of his forgetting the
reality their superstitions were to those who believed
in them ; and secondly, on account of his ignorance
of their meaning. As a reality to those who believed
in them, the superstitions of our ancestors form an

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 559

integral part of their history. However, I need not
follow that topic further by trying to show how 'the
proper study of mankind is man/ and how it is a mark
of an uncultured people not to know or care to know
about the history of the race. So the ancient Roman
historian, Tacitus, evidently thought; for, when com-
plaining how little was known as to the original peopling
of Britain, he adds the suggestive words lit infer bar-
baros, ' as usual among barbarians.' Conversely, I take
it for granted that no liberally educated man or woman
of the present day requires to be instructed as to the
value of the study of history in all its aspects, or to
be told that folklore cannot be justly called trivial,
seeing that it has to do with the history of the race —
in a wider sense, I may say with the history of the
human mind and the record of its development.

As history has been mentioned, it may be here
pointed out that one of the greatest of the folklorist's
difficulties is that of drawing the line between story
and history. Nor is that the worst of it ; for the ques-
tion as between fact and fiction, hard as it is in itself,
is apt to be further complicated by questions of ethno-
logy. This may be illustrated by reference to a group
of legends which project a vanishing distinction be-
tween the two kindred races of Brythons and Goidels
in Wales ; and into the story of some of them Arthur
is introduced playing a principal role. They seem to
point to a time when the Goidels had as yet wholly
lost neither their own language nor their own institu-
tions in North Wales : for the legends belong chiefly
to Gwyned, and cluster especially around Snowdon,
where the characteristics of the Goidel as the earlier
Celt may well have lingered latest, thanks to the
comparatively inaccessible nature of the countr}^ One
of these legends has already been summarized as repre-

560 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

senting Arthur marching up the side of Snowdon
towards Bwlch y Saethau, where he falls and is buried
under a cairn named from him Carried Arthur : see p. 473.
We are not told who his enemies were ; but with this
question has usually been associated the late Triad,
iii, 20, which alludes to Arthur meeting in Nanhwynain
with Medrawd or Medrod (Modred) and Idawc Corn
Prydain, and to his being betrayed, for the benefit and
security of the Saxons in the island. An earlier
reference to the same story occurs in the Dream of
Rhonabwy in the Red Book of Hergest^^ in which
Idawc describes himself as Idawc son of Mynio, and as
nicknamed htawc Cord: Prydain — which means 'Idawc
the Churn-staff of Prydain ' — in reference presumably
to his activity in creating dissension. He confesses
to having falsified the friendly messages of Arthur to
Medrod, and to succeeding thereby in bringing on
the fatal battle of Camlan, from which Idawc himself
escaped to do penance for seven years on the E^ech
Las, ' Grey Stone V in Prydain or Pictland.

Another story brings Arthur and the giant Rhita into
collision, the latter of whom has already been mentioned
as having, according to local tradition, his grave on the
top of Snowdon : see pp. 474-9. The story is a very wild
one. Two kings who were brothers, Nyniaw or Nynio
and Peibiaw or Peibio, quarrelled thus : one moonlight
night, as they were together in the open air, Nynio said
to Peibio, ' See, what a fine extensive field I possess.'
' Where is it ? ' asked Peibio. ' There it is,' said Nynio,
'the whole firmament.' 'See,' said Peibio, 'what

' The Oxford Mabmogton, p. 147 ; Guest's Mabinogion, ii. 398.

^ This may have meant the 'Blue Slate or Flagstone'; but there is no
telling so long as the place is not identified. It may have been in the
Pictish district of Galloway, or else somewhere beyond the Forth. Query
whether it was the same place as E^ecli Gelydon in Prydyn, mentioned in
Bomiy Saint : see the Myvyrian Archaiology, ii. 49.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR I ST 561

innumerable herds of cattle and sheep I have grazing in
thy field.' * Where are they ? ' asked Nynio. * There
they are,' said Peibio, ' the whole host of stars that thou
seest, each of golden brightness, with the moon shep-
herding them.' ' They shall not graze in my field,' said
Nynio. ' But they shall,' said Peibio ; and the two
kings got so enraged with one another, that they began
a war in which their warriors and subjects were nearly
exterminated. Then comes Rhita Gawr, king of Wales,
and attacks them on the dangerous ground of their
being mad. He conquered them and shaved off their
beards ^ ; but when the other kings of Prydain, twenty-
eight in number, heard of it, they collected all their
armies together to avenge themselves on Rhita for the
disgrace to which he had subjected the other two. But
after a great struggle Rhita conquers again, and has
the beards of the other kings shaved. Then the kings
of neighbouring kingdoms in all directions combined to
make war on Rhita to avenge the disgrace to their
order; but they were also vanquished forthwith, and
treated in the same ignominious fashion as the thirty
kings of Prydain. With the beards he had a mantle
made to cover him from head to foot, and that was a
good deal, we are told, since he was as big as two ordi-
nary men. Then Rhita turned his attention to the
establishment of just and equitable laws as between king
and king and one realm with another ^. But the sequel

' The story of Kulhwch and Olwen has a different legend which
represents Nynio and Peibio changed by the Almighty into two oxen called
Ychen Bannadc: see the Oxford Mabinogion, p. 121, also my Arthurian
Legend, p. 304, and the remarks which are to follow in this chapter with
respect to those oxen.

^ For the story in Welsh see the lolo MSS., pp. 193-4; where a footnote
tells the reader that it was copied from the book of ' laco ab Dcwi.' From
his father's manuscript, Taliesin Williams printed an abstract in English
in his notes to his poem entitled the Doom of Colyn Dolphyn (London, 1837),
pp. 119-20, from which it will be found translated into German in the notes
to San-Marte's Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Brilanmce, pp. 40^-3.

RHYS O O

562 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

to the shaving is related by Geoffrey of Monmouth, x. 3,
where Arthur is made to tell how the giant, after
destroying the other kings and using their beards in the
way mentioned, asked him for his beard to fix above the
other beards, as he stood above them in rank, or else to
come and fight a duel with him. Arthur, as might be
expected, chose the latter course, with the result that he
slew Rhita, there called Rifho, at a place said to be in
Aravio Monte, by which the Welsh translator under-
stood the chief mountain of Eryri^ or Snowdon. So
it is but natural that his grave should also be there,
as already mentioned. I may here add that it is
the name Snowdon itself, probably, that undedies the
Senaudon or Sinadoun of such Arthurian romances as
the English version of Liheaus Desconns, though the
place meant has been variously supposed to be situated
elsewhere than in the Snowdon district : witness Sinodun
Hill in Berkshire^.

The story of Rhita is told also by Malory, who calls
that giant Ryons and Ryence; and there the incident
seems to end with Ryons being led to Arthur's court
by knights who had overcome him. Ryons' challenge,
as given by Malory ^, runs thus :—

'This meane whyle came a messager from kynge
Ryons of Northwalys. And kynge he was of all Ireland
and of many lies. And this was his message gretynge
wel kynge Arthur in this manere wyse sayenge . that
kynge Ryons had discomfyte and ouercome xj kynges .
and eueryche of hem did hym homage . and that was this .

O-a^ovd Bruts, p. 213: compare p. 146, together with Geoffrey's Tatin,
vii. 3, X. 3.

' See Kelbing's AltengUsche Bibliothek, the fifth vohime of which consists
of Libeaus Desconus,&d\ied by Max Kaluza (Leipsic, 1890), lines 163, 591,
and Introduction, p. cxxxxiv. For calling my attention to this, I have to
thank my friend, Mr. Henry Bradley.

* Malory's Morie Darihur, i. 27 : see also i. 17-8, 28; ii. 6, 8-9.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 563

they gaf hym their berdys clene flayne of . as moche as
ther was . wherfor the messager came for kyng Arthurs
herd. For kyng Ryons had purfyled a mantel with
kynges berdes . and there lacked one place of the mantel .
wherfor he sente for his herd or els he wold entre in
to his landes . and brenne and slee . & neuer leue tyl he
haue the hede and the herd.'

Rhita is not said, it is true, to have been a Gwydisl,
' Goidel ' ; but he is represented ruling over Ireland, and
his name, which is not Welsh, recalls at first sight those
of such men as Boya the Pict or Scot figuring in the life
of St. David, and such as JLta Gvitel, ' ILia the Goidel,'
mentioned in the Stanzas of the Graves in the Black Book
of Carmarthen as buried in the seclusion of Ardudwy^
Malory's Ryons is derived from the French Romances,
where, as for example in the Merlin, according to the
Huth MS., it occurs as Rion-s in the nominative, and
Rioji in regime. The latter, owing to the old French
habit of eliding d' or th, derives regularly enough from
such a form as the SLCCUsative Rlfkon-em'", which is the one

' See Evans' Autotype Facsimile, fo. 33": could the spot so called (in the
Welsh text argel Ardudwy) be somewhere in the neighbourhood of ILyn
Irdyn (p. 148), a district said to be rich in the remains of a prehistoric
antiquity? J. Evans, author of the North Wales volume of the Beauties of
Englmid and Wales, says, after hurriedly enumerating such antiquities, p. 909 :
' Perhaps in no part of Britain is there still remaining such an assemblage of
relicks belonging to druidical rites and customs as arc found in this place,
and the adjacent parts.'

" As to Rion, see Gaston Paris and Ulrich's Merlin (Paris, 1886), i. 202,
239-46. Other instances will readily occur to the reader, such as the
Domesday Roelend or Roelcnt for Rothelan, in Modern Welsh Rlindlan ; but
for more instances of this elision by French and Anglo-Norman scribes
of vowel-flanked <f and tli, see Notes and Queries for Oct. 28, 1899, pp. 351-a,
and Nov. 18, p. 415 ; also Vising's Etude siir le Dialecte anglo-nonnand dn
xij^ Steele (Upsala, 1882), p. 88 ; and F. Hildcbrand's article on Domesday, in
the Zei/schri/t/iir romanisc/ie Philologie, 1884, p. 360. According to Suchier in
GrOber's Grundriss der rom. Philologie, i. 581, this process of elision became
complete in the twelfth century : see also Schwan's Gramniatik des Alt-
franzosisehen (Leipsic, 1888), p. 65. For most o these references, I have
to thank my friend and neighbour, Mr. Stevenson of Exeter College.

002

564 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ck.

occurring in Geoffrey's text ; and we should probably
be right in concluding therefrom that the correct old
Welsh form of the name was Rithon. But the Goidelic
form was at the same time probably Ritfa, with a genitive
Rittann, for an earlier Ritton. Lastly, that the local
legend should perpetuate the Goidelic Ritta slightly
modified, has its parallel in the case of Trwyd and Trwyth,
and of Echel and Egel or Ecel, pp. 541-2 and 536-7.

The next story ^ points to a spot between y Dinas or
Dinas Emrys and Lyn y Dinas as containing the grave
of OwenyMhacsen, that is to say, ' Owen son of Maxen.'
Owen had been fighting with a giant — whose name local
tradition takes for granted — with balls of steel ; and there
are depressions {panylau ") still to be seen in the ground
where each of the combatants took his stand. Some, how-
ever, will have it that it was with bows and arrows they
fought, and that the hollows are the places they dug to
defend themselves. The result was that both died at
the close of the conflict ; and Owen, being asked where
he wished to be buried, ordered an arrow to be shot
into the air and his grave to be made where it fell. The
story is similarly given in the lolo MSS., pp. 81-2,
where the combatants are called Owen Einctn ab Macsen
Wledig, ' Owen of the Dark Face, son of Prince Maxen,'
and Eiirnach Hen, ' E. the Ancient,' one of the Gwydyl or
' Goidels ' of North Wales, and otherwise called Urnach
WydeL He is there represented as father (i) of the Serrigi
defeated by Catwattawn or Cadwatton Law-hir, ' C. the
Long-handed,' at Cerrig y Gwydyd, ' the Stones of the
Goidels,' near Matldraeth ^, in Anglesey, where the great
and final rout of the Goidels is represented as having

^ It comes from the same ILwyd MS. which has already been cited at
PP- 233-4 '• see the Cambrian Journal for 1859, pp. 209-10.

' I notice in the maps a spot called Panylau, which is nearer to ILyn
Gwynain than to ILyn y Dinas.

^ See Morris' Celtic Remains, s. v. Serigi, and the lolo MSS., p. 81.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 565

taken place ^ ; (2) of Daronwy, an infant spared and
brought up in Anglesey to its detriment, as related in
the other story, p. 504 ; and (3) of Solor, who commands
one of the three cruising fleets of the Isle of Prydain ^.
The stronghold of Eurnach or Urnach is said to have
been Dinas Ffaraon, which was afterwards called Din
Emreis and Dinas Emrys. The whole story about the
Goidels in North Wales, however, as given in the
lolo MSS., pp. 78-80, is a hopeless jumble, though
it is probably based on old traditions. In fact, one
detects Eurnach or Urnach as Wrnach or Gwrnach in
the story of Kulhwch and Olwen ^ in the Red Book,
where we are told that Kei or Cai, and others of Arthur's
men, got into the giant's castle and cut off his head in
order to secure his sword, which was one of the things
required for the hunting of Twrch Trwyth. In an
obscure passage, also in a poem in the Black Book, we
read of Cai fighting in the hall of this giant, who is then
called Awarnach *. Some such a feat appears to have
been commemorated in the place-name Gw>yd Cai,
* Cai's Feat of Arms,' which occurs in ILewelyn's grant
of certain lands on the Bedgelert and Pen Gwryd
side of Snowdon in 1198 to the monks of Aber-
conwy, or rather in an inspexifnus of the same :
see Dugdale's Monasticon, v. 673*, where it stands
printed g-wryt, kei. Nor is it unreasonable to guess
that Pen Gwryd is only a shortening of Pen Gwryd
Cai, 'Cai's Feat Knoll or Terminus'; but compare
p. 217 above. Before leaving Cai I may point out that

> The lolo MSS., p. 81, have Syrigi Wydel son of Mwrchan son of
Eurnach Hen.

» See Triads, ii. 12, and the Mabinogion, p. 301 : in Triads, i. 72, iii. 86,
instead of Solor we have Doler and Dolor.

2 See the Oxford Mabinogion, pp. 125-8.

* Evans' Autotype Facsimile, fo. 48" ; see also my preface to Dent's
Malory, p. xxvii ; likewise p. 457 above.

566 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

tradition seems to ascribe to him as his residence the
place called Caer Gat, ' Cai's Fort,' between Bala and
Lanuwchttyn. If one may treat Cai as a historical
man, one may perhaps suppose him, or some member
of his family, commemorated by the vocable Burgo-
cavi on an old stone found at Caer Gai, and said
to read : Ic iacit Salvianiis Biirgocavi filius Ciipitiani ^ —
' Here lies Salvianus Burgoraws, son of Cupitianus.'
The reader may also be referred back to such non-
Brythonic and little known figures as Daronwy, Cath-
balug, and Brynach, together perhaps with Mengwaed,
the wolf-lord of Artiechwed, pp. 504-5. It is worth
while calling attention likewise to Goidehc indications
afforded by the topography of Eryri, to wit such cases
as Bwlch Mwrchan or Mwlchaii, ' Mwrchan's Pass,'
sometimes made into Bwlch Mwyalchen or even Bwlch
y Fwyalchen, ' the Ousel's Gap,' near ILyn Gwynain ; the
remarkable remains called Miiriau'r Dre, 'the Town
Walls' — otherwise known as Tre'r Gwyctelod'^, 'the
Goidels' town ' — on the land of Gwastad Annas at the
top of Nanhwynain ; and Bwlch y Gwydel, still higher
towards Pen Gwryd, may have meant the ' Goidel's Pass.'
Probably a study of the topography on the spot would
result in the identification of more names similarly
significant ; but I will call attention to only one of them,

' See my Lectures on Welsh Philology, pp. 377-9 ; and, as to the Caer Gai
tradition, the Arch. Canib. for 1850, p. 204, and Morris' Celtic Remains,
p. 63. I may add as to JLanuwchltyn, that the oldest inhabitants pronounce
that name JLanuwttyn.

^ I cannot discover that it has ever been investigated by the Cambrian
Archaeological Association or any other antiquaries. Compare the case of
the neighbouring site with the traces of the copper smeltings mentioned
in the note on p. 532 above. To my knowledge the Cambrians have twice
failed to make their way nearer to the ruins than ILanberis, or at most
ILanberis Pass, significantly called in Welsh Pen Gorffwysfa for the older
name Gorffwysfa Bens, 'Peris' Resting-place': thus we loyally follow
the example of resting set by the saint, and leave alone the archeology
of the district.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 567

namely Bedgelert or, as it is locall}^ pronounced, Beth-
gelart, though the older spellings of the name appear
to be Beth Kellarth and Beth Kelert. Those who are
acquainted with the story, as told there, of the man who
rashly killed his hound might think that Bedgelert,
* Gelert or Kelert's Grave,' refers to the hound; but
there is a complete lack of evidence to show this widely
known story to have been associated with the neigh-
bourhood by antiquity ^ ; and the compiler of the notes
and pedigrees known as Bonect y Saint was probably
right in treating Kelert as the name of an ancient saint :
see the Myvyr. Arch.^ ii. 36. In any case, Kelert or
Gelert with its rt cannot be a genuine Welsh name : the
older speUings seem to indicate two pronunciations —
a Goidelic one, Kelert, and a Welsh one, Kelarth or
Kettarth, which has not survived. The documents,
however, in which the name occurs require to be
carefully examined for the readings which they supply.
Lastly, from the Goidels of Arfon must not be too
violently severed those of Mona, among whom we have
found, pp. 504-5, the mysterious Cathbalug, whose name,
still half unexplained, reminds one of such Irish ones as
Cathbuadach, ' battle-victorious or conquering in war ' ;
and to the same stratum belongs Darofiwy, p. 504, which
survives as the name of a farm in the parish of ILan-
fachreth. The Record of Carnarvon, p. 59, speaks both
of a Molendinum de Darronwy et Cornezve, ' Mill of
Daronwy ^ and Cornwy,' and of Villce de Dorronzvy et

* The subject has been discussed at length by Mr. Jacobs, in a note to the
legend, in his Celtic Fairy Tales, pp. 259-64 ; and quite recently by Mr. D. E.
Jenkins in his Bed Gelert (Portmadoc, 1899), pp. 56-74.

" Professor J. Morris Jones, to whom I am indebted for the particulars
connected with these names, informs me that the local pronunciation is
DroHivy ; but Mrs. Rhys remembers that, years ago, at Amlwch, it was always
sounded Daronwy. The Professor also tells me that Dcniog is never made
into Dymog : the Kttwg/t of the Record is doubtless to be corrected into
Knivgh, and probably also Dornok into Dcriiok, which is the reading in the

568 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Kuwghdornok, 'Vills of Daronwy and of the Cnwch
Dernog,' which has been mentioned as now pronounced
Clwch Dernog, p. 457 : it is situated in the adjoining
parish of ILandeusant. The name is given in the same
Record as Dentok, and is doubtless to be identified with
the Ternoc not very uncommon in Irish hagiology.
With these names the Record further associates a hold-
ing called Wele Conus, and Conns survives in Weun
Gonnws, the name of a field on the farm of Bron Heulog,
adjoining Clwch Dernog. That is not all, for Connws
turns out to be the Welsh pronunciation of the Goidelic
name Cunagtissus, of which we have the Latinized geni-
tive on the Bodfedan menhir, some distance north-
east of the railway station of Ty Croes. It reads :
cvNOGVSi Hic lACiT, * Here lies (the body) of Cunagussus/
and involves a name which has regularly become in
Irish Conghus, while the native Welsh equivalent would
be Cynwst ^ These names, and one ^ or two more which
might be added to them, suggest a very Goidelic popula-
tion as occupying, in the fifth or sixth century, the part
of the island west of a line from Amlwch to Mattdraeth.
Lastly, the chronological indications of the crushing

margin. Cornewe is doubtless the district name which we have still in
E^an/air y'Nghomwy, 'St. Mary's in Cornwy ' : the mill is supposed to be
that of Bodronyn.

* The Book oflLan Ddv has an old form Cinust for an earlier Cingust or
Congust. The early Brythonic nominative must have been Cimogushi-s and
the early Goidelic Ct'inagusn-s, and from the difference of accentuation come
the o of Conghus, Connws, and the y of the Welsh Cynwst : compare Irish
Fergus and Welsh Gurgi'tst, later Gurust (one syllable), whence Grwst,
finally the accented rwst of ILanrwst, the name of a small town on the river
Conwy. Moreover the accentuation Ci'mogusi is the reason why it was not
written Ctinogussi: compare Bdrrivendi a.r\d Vendubari in one and the same
inscription from Carmarthenshire.

■•' Such as that of a holding called Wele Dauid ap Gwelsantfmit, the latter
part of which is perversely written or wrongly read so for Gwas Sunt Freit,
a rendering into Welsh of the very Goidelic name, Mael-Brigte, ' Servant of
St. Bridget; This Wele, with Wele Conus and Wele More, is contained in
the Extent marginally headed Darronwy cum Hameletta de Kiiwghdernok.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 569

of the power of the Goidels, and the incipient merging of
that people with the Brythons into a single nation
of Kymry or ' Compatriots,' are worthy of a passing
remark. We seem to find the process echoed in the
Triads when they mention as a favourite at Arthur's
Court the lord of Arltechwed, named Menwaed, who
has been guessed, p. 507 above, to have been a Goidel.
Then Serrigi and Daronwy are signalized as contem-
poraries of Cadwallon Law-hir, who inflicted on the
former, according to the later legend, the great defeat of
Cerrigy Gwydyl ^ The name, however, of the leader of
the Goidels arrayed against Cadwallon may be regarded
as unknown, and Serrigi as a later name, probably of
Norse origin, introduced from an account of a tenth
century struggle with invaders from the Scandinavian
kingdom of Dublin^. In this conqueror we have

' This comes in Triad i. 49 = ii. 40 ; as to which it is to be noted that
the name is Caiwatfawn in i and ii, but Caswatfazva in iii. 27, as in the
Oxford Mabinogion.

^ Serrigi, Serigi, or Syrigi looks like a Latin genitive torn out of its
context, but derived in the last resort from the Norse name Sigtrygg-r, -which
the Four Masters give as Sitriucc or Siiring: see their entries from 891 to
1091. The Scandinavians of Dublin and its neighbourhood were addicted
to descents on the shores of North Wales ; and we have possibly a trace of
occupation by them in Gauell Seiriih, ' Seirith's holding,' in the Record of
Carnarvon, p. 63, where the place in question is represented as being in the
manor of Cemmaes, in Anglesey. The name Seirith was probably that written
by the Four Masters as Sichfraith Sichraidh (also Serridh, a. d. 971?, that is to
say the Norse Sigrad-r before it lost the /retained in its German equivalent
Siegfried. We seem to detect Seirith later as Seri in place-names in
Anglesey — as for example in the name of the farms called Sen Faivr and Sen
Bach between ILandrygarn and ILannerch y Med*, also in a Pen Seri, ' Scri's
Knoll or Hill,' at Bryn Du, near Ty Croes station, and in another Pen Sen
on Holyhead Island, between Holyhead and ILain Goch, on the way to tlie
South Stack. Lastly Dugdale, v. 672'', mentions a Claud Seri, ' Seri's Dyke
or Ditch,' as being somewhere in the neighbourhood of ILanwnda, in
Carnarvonshire — not very far perhaps from the Gwyrfai and the spot where
the loloMSS. (pp. 8i-2; represent Serrigi repulsed b3' Caswatton and driven
back to Anglesey, previous to his being crushed at Cerrig y Gwyd'yl. The
reader must, however, be warned that the modern Seri is sometimes pro-
nounced Sieri or Sheri, which suggests the possibility of some of the instances
involving rather a form of the English word sheriff.

570

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

probably all that can be historical of the Caswatton of
the Mahinogion of Branwen and Manawydan, that
is, the Caswatton who ousts the Goidelic family of ILyr
from power in this country, and makes Pryderi of
Dyfed pay homage to him as supreme king of the
island. His name has there undergone assimilation to
that of Cassivellaunos, and he is furthermore represented
as son of Beli, king of Prydain in the days of its inde-
pendence, before the advent of the legions of Rome. But
as a historical man we are to regard Caswatton probably
as Cadwatton Law-hir, grandson of Cuneda and father
of Maelgwn of Gwyned. Now Cuneda and his sons,
according to Nennius (§ 62), expelled the Goidels with
terrible slaughter ; and one may say, with the Triads,
which practically contradict Nennius' statement as to
the Goidels being expelled, that Cuneda's grandson
continued the struggle with them. In any case there
were Goidels still there, for the Book of Taliessin
seems to give evidence ^ of a persistent hostility, on
the part of the Goidelic bards of Gwyned, to Maelgwn
and the more Brythonic institutions which he may be
regarded as representing. This brings the Goidelic
element down to the sixth century 2. Maelgwn's death
took place, according to the oldest manuscript of the
Annales Cambria^ in the year 547, or ten years after
the Battle of Camlan — in which, as it says, Arthur and
Medrod fell. Now some of this is history and some
is not : where is the line to be drawn ? In any case,
the attempt to answer that question could not be justly
met with contempt or treated as trivial.
The other cause, to which I suggested that contempt

* See my Hibbert Lectures, pp. 546-8.

^ The case with regard to the extreme south of the Principality is some-
what similar ; for inscriptions in Glamorgan seem to bring the last echoes
there of Goidelic speech down to the seventh century: see the Archopologia
Cambreiisis for 1899, pp. 160-6.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR I ST ^-ji

for folklore was probably to be traced, together with the
difficulties springing therefrom to beset the folklorist's
paths, is one's ignorance of the meaning of man}^ of
the superstitions of our ancestors. I do not wish this
to be regarded as a charge of wilful ignorance ; for
one has frankly to confess that many old superstitions
and superstitious practices are exceedingly hard to
understand. So much so, that those who have most
carefully studied them cannot always agree with one
another in their interpretation. At first sight, some of
the superstitions seem so silly and absurd, that one
cannot wonder that those who have not gone deeply
into the study of the human mind should think them
trivial, foolish, or absurd. It is, however, not improb-
able that they are the results of early attempts to
think out the mysteries of nature ; and our difficulty is
that the thinking was so infantile, comparatively speak-
ing, that one finds it hard to put one's self back into
the mental condition of early man. But it should be
clearly understood that our difficulty in ascertaining
the meaning of such superstitions is no proof what-
soever that they had 7io meaning.

The chief initial difficult}^, however, meeting any one
who would collect folklore in Wales arises from the
fact that various influences have conspired to laugh
it out of court, so to say, so that those who are
acquainted with superstitions and ancient fads become
ashamed to own it: they have the fear of ridicule
weighing on their minds, and that is a weight not
easily removed. I can recall several instances : among
others I may mention a lady who up to middle age
believed implicitly in the existence of fairies, and was
most anxious that her children should not wander away
from home at any time when there happened to be
a mist, lest the fairies should carry them away to their

572

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

home beneath a neighbouring lake. In her later years,
however, it was quite useless for a stranger to question
her on these things: fairy lore had been so laughed
out of countenance in the meantime, that at last she
would not own, even to the members of her own
family, that she remembered anything about the fairies.
Another instance in point is supplied by the story of
Casteilmarch, and by my failure for a whole fortnight
to elicit from the old blacksmith of Aber Soch the
legend of March ab Meirchion with horse's ears.
Of course I can readily understand the old man's shy-
ness in repeatin the story of March. Science, how-
ever, knows no such shyness, as it is her business
to pry into everything and to discover, if possible,
the why and wherefore of all things. In this con-
text let me for a moment revert to the story of
March, silly as it looks: — March was lord of Casteil-
march in ILeyn, and he had horse's ears ; so lest the
secret should be known, every one who shaved him
was killed forthwith ; and in the spot where the bodies
were buried there grew reeds, which a bard cut in
order to provide himself with a pipe. The pipe
when made would give no music but words meaning
March has horse's ears! There are other forms of the
story, but all substantially the same as that preserved
for us by ILwyd (pp. 233-4), except that one of them
resembles more closely the Irish version about to be
summarized. It occurs in a manuscript in the Peniarth
collection, and runs thus : — March had horse's ears,
a fact known to nobody but his barber, who durst not
make it known for fear of losing his head. But the
barber fell ill, so that he had to call in a physician, who
said that the patient was being killed by a secret ; and
he ordered him to tell it to the ground. The barber
having done so became well again, and fine reeds grew

xl DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 573

on the spot. One day, as the time of a great feast was
drawing nigh, certain of the pipers of Maelgwn Gwyned"
coming that way saw the reeds, some of which they cut
and used for their pipes. By-and-by they had to per-
form before King March, when they could ehcit from
their pipes no strain but ' Horse's ears for March ab
Meirchion' {klvstiav march i varch ab Meirchion).
Hence arose the saying — 'That is gone on horns and
pipes' {vaeth hynny ar gym a fftbav), which was as much
as to say that the secret is become more than pubhc ^

The story, it is almost needless to say, can be traced
also in Cornwall and in Brittany^; and not only among
the Brythonic peoples of those countries, but among
the Goidels of Ireland likewise. The Irish story runs
thus^: — Once on a time there was a king over Ireland
whose name was Labraid Lore, and this is the manner
of man he was — he had two horse's ears on him. And
every one who shaved the king used to be slain forth-
with. Now the time of shaving him drew nigh one
day, when the son of a widow in the neighbourhood
was enjoined to do it. The widow went and besought
the king that her son should not be slain, and he
promised her that he would be spared if he would only
keep his secret. So it came to pass ; but the secret so
disagreed with the widow's son that he fell ill, and
nobody could divine the cause until a druid came by.
He at once discovered that the youth was ill of an
uncommunicated secret, and ordered him to go to the
meeting of four roads. * Let him,' said he, ' turn sunwise,
and the first tree he meets on the right side let him
tell the secret to it, and he will be well.' This 3'ou

' See Evans' Report on MSS. in the IVclsli Language, p. 837, where the
Welsh is quoted from p. 131 of the Peniarth MS. 134.

' See my Arthurian Legend, p. 70.

» See the Revue Celtique, ii. 197-9, where Dr. Stokes has pubhshcd the
original with a translation and notes ; also p. 435 above.

574 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

might think was quite safe, as it was a tree and not his
mother, his sister, or his sweetheart; but you would
be quite mistaken in thinking so. The tree to which
the secret was told was a willow ; and a famous Irish
harper of that day, finding he wanted a new harp,
came and cut the makings of a harp from that very
tree ; but when the harp was got ready and the harper
proceeded to play on it, not a note could he ehcit but
* Labraid Lore has horse's ears ! ' As to the barber's
complaint, that was by no means unnatural : it has often
been noticed how a secret disagrees with some natures,
and how uneasy and restless it makes them until they
can out with it. The same thing also, in an aggravated
form, occurs now and then to a public man who has
prepared a speech in the dark recesses of his heart, but
has to leave the meeting where he intended to have it
out, without finding his opportunity. Our neighbours
on the other side of the Channel have a technical term
for that sort of sufferer : they say of him that he is
malade d'lin discours ventre, or ill of a speech which has
gone into the patient's constitution, like the measles or
the small-pox when it fails to come out. But to come
back to the domain of folklore, I need only mention
the love-lorn knights in Malory's Morte Darthttr, who
details their griefs in doleful strains to solitary fountains
in the forests : it seems to have relieved them greatly, and
it sometimes reached other ears than those of the wells.
Now with regard to him of the equine ears, some one
might thoughtlessly suggest, that, if it ever became a
question of improving this kind of story, one should
make the ears into those of an ass. As a matter of
fact there was a Greek story of this kind, and in that
story the man with the abnormal head was called
Midas, and his ears were said to be those of an ass.
The reader will find him figuring in most collections

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR 1ST 575

of Greek stories ; so I need not pursue the matter
further, except to remark that the exact kind of brute
ears was possibly a question which different nations
decided differently. At any rate Stokes mentions a
Serbian version in which the ears were those of a goat.
What will, however, occur to everybody to ask, is —
What was the origin of such a story ? what did it mean,
if it had a meaning? Various attempts have been made
to interpret this kind of story, but nobody, so far as
I know, has found a sure key to its meaning. The best
guess I can make has been suggested in a previous
chapter, from which it will be seen that the horse fits the
Welsh context, so to say, best, the goat less well, and
the ass probably least of all : see pp. 433-9 above. Sup-
posing, then, the interpretation of the story established
for certain, the question of its origin would still remain.
Did it originate among the Celts and the Greeks and
other nations who relate it ? or has it simply originated
among one of those peoples and spread itself to the
others ? or else have they all inherited it from a common
source? If we take the supposition that it originated
independently among a variety of people in the distant
past, then comes an interesting question as to the con-
ditions under which it arose, and the psychological state
of the human race in the distant past. On the other
supposition one is forced to ask : Did the Celts get the
story from the Greeks, or the Greeks from the Celts, or
neither from either, but from a common source ? Also
when and how did the variations arise ? In any case,
one cannot help seeing that a story like the one I have
instanced raises a variety of profoundly difficult and
interesting questions.

Hard as the folklorist may find it to extract tales and
legends from the people of Wales at the present day,
there is one thing which he finds far more irritating

576 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

than the taciturnity of the peasant, and that is the hope-
less fashion in which some of those who have written
about Welsh folklore have deigned to record the stories
which were known to them. Take as an instance the
following, which occurs in Howells' Cambrian Super-
stitions, pp. 103-4 : —

' In Cardiganshire there is a lake, beneath which it
is reported that a town hes buried ; and in an arid
summer, when the water is low, a wall, on which people
may walk, extending across the lake is seen, and sup-
posed to appertain to the inundated city or town ; on
one side is a gigantic rock, which appears to have
been split, as there is a very extensive opening in it,
which nearly divides it in twain, and which tradition
relates was thus occasioned : — Once upon a time there
was a person of the name of Pannog, who had two
oxen, so large that their like was never known in any
part of the world, and of whom it might be said.

They ne'er will look upon their like again.

It chanced one day that one of them (and it appears that
they were not endued with a quantum of sense propor-
tionate to their bulk) was grazing near a precipice
opposite the rock, and whether it was his desire to
commit suicide, or to cool his body by laving in the
lake below, one knows not, but certain it is that down
he plunged, and was never seen more : his partner
searching for him a short time after, and not perceiving
any signs of his approach, bellowed almost as loud as
the Father of the Gods, who when he spake " Earth
to his centre shook " ; however, the sound of his bleating
\sic\ split the opposite rock, which from the circumstance
is called Uchain Pannog (Pannog's Oxen). These oxen
were said to be two persons, called in Wales, Nyniaf
and Phebiaf, whom God turned into beasts for their
sins.'

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 577

Here it is clear that Mr. Howells found a portion, if not
the whole, of his story in Welsh, taken partly from the
Kulhwch story, and apparently in the old spelling ; for
his own acquaintance with the language did not enable
him to translate Nynnya6 a pheiha6 into * Nynio and
Peibio.' The slenderness of his knowledge of Welsh
is otherwise proved throughout his book, especially by
the way in which he spells Welsh words : in fact one
need not go beyond this very story with its Ucliain
Pannog. But when he had ascertained that the lake
was in Cardiganshire he might have gone a little further
and have told his readers which lake it was. It is not
one of the lakes which I happen to know in the north of
the county — ILyn ILygad y Rheidol on Plinlimmon, or
the lake on Moel y ILyn to the north of Cwm Ceulan,
or either of the Iwan Lakes which drain into the Merin
(or Meri), a tributary of the Mynach, which flows under
Pont ar Fynach, called in English the Devil's Bridge.
From inquiry I cannot find either that it is any one
of the pools in the east of the county, such as those
of the Teifi, or ILyn Ferwyn, not far from the gorge
known as Cwm Berwyn, mentioned in Edward Richards'
well known lines, p. 43 :— •

Mae'n bwrw' 'Nghwm Berwyn cCr cysgod yn estyn,
Gwna heno fy mwthyn yn derfyn dy daith.

It rains in Cwm Berwyn, the shadows are growing,
To-night make my cabin the end of thy journey.

There is, it is true, a pool at a place called Maes y
ILyn in the neighbourhood of Tregaron, as to which
there is a tradition that a village once occupied the
place of its waters : otherwise it shows no similarity to
the lake of Howells' story. Then there is a group of
lakes in which the river Aeron takes its rise : they are
called ILyn Eidwen, ILyn Fanod, and ILyn Farch. As
to ILyn Eidwen, I had it years ago that at one time

RHYS P P

578 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

there was a story current concerning * wild cattle,' which
used to come out of its waters and rush back into them
when disturbed. In the middle of this piece of water,
which has a rock on one side of it, is a small island
with a modern building on it ; and one would like to
know whether it shows any traces of early occupation.
Then as to ILyn Farch, there is a story going that there
came out of it once on a time a wonderful animal, which
was shot by a neighbouring farmer. Lastly, at ILyn
Fanod there are boundary walls which go right out
into the lake ; and my informant thinks the same is the
case with ILyn Eidwen ^. One of these walls is probably
what in Howells' youthful hands developed itself into
a causeway. The other part of his story, referring to
the lowing of the Bannog Oxen, comes from a well
known doggerel which runs thus : —

ILan Dewi Frefi fraith"^, ILanSewi of Brefi the spotted,

tt^e brefoi yr ych naw gwaith, Where bellowed the ox nine times,

Nes hotiti craig y Foelatit. Till the Foelattt rock split in two.

Brefi is the name of the river from which this ILandewi
takes its distinctive name ; and it is pronounced there
much the same as brefu, ' the act of lowing, bellowing,
or bleating,' Now the Brefi runs down through the
Foelatit Farm, which lies between two very big rocks
popularly fancied to have been once united, and
treated by Howells, somewhat inconsistently, as the
permanent forms taken by the two oxen. The story
which Howells seems to have jumbled up with that of

' The gentlemen to whom I am chiefly indebted for the information em-
bodied in the foregoing notes are the following four : the Rev. John Jones
ofYstad Meurig, Professor Robert Williams of St. David's College, the Vicar
of ILandfewi Brefi, Mr. J. H. Davies of Cwrt Mawr and Lincoln's Inn
(P- 354) ; and as to the ' wild cattle ' story of ILyn Eid\ven, Mr. J. E. Rogers
of Aber Meurig is my authority.

^ So I had it many years ago from an old woman from BLangeitho, and so
Mr. J. G. Evans remembers his mother repeating it ; but now it is made
into E^an Dewi Brefi braith, with the mutations disregarded.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST

579

one or more lake legends, is to be found given in
Samuel Rush Meyrick's County of Cardigan : see
pp. 265-6, where one reads of a wild tradition that when
the church was building there were two oxen to draw
the stone required ; and one of the two died in the effort
to drag the load, while the other bellowed nine times
and thereby split the hill, which before presented itself
as an obstacle. The single ox was then able to bring
the load unassisted to the site of the church. It is to
this story that the doggerel already given refers ; and,
curiously enough, most of the district between ILan-
dewi and Ystrad Fflur, or Strata Florida, is more or less
associated with the Ychen Bannog. Thus a ridge run-
ning east and west at a distance of some three miles
from Tregaron, and separating Upper and Lower Caron
from one another, bears the name of Civys yr Ychen
Bannog, or the Furrow of the Ychen Bannog. It some-
what resembles in appearance an ancient dyke, but it is
said to be nothing but ' a long bank of glacial till ^'
Moreover there used to be preserv^ed within the church
of ILandewi a remarkable fragment of a horn commonly
called Madcornyr Ych Bannog, 'the mabcorn or core of
the Bannog Ox's Horn.' It is now in the possession
of Mr. Parry of ILidiardau, near Aberystwyth ; and it
has been pronounced by Prof. Boyd Dawkins to have
belonged to ' the great urus {Bos Primigenius), that
Charlemagne hunted in the forests of Aachen, and the
monks of St. Galle ate on their feast days.' He adds
that the condition of the horn proves it to have been
derived from a peat bog or alluvium '^. On the whole, it
seems to me probable that the wild legends about the

' See the Archceologta Cantbrensis for 1868, p. 88.

* See ib. p. 87. I have ascertained on the best authority the identity of
the present owner of the horn, though I have not succeeded in eliciting from
him any reply to my inquiries. I conchide that there is something wrong
with the postal service in my native county.

P P 2

580 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Ychen Bannog'^ in Cardiganshire have underlying them
a substratum of tradition going back to a time when the
urus was not as yet extinct in Wales. How far the
urus was once treated in this country as an emblem of
divinity, it is impossible to say; but from ancient Gaul
we have such a name as Urogeno-nertus'^y meaning a

* Several passages bearing on the word bannog have been brought
together in Silvan Evans' Geiriadnr. He gives the meaning as 'high, lofty,
prominent, conspicuous.' The word is derived from bait, 'a. summit or peak,'
plural bannaii, so common in the names of hills and mountains in South
Wales — as \r\y Fan in Carmarthenshire, Bannwchdeni fp. 22) in Breconshire,
Pen y Batman near Pont Rhyd Fendigaid in Cardiganshire, Bannau
Brycheiniog and Bannau Sir Gaer, the mountains called in English the
Beacons of Breconshire and Carmarthenshire respectively. In North Wales
we have it possibly in the compound Tryfan, which the mapsters will have
us call Tryfaen ; and the corresponding word in Scotch Gaelic appears in such
names as Ben Nevis and the like, while in Irish the word benn meant a horn
or peak. I am, nevertheless, not at all sure that Ychen Bannog meant horned
oxen or even tall and conspicuous oxen ; for there is a Welsh word man,
meaning a spot or mark (Latin menda), and the adjective was mannawc,
mannog. * spotted, marked, particoloured.' Now in the soft mutation all four
words — ban, bannog, and man. mannog — would begin with/=i^, which might
help to confusion between them. This may be illustrated in a way from
Williams' Seint Great (pp. 88-92), where Gwalchmai has a dream in which
he sees 150 bulls with spots or patches of colour on them, except three only
which were 'without any spot in the world ' (neb ryw vann or byt), or as it
is also put 'without spot' (heb vann). This word vann, applied to the
colour of the bulls, comes from the radical form mann ; and the adjective was
mannawc or mannog, which would 'mean spotted, particoloured, or having
patches of colour. Now the oxen of Welsh legends are also sometimes called
Ychen Mannog (pp. 131—2), and it is possible, that, whichever way the term is
written, it should be interpreted to mean spotted, marked, or particoloured
oxen. I take it also that E^an ■Devui Frefi fraith was meant as synonymous
with TLan -Dewi Frefi fannog, which did not fit the rhyme. Lastly, the Dyfed
use of the saying Fel dau ych bannog, 'Like two Bannog oxen,' in the sense
of ' equal and inseparable companions' (as instanced in the Geiriadur),
sounds like the antithesis of the passage in the Kulhwch (Mabinogion, p. 121).
For there we have words to the following effect : ' Though thou shouldst
get that, there is something which thou wilt not get, namely the two oxen
of Bannog, the one on the other side of the Bannog mountain and the other
on this side, and to bring them together to draw the same plough. They
are, to wit, Nynio and Peibio, whom God fashioned into oxen for their sins.'
Here the difficulty contemplated was not to separate the two, but to bring
them together to work under the same yoke. This is more in harmony
with the story of the mad quarrel between the two brother kings bearing
those names as mentioned above.

" See the Revue Ccltique, iii. 310, after Gruter, 570, 6.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR I ST 581

man of the strength of an Urogcn, that is, of the off-
spring of a urus ; not to mention the Gaulish Tarvos
Trigaramts, or the bull with three cranes on his back.
With this divine animal M. d'Arbois de Jubainville
would identify the Donnos underlying such Gallo-
Roman names as Donnotaurus, and that of the won-
derful bull called Donn in the principal epic story of
Ireland ^, where we seem to trace the same element in
the river-name given by Ptolemy as Mo-donnos, one of
the streams of Wicklow, or else the Slaney. This would
be the earliest instance known of the prefixing of the
pronoun mo/ m.y,' in its reverential application, which was
confined in later ages to the names of Goidelic saints.

To return, however, to the folklorist's difficulties, the
first thing to be done is to get as ample a supply of
folklore materials as possible ; and here I come to a
point at which some of the readers of these pages could
probably help ; for we want all our folklore and super-
stitions duly recorded and rescued from the yawning
gulf of oblivion, into which they are rapidly and irre-
trievably dropping year by year, as the oldest inhabitant
passes away.

Some years ago I attempted to collect the stories still
remembered in Wales about fairies and lake dwellers ;
and I seem to have thrown some amount of enthusiasm
into that pursuit. At any rate, one editor of a Welsh
newspaper congratulated me on being a thorough
believer in the fairies. Unfortunately, I was not
nearly so successful in recommending myself as a be-
liever to the old people who could have related to me
the kind of stories I wanted. Nevertheless, the best

• An important paper on the Tarvos Trigaraniis, from the pen of M. Salomon
Reinach, will be found in the Revue Celtique, xviii. 253-66 ; and M. d'A. dc
Jubainville's remarkable equations are to be read in the same periodical,
xix. 245-50 : see also xx. 374 5.

582 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

plan I found was to begin by relating a story about
the fairies myself: if that method did not result in
eliciting anything from the listener, then it was time to
move on to try the experiment on another subject.
Among the things which I then found was the fact, that
most of the well known lakes and tarns of Wales were
once beheved to have had inhabitants of a fairy kind,
who owned cattle that sometimes came ashore and
mixed with the ordinary breeds, while an occasional
lake lady became the wife of a shepherd or farmer
in the neighbourhood. There must, however, be
many more of these legends lurking in out of the
way parts of Wales in connexion with the more remote
mountain tarns; and it would be well if they were
collected systematically.

One of the most complete and best known of these
lake stories is that of ILyn y Fan Fach in the Beacons
of Carmarthenshire, called in Welsh Bannaii Sir Gaer.
The story is so much more circumstantial than all the
others, that it has been placed at the beginning of this
volume. Next to it may be ranked that of the Ystrad
Dyfodwg pool, now known as ILyn y Forwyn, the
details of which have only recently been unearthed for
me by a friend : see pp. 27-30 above. Well, in the Fan
Fach legend the lake lady marries a young farmer
from Mydfai, on the Carmarthenshire side of the range ;
and she is to remain his wife so long as he lives without
striking her three times without cause. When that
happens, she leaves him and calls away with her all her
live stock, down to the little black calf in the process of
being flayed ; for he suddenly dons his hide and hurries
away after the rest of the stock into the lake. The
three blows without cause seem to belong to a category
of very ancient determinants which have been recently
discussed, with his usual acumen and command of

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR I ST 583

instances from other lands, by Mr. Hartland, in the
chapters on the Swan Maidens in his Science of Fairy
Tales. But our South Welsh story allows the three
blows only a minimum of force ; and in North Wales
the determinant is of a different kind, though probably
equally ancient : for there the husband must not strike
or touch the fairy wife with anything made of iron,
a condition which probably points back to the Stone
Age. For archaeologists are agreed, that before metal,
whether iron or bronze, was used in the manufacturing
of tools, stone was the universal material for all cutting
tools and weapons. But as savages are profoundly con-
servative in their habits, it is argued that on ceremonial
and religious occasions knives of stone continued to be
the only ones admissible long after bronze ones had
been in common use for ordinary purposes. Take for
example the text of Exodus iv. 25, where Zipporah is
mentioned circumcising her son with a flint. From
instances of the kind one may comprehend the sort of
way in which iron came to be regarded as an abomina-
tion and a horror to the fairies. The question will be
found discussed by Mr. Hartland at length in his
book mentioned above : see more especially pp. 305-9.

Such, to my mind, are some of the questions to which
the fairies give rise : I now wish to add another turning
on the reluctance of the fairies to disclose their names.
There is one story in particular which would serve to
illustrate this admirably; but it is one which, I am sorry
to say, I have never been able to discover complete or
coherent in Wales. The substance of it should be,
roughly speaking, as follows :— A woman finds herself
in great distress and is delivered out of it by a fairy,
who claims as reward the woman's baby. On a certain
day the baby will inevitably be taken by the fairy unless
the fairy's true name is discovered by the mother. The

584 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

fairy is foiled by being in the meantime accidentally
overheard exulting, that the mother does not know that
his or her name is Rumpelstiltzchen, or whatever it
may be in the version which happens to be in question.
The best known version is the German one, where the
fairy is called Rumpelstiltzchen ; and it will be found in
the ordinary editions of Grimm's Mdrchen. The most
complete English version is the East Anglian one pub-
hshed by Mr. Edward Clodd, in his recent volume
entitled Tom Tit Tot, pp. 8-16 ; and previously in an
article full of research headed ' The Philosophy of
Rumpelstiltskin,' in Folk-Lore for 1889, pp. 138-43. It
is first to be noted that in this version the fairy's name
is Tom Tit Tot, and that the German and the East
Anglian stories run parallel. They agree in making
the fairy a male, in which they differ from our Welsh
Silly Frit and Silly go Dwt : in what other respect the
story of our Silly differed from that of Rumpelstiltzchen
and Tom Tit Tot it is, in the present incomplete state
of the Welsh one, impossible to say. Here it may be
found useful to recall the fragments of the Welsh story:
(1) A fairy woman used to come out of Corwrion Pool
to spin on fine summer days, and whilst spinning
she sang or hummed to herself sUi ffrit, stli ffrit — it
does not rise even to a doggerel couplet : see p. 64
above. (2) A farmer's wife in ILeyn used to have visits
from a fairy woman who came to borrow things from
her; and one day when the goodwife had lent her a
troett bach, or wheel for spinning flax, she asked the
fairy to give her name, which she declined to do. She
was, however, overheard to sing to the whir of the
wheel as follows (p. 229) : —

Bychan a tvyScC hi Little did she know

Mai S'lli go Dwt That Silly go Dwt

Yw fenw i. Is my name.

This throws some light on Silly Frit, and we know

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR I ST 585

where we are ; but the story is inconsequent, and far
from representing the original. We cannot, however,
reconstruct it quite on the hues of Grimm's or Clodd's
version. But I happened to mention my difficulty one
day to Dr. J. A. H. Murray, when he assured me of
the existence of a Scottish version in which the fairy is
a female. He learnt it when he was a child, he said,
at Denholm, in Roxburghshire ; and he was afterwards
charmed to read it in Robert Chambers' Popular
Rhymes of Scotland (Edinburgh, 1858), pp. 221-5,
whence Mr. Clodd has given an abstract of it in his
' Philosophy of Rumpelstiltskin.' Among those popular
rhymes the reader will find it as related at length by
Nurse Jenny in her inimitable fashion ; but the Scotch
is so broad, that I think it advisable, at the risk of
some havoc to the local colouring, to southronize it
somewhat as follows : —

' I see that you are fond of talks about fairies, children ;
and a story about a fairy and the goodwife of Kittle-
rumpit has just come into my mind ; but I can't very
well tell you now whereabouts Kittlerumpit lies. I
think it is somewhere in the Debatable Ground; any-
way I shall not pretend to know more than I do, like
everybody nowadays. I wish they would remember
the ballad we used to sing long ago: —

Mony ane sings the gerss, the gerss,
And mony ane sings the corn ;
And mony ane clatters o' bold Robin Hood,
Ne'er kent where he was born.

But howsoever about Kittlerumpit : the goodman was
a rambling sort of body ; and he went to a fair one day,
arfd not only never came home again, but nevermore
was heard of. Some said he 'listed, and others that the
tiresome pressgang snatched him up, though he was
furnished with a wife and a child to boot. Alas ! that

586 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

wretched pressgang! They went about the country
like roaring lions, seeking whom they might devour.
Well do I remember how my eldest brother Sandy was
all but smothered in the meal-chest, hiding from those
rascals. After they were gone, we pulled him out from
among the meal, puffing and crying, and as white as
any corpse. My mother had to pick the meal out of
his mouth with the shank of a horn spoon.

' Ah well, when the goodman of Kittlerumpit was
gone, the goodwife was left with small means. Little
resources had she, and a baby boy at her breast. All
said they were sorry for her ; but nobody helped her —
which is a common case, sirs. Howsoever the good-
wife had a sow, and that was her only consolation ;
for the sow was soon to farrow, and she hoped for a
good litter.

' But we all know hope is fallacious. One day the
woman goes to the sty to fill the sow's trough ; and
what does she find but the sow lying on her back,
grunting and groaning, and ready to give up the ghost.

' I trow this was a new pang to the goodvvife's heart ;
so she sat down on the knocking-stone ^, with her bairn
on her knee, and cried sorer than ever she did for the
loss of her own goodman.

' Now I premise that the cottage of Kittlerumpit was
built on a brae, with a large fir-wood behind it, of which
you may hear more ere we go far on. So the good-
wife, when she was wiping her eyes, chances to look
down the brae ; and what does she see but an old
woman, almost like a lady, coming slowly up the road.
She was dressed in green, all but a short white apron
and a black velvet hood, and a steeple-crowned beaVer

' This, we are told, was a stone with a hollow in it for pounding corn, so
as to separate the husks from the grain ; and such a stone stood formerly
somewhere near the door of every farm house in Scotland.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 587

hat on her head. She had a long walking-staff, as long
as herself, in her hand— the sort of staff that old men
and old women helped themselves with long ago ; I see
no such staffs now, sirs.

* Ah well, when the goodwife saw the green gentle-
woman near her, she rose and made a curtsy; and
" Madam," quoth she, weeping, " I am one of the most
misfortunate women alive."

' " I don't wish to hear pipers' news and fiddlers' tales,
goodwife," quoth the green woman. " I know you have
lost your goodman — we had worse losses at the Sheriff
Muir^ ; and I know that your sow is unco sick. Now
what will you give me if I cure her ? "

*' ' Anything your ladyship's madam likes," quoth the
witless goodwife, never guessing whom she had to
deal with.

" ' Let us wet thumbs on that bargain," quoth the
green woman ; so thumbs were wetted, I warrant you ;
and into the sty madam marches.

'She looks at the sow with a long stare, and then
began to mutter to herself what the goodwife couldn't
well understand ; but she said it sounded like —

Fitter patter,
Holy Water.

' Then she took out of her pocket a wee bottle, with
something like oil in it ; and she rubs the sow with it
above the snout, behind the ears, and on the tip of the
tail. " Get up, beast," quoth the green woman. No
sooner said than done— up jumps the sow with a grunt,
and away to her trough for her breakfast.

' The goodwife of Kittlerumpit was a joyful goodwife
now, and would have kissed the very hem of the green
woman's gowntail ; but she wouldn't let her. " I am not

» The editor here explains in a note that ' this was a common saying
formerly, when people were heard to regret trifles.'

588 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

so fond of ceremonies," quoth she ; "but now that I have
righted your sick beast, let us end our settled bargain.
You will not find me an unreasonable, greedy body —
I like ever to do a good turn for a small reward : all
I ask, and ivill have, is that baby boy in your bosom."

'The goodwife of Kittlerumpit, who now knew her
customer, gave a shrill cry like a stuck swine. The
green woman was a fairy, no doubt ; so she prays, and
cries, and begs, and scolds ; but all wouldn't do. " You
may spare your din," quoth the fairy, " screaming as if
I was as deaf as a door-nail; but this I'll let you know
— I cannot, by tJie law we live under, take your bairn till
the third day ; and not then, if you can tell me my right
name." So madam goes away round the pig-sty end ;
and the goodwife falls down in a swoon behind the
knocking-stone.

* Ah well, the goodwife of Kittlerumpit could not
sleep any that night for crying, and all the next day the
same, cuddling her bairn till she nearly squeezed its
breath out ; but the second day she thinks of taking
a walk in the wood I told you of; and so with the bairn
in her arms, she sets out, and goes far in among the
trees, where was an old quarry-hole, grown over with
grass, and a bonny spring well in the middle of it.
Before she came very near, she hears the whirring of
a flax wheel, and a voice singing a song ; so the woman
creeps quietly among the bushes, and peeps over the
brow of the quarry; and what does she see but the
green fairy tearing away at her wheel, and singing like
any precentor : —

Little kens our guid dame at hame,
That Whuppity Stoorie is my name.

' " Ha, ha ! " thinks the woman, *' I've got the mason's
word at last ; the devil give them joy that told it ! " So
she went home far lighter than she came out, as you may

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 589

well guess— laughing like a madcap with the thought of
cheating the old green fairy.

* Ah well, you must know that this goodwife was a
jocose woman, and ever merry when her heart was not
very sorely overladen. So she thinks to have some
sport with the fairy; and at the appointed time she puts
the bairn behind the knocking-stone, and sits on the stone
herself. Then she pulls her cap over her left ear and
twists her mouth on the other side, as if she were weep-
ing ; and an ugly face she made, you may be sure. She
hadn't long to wait, for up the brae chmbs the green
fairy, neither lame nor lazy ; and long ere she got near
the knocking-stone she screams out — " Goodwife of
Kittlerumpit, you know well what I come for— stand
and deliver ! "

' The woman pretends to cry harder than before, and
wrings her hands, and falls on her knees, with " Och,
sweet madam mistress, spare my only bairn, and take
the wretched sow ! "

' " The devil take the sow, for my part," quoth the
fairy ; ** I come not here for swine's flesh. Don't be
contramawcious, huzzy, but give me the child instantly ! "

* " Ochone, dear lady mine," quoth the crying good-
wife ; " forgo my poor bairn, and take me myself! "

' " The devil is in the daft jade," quoth the fairy, look-
ing like the far end of a fiddle ; " I'll bet she is clean
demented. Who in all the earthly world, with half an
eye in his head, would ever meddle with the likes of
thee?"

'I trow this set up the woman of Kittlerumpit's
bristle : for though she had two blear eyes and a long
red nose besides, she thought herself as bonny as the
best of them. So she springs off her knees, sets the
top of her cap straight, and with her two hands folded
before her, she makes a curtsy down to the ground,

590 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

and, " In troth, fair madam," quoth she, " I might have
had the wit to know that the hkes of me is not fit to tie
the worst shoe-strings of the high and mighty princess,
Whuppity Stoorie."

' If a flash of gunpowder had come out of the ground
it couldn't have made the fairy leap higher than she did ;
then down she came again plump on her shoe-heels;
and whirling round, she ran down the brae, screeching
for rage, Hke an owl chased by the witches.

'The goodwife of Kittlerumpit laughed till she was
like to split ; then she takes up her bairn, and goes iqto
her house, singing to it all the way : —

A goo and a gitty, my bonny wee tyke,
Ye'se noo ha'e your four-oories ;
Sin' we've gien Nick a bane to pyke,
Wi' his wheels and his Whuppity Stoories.'

That is practically Chambers' version of this Scottish
story; and as to the name of the fairy Whuppity Stoorie ^
the first syllable should be the equivalent of English
whip, while stoor is a Scotch word for dust in motion :
so the editor asks in a note whether the name may not
have originated in the notion ' that fairies were always
present in the whirls of dust occasioned by the wind on
roads and in streets ^' But he adds that another version
of the story calls the green woman Fittletetot, which ends
with the same element as the name Tom Tit Tot and
Silly go Dwt. Perhaps, however, the Welsh versions
of the story approached nearest to one from Mochdrum
in Wigtownshire, published in the British Association's
Papers of the Liverpool Meeting, 1896, p. 613, This
story was contributed by the Rev. Walter Gregor, and
the name of the fairy in it is Marget Totts : in this we
have a wife, who is in great distress, because her hus-
band used to give her so much flax to spin by such and

' I have heard of this belief in Wales late in the sixties; but the presence
was assumed to be that of a witch, not of a fairy.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR I ST 591

such a day, that the work was beyond human power.
A fairy comes to the rescue and takes the flax away,
promising to bring it back spun by the day fixed, pro-
vided the woman can tell the fairy's name. The woman's
distress thereupon becomes as great as before, but
the fairy was overheard saying as she span, ' Little
does the guidwife ken it, my name is Marget Totts.'
So the woman got her flax returned spun by the day ;
and the fairy, Marget Totts, went up the chimney in
a blaze of fire as the result of rage and disappointment.
Here one cannot help seeing that the original, of which
this is a clumsy version, must have been somewhat as
follows

Little does the guidwife wot
That my name is Marget Tot.

To come back to Wales, we have there the names
Silly Frit and Silly go Dwt, which are those of females.
The former name is purely English— S///v Frit, which
has been already guessed (p. 66) to mean a silly sprite,
or silly apparition, with the idea of its being a fright of
a creature to behold : compare the application elsewhere
to a fairy changeling of the terms crimbil (p. 263) and
cyrfaglach or cryfaglach (p. 450), which is explained as
implying a haggard urchin that has been half starved
and stunted in its growth. Leaving out of the reckon-
ing this connotation, one might compare the term with
the Scottish habit of calHng the fairies silly wights, ' the
Happy Wights.' See J. Jamieson's Scottish Dictionary,
where s. v. seily, seely, 'happy,' he purports to quote
the following lines from ' the Legend of the Bishop of
St. Androis ' in a collection of Scottish Poems of the
Sixteenth Century (Edinburgh, 1801), pp. 320-1 :—

For oght the kirk culd him forbid,
He sped him sone, and gat the thrid ;
Ane Carling of the Qucne of Phareis,
That ewill win gair to elphyne carcis,

592 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Through all Braid Albane scho hes bene,

On horsbak on Hallow ewin ;

And ay in seiking certayne nyghtis,

As scho sayis, with sur [read our] sillie wychtis.

Similarly, he gives the fairies tfie name of Seely Court,
and cites as illustrating it the following lines from
R. Jamieson's Popular Ballads, (i. 236, and) ii. 189 : —

But as it fell out on last Hallowe'en,
When the Seely Court was ridin' by,
The queen lighted down on a gowan bank,
Nae far frae the tree where I wont to lye.

Into Welsh, however, the designation Silly Frit must
have come, not from Scotland, but from the Marches ;
and the history of S ill go Dwt must be much the same.
For, though construed as Welsh, the name would mean
the Silly who is go Dzvt \ ' somewhat tidy or natty ' ;
but the dwt (mutated from tzvt) was suggested doubtless
by the tot of such fairy names as Tom Tit Tot. That
brings me to another group, where the syllable is trot or
trut, and this we have in the Welsh doggerel, mentioned
at p. 229, as follows : —

Bydian a wyda' hi Little did she know

Mai Trwtyn-Tratyn That Trwtyn Tratyn

Yw fenw i. Is my name.

But this name Trwtyn-Tratyn sounds masculine, and
not that of a she-fairy such as Silly Frit. The feminine
would have been Trwtan-Tratan in the Carnarvonshire
pronunciation, and in fact trwtan is to be heard there ;
but more frequently a kind of derivative trwdlan, mean-

' The word twt, ' tidy,' is another vocable which has found its way into
Wales from the western counties of England ; and though its meaning is
more universally that of ' tidy or natty,' the term gtvas twt, which in North
Cardiganshire means a youth who is ready to run on all kinds of errands,
would seem to bring us to its earlier meaning of the French iottt — as \i gwas
twt might be rendered a 'garfon a tout' — which survives as tote in the coun-
ties of Gloucester and Hereford, as I am informed by Professor Wright.
Possibly, however, one may prefer to connect twt with the nautical English
word taut ; but we want more light. In any case one may venture to say
that colloquial Welsh swarms with words whose origin is to be sought
outside the Principality.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 593

ing an ungainly sort of woman, a drudge, a short-legged
or deformed maid of all work. Some Teutonic varieties
of this group of stories will be found mentioned briefly
in Mr. Clodd's article on the ' Philosophy of Rumpel-
stiltskin^' Thus from the Debatable Ground on the
borders of England and Scotland there comes a story
in which the fairy woman's name was Habetrot ; and
he alludes to an Icelandic version in which the name
is Gillitrut; but for us still more interest attaches to
the name in the following rhyme ^ : —

Little does my lady wot
That my name is Trit-a-Trot.

This has been supposed to belong to a story coming
from Ireland ; but whether that may prove true or not,
it is hardly to be doubted that our Trwtyn Tratyn is
practically to be identified with Trit-a-Trot, who is also
a he-fairy.

That is not all ; for since the foregoing notes were
penned, a tale has reached me from Mr. Craigfryn
Hughes about a fairy who began by conducting him-
self like the brownies mentioned at pp. 287, 324-5
above. The passages here in point come from the story
of which a part was given at pp. 462-4 ; and they are
to the following effect : — Long ago there was in service
at a Monmouthshire farm a young woman who was
merry and strong. Who she was or whence she came
nobody knew; but many believed that she belonged
to the old breed of Bendith y Mamau. Some time after
she had come to the farm, the rumour spread that the
house was sorely troubled by a spirit. But the girl
and the elf understood one another well, and tliey

' See Folk-Lore for i88g, pp. 144-52.

"^ Ibid, for 1891, p. 246, where one will find this rhyme the subject of
a note— rendered useless by a false reference — by Kohler ; see also the same
volume, p. 132, where Mr. Kirby gives more lines of the rhyme.

RHYS Q ^

594

CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

became the best of friends. So the elf proved very
useful to the maid, for he did everything for her—
washing, ironing, spinning and twisting wool; in fact
they say that he was remarkably handy at the spinning-
wheel. Moreover, he expected only a bowlful of
sweet milk and wheat bread, or some flummery, for his
work. So she took care to place the bowl with his
food at the bottom of the stairs every night as she
went to bed. It ought to have been mentioned that
she was never allowed to catch a sight of him ; for he
always did his work in the dark. Nor did anybody know
when he ate his food : she used to leave the bowl there
at night, and it would be empty by the time when she
got up in the morning, the hwca having cleared it. But
one night, by way of cursedness, what did she do but
fill the bowl with some of the stale urine which they
used in dyeing wool and other things about the house.
But heavens ! it would have been better for her not to
have done it ; for when she got up next morning what
should he do but suddenly spring from some corner
and seize her by the neck! He began to beat her and
kick her from one end of the house to the other, while
he shouted at the top of his voice at every kick : —

Y faidan din dwmp — The idea that the thick-buttocked lass

Yn rhoi bara haid a thrwnc Should give barley bread and p —
/V bwca ! To the bogie !

Meanwhile she screamed for help, but none came for
some time ; when, however, he heard the servant men
getting up, he took to his heels as hard as he could ; and
nothing was heard of him for some time. But at the
end of two years he was found to be at another farm in
the neighbourhood, called Hafod yr Ynys, where he at
once became great friends with the servant girl : for she
fed him like a young chicken, by giving him a Httle
bread and milk all the time. So he worked willingly

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 595

and well for her in return for his favourite food.
More especially, he used to spin and wind the yarn for
her ; but she wished him in time to show his face, or
to tell her his name : he would by no means do either.
One evening, however, when all the men were out, and
when he was spinning hard at the wheel, she deceived
him by telling him that she was also going out. He
believed her ; and when he heard the door shutting, he
began to sing as he plied the wheel : —

Hi ivarddn iawn pe givypa hi, How she would laugh, did she know

Taw Gwanvyn-a-throt yuu'm enw i. That Gwarwyn-a-throt is my name !

'Ha! ha!' said the maid at the bottom of the stairs;
' I know thy name now.' ' What is it, then ?' he asked.
She replied, ' Gwarwyn-a-throt ' ; and as soon as she
uttered the words he left the wheel where it was, and
off he went. He was next heard of at a farmhouse
not far off, where there happened to be a ser\'ant man
named Moses, with whom he became great friends at
once. He did all his work for Moses with great ease.
He once, however, gave him a good beating for doubt-
ing his word ; but the two remained together afterwards
for some years on the best possible terms : the end
of it was that Moses became a soldier. He went
away to fight against Richard Crookback, and fell on
the field of Bosworth. The bogie, after losing his
friend, began to be troublesome and difficult to live
with. He would harass the oxen when they ploughed,
and draw them after him everywhere, plough and all ;
nor could any one prevent them. Then, when the sun
set in the evening he would play his pranks again, and
do all sorts of mischief about the house, upstairs, and
in the cowhouses. So the farmer was advised to visit
a wise man {dyn cynnil), and to see if he could devise
some means of getting rid of the bogie. He called on
the wise man, who happened to be living near Cacrleon

Q q 2

596 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

on the Usk ; and the wise man, having waited till the
moon should be full, came to the farmer's house. In
due time the wise man, by force of manoeuvring, secured
the bogie by the very long nose which formed the
principal ornament of his face, and earned for him the
name of Bwca'r Trwyn, * the Bogie of the Nose/
Whilst secured by the nose, the bogie had something
read to him out of the wise man's big book ; and he
was condemned by the wise man to be transported
to the banks of the Red Sea for fourteen generations,
and to be conveyed thither by ' the upper wind ' {yr
uwchwynt). No sooner had this been pronounced by
the cunning man than there came a whirlwind which
made the whole house shake. Then came a still
mightier wind, and as it began to blow the owner of
the big book drew the awl out of the bogie's nose ; and
it is supposed that the bogie was carried away by that
wind, for he never troubled the place any more.

Another version of the story seems to have been
current, which represented the bogie as in no wise to
blame ^ : but I attach some importance to the foregoing
tale as forming a link of connexion between the Rum-
pelstiltzchen group of fairies, always trying to g6t hold
of children ; the brownie kind, ever willing to serve in
return for their simple keep; and the troublesome bogie,
that used to haunt Welsh farm houses and delight in
breaking crockery and frightening the inmates out of
their wits. In fact, the brownie and the bogie reduce
themselves here into different humours of the same
uncanny being. Their appearance may be said to have
differed also : the bogie had a very long nose, while
the brownie of Blednoch had only *a hole where a nose
should hae been.' But one of the most remarkable
points about the brownie species is that the Lincoln-

* See Choice Notes from 'Notes and Queries,' p. 35.

X] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST

59/

shire specimen was a small creature, ' a weeny bit of a
fellow'— which suggests a possible community of origin
with the banshee of the Irish, and also of the Welsh :
witness the wee little woman in the story of the Curse
of Pantannas (pp. 188-9), who seems to come up out of
the river. All alike may perhaps be said to suggest
vr.rious aspects of the dead ancestor or ancestress ;
h'Ut Bwca'r Trwyn is not to be severed from the fairy
woman in the Pennant Valley, who undertakes some of
the duties, not of a dairymaid, as in other cases men-
tioned, but those of a nurse. Her conduct on being
offered a gown is exactly that of the brownie similarly
placed: see p. 109 above. But she and Bwca'r Trwyn
are unmistakably fairies who take to domestic service,
and work for a time willingly and well in return for
their food, which, as in the case of other fairies, appears
to have been mostly milk.

After this digression I wish only to point out that
the Welsh bogie's name, Gwarwyn-a-throt, treated as
Welsh, could only mean ivhite- necked and (or with)
a trot; for rt throt could only mean ' and {or with) a trot.'
So it is clear that a throt is simply the equivalent of
a-Trot, borrowed from such an English combination as
Trit-a-Trot, and that it is idle to translate Gwarwyn-
a-throt. Now trot and twt are not native Welsh words ;
and the same remark applies to Trwtyn Tratyn, and of
course to Sili ffrit and Sili go Dwt. Hence it is
natural to infer that either these names have in the
Welsh stories merely superseded older ones of WVlsh
origin, or else that there was no question of name in
the Welsh stories till they had come under English
influence. The former conjecture seems the more
probable of the two, unless one should rather suppose
the whole story borrowed from English sources. But
it is of no consequence here as regards the reluctance

11 OM W'est njv» '

598 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

of fairies to disclose their names ; for w i ->ther

instances to which the reader may turn, . u; 45,
87-8, 97 above. One of them, in particular, !S in point
here : see pp. 54, 61. It attaches itself to the Pool of
Corwrion in the neighbourhood of Bangor nd it
relates how a man married a fairy on the ^ -^ss
condition that he was neither to know her nan r

to touch her with iron, on pain of her instantly le
him. Of course in the lapse of years the condii 1
are accidentally violated by the luckless husba '
and the wife flies instantly away into the waters '^
the pool : her name turned out to be Belene.

Thus far of the unwillingness of the fairies to tell
their names : I must now come to the question, why
that was so. Here the anthropologist or the student
of comparative folklore comes to our aid ; for it is an
important part of his business to compare the super-
stitions of one people with those of another ; and in
the case of superstitions which have lost their meaning
among us, for instance, he searches for a parallel among
other nations, where that parallel forms part of living
institutions. In this way he hopes to discover the key
to his difficulties. In the present case he finds savages
who habitually look at the name as part and parcel of
the person \ These savages further believe that any
part of the person, such as a hair oflf one's head or the
parings of one's nails, if they chanced to be found by
an enemy, would give that enemy magical power over
their lives, and enable him to injure them. Hence
the savage tendency to conceal one's name. I have
here, as the reader will perceive, crowded together
several important steps in the savage logic ; so I must

' A number of instructive instances will be found mentioned, and dis-
cussed in his wonted and lucid fashion, by Mr. Clodd in his Tom Tit Tot,
pp. 80-105.

xl DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST

599

try to illustrate them, somewhat more in detail, by refer-
ence to some of the survivals of them after the savage
has long been civilized. To return to Wales, and to
illustrate the belief that possession of a part of one's
person, or of anything closely identified with one's person,
gives the possessor of it power over that person, I need
only recall the Welsh notion, that if one wished to sell

0 e's self to the devil one had merely to give him a hair
of one's head or the tiniest drop of one's blood, then one
would be for ever his for a temporary consideration.
Again, if you only had your hair cut, it must be care-
fully gathered and hidden away : by no means must it
be burnt, as that might prove prejudicial to your health.
Similarly, you should never throw feathers into the fire ;
for that was once held, as I infer, to bring about death
among one's poultry : and an old relative of mine,
Modryb Mari^ 'Aunt Mary,' set her face against my
taste for toasted cheese. She used to tell me that if

1 toasted my cheese, my sheep would waste away and
die : strictly speaking, I fancy this originally meant only
the sheep from whose milk the cheese had been made.
But I was not well versed enough in the doctrines of
sympathetic magic to reply, that it did not apply to our
cheese, which was not made from sheep's milk. So her
warning used to frighten me and check my fondness
for toasted cheese, a fondness which I had doubtless
quite innocently inherited, as anybody will see who
will glance at one of the Hundred May Talys, printed
by John Rastell in the sixteenth century, as follows : —
' I fynde wrytten amonge olde gestes, howe God mayde
Saynt Peter porter of heuen, and that God of hys
goodnes, sone after his passyon, suffered many men to
come to the kyngdome of Heuen with small descruynge ;
at whyche tyme there was in heuen a great companye
of Welchemen, whyche with their crakynge and babel-

6oo CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

ynge troubled all the other. Wherfort yde to

Saynte Peter that he was wery of them at he

wolde fayne haue them out of heuen. ome

Saynte Peter sayd : Good Lorde, I warren^ hat

shall be done. Wherfore Saynt Peter we of

heuen gates and cryed wyth a loud voyce Ca \

that is as moche to saye as rosted chese, , -.e
thynge the Welchemen herynge, ranne out of
a great pace. And when Saynt Peter sawe thv
out, he sodenly wente into Heuen, and locked the
and so sparred all the Welchemen out. By this ye .
se, that it is no wysdome for a man to loue or to set
mynde to moche upon any delycate or worldely pleasure,
wherby he shall lose the celestyall and eternall ioye.'

To leave the Mery Talys and come back to the
instances mentioned, all of them may be said to illus-
trate the way in which a part, or an adjunct, answered
for the whole of a person or thing. In fact, having due
regard to magic as an exact science, an exceedingly exact
science, one may say that according to the wisdom of

' The Welsh spelling is caws pob^ ' baked (or roasted) cheese,' so called in
parts of South Wales, such as Carmarthenshire, whereas in North Wales it
is caws pobi. It is best known to Englishmen as * Welsh rabbit/ which
superior persons ' ruling the roast ' in our kitchens choose to make into
rarebit : how they would deal with ' Scotch woodcock' and ' Oxford hare,'
I do not know. I should have mentioned that copies of the Hundred Mery
Talys are exceedingly scarce, and that the above, which is the seventy-sixth
in the collection, has here been copied from the Cymmrodor, iii. 115-6,
where we have the following sapient note : — ' Cause bobe, it will be observed,
is St. Peter's rendering of the phrase Caws ivedi ei bobi. The chief of the
Apostles apparently had only a rather imperfect knowledge of Welsh,
which is not to be wondered at, as we know that even his Hebrew was far
from giving satisfaction to the priests of the capital.' From these words one
can only say that St. Peter would seem to have known Welsh far better
than the author of that note, and that he had acquired it from natives of
South Wales, perhaps from the neighbourhood of Kidwelly. I have to
thank my friend Mr. James Cotton for a version of the cheese story in the
Bodleian Library, namely in Malone MS. 19 (p. 144), where a certain master
at Winchester School has put it into elegiacs which make St. Peter cry out
with the desired effect : Tostus to WalU, tosius niodo caseus.

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLK LOR I ST 60 1

our ancestors the leading axiom of that science practi-
cally amounted to this : the part is quite equal to the
whole. Now the name, as a part of the man, was once
probably identified with the breath of life or with the
soul, as we shall see later ; and the latter must have been
regarded as a kind of matter ; for I well remember that
when a person was dying in a house, it was the custom
about Ponterwyd, in North Cardiganshire, to open the
windows. And a farmer near Ystrad Meurig, more to-
wards the south of the county, told me some years ago
that he remembered his mother dyingwhen he was a boy :
a neighbour's wife who had been acting as nurse tried
to open the window of the room, and as it would not
open she deliberately srnashed a pane of it. This was
doubtless originally meant to facilitate the escape of the
soul ; and the same idea has been attested for Glouces-
tershire, Devon, and other parts of the country \ This
way of looking at the soul reminds one of Professor
Tylor's words when he wrote in his work on Primitive
Culture, i. 440 : ' and he who says that his spirit goes
forth to meet a friend, can still realize in the phrase
a meaning deeper than metaphor.'

Then if the soul was material, you may ask what its
shape was ; and even this I have a story which will
answer: it comes from the same Modryb Mari who set
her face against caws pobi, and cherished a good many
superstitions. Therein she differed greatly from her
sister, my mother, who had a far more logical mind and
a clearer conception of things. Well, my aunt's story
was to the following effect :— A party of reapers on a
farm not far from Ponterwyd— I have forgotten the
name— sat down in the field to their midday meal.
Afterwards they rested awhile, when one of their
number fell fast asleep. The others got up and began

1 See Choice Notes from ' Notes and Qucnes,' pp. 1 1 7-8.

6o2 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

reaping glancing every now and then at the

sleeping man, who had his mouth wide open and
breathed very loudly. Presently they saw a little
black man, or something like a monkey, coming out
of his mouth and starting on a walk round the field :
they watched this little fellow walking on and on till he
came to a spot near a stream. There he stopped and
turned back : then he disappeared into the open mouth
of the sleeper, who at once woke up. He told his com-
rades that he had just been dreaming of his walking-
round the field as far as the very spot where they had
seen the little black fellow stop. I am sorry to say that
Modryb Mari had wholly forgotten this story when,
years afterwards, I asked her to repeat it to me ; but
the other day I found a Welshman who still remembers
it. I happened to complain, at a meeting of kindred
spirits, how I had neglected making careful notes of bits
of folklore which I had heard years ago from informants
whom I had since been unable to cross-examine : I in-
stanced the story of the sleeping reaper, when my
friend Professor Sayce at once said that he had heard
it. He spent part of his childhood near ILanover in
Monmouthshire ; and in those days he spoke Welsh,
which he learned from his nurse. He added that he
well remembered the late Lady ILanover rebuking his
father for having his child, a Welsh boy, dressed like
a little Highlander ; and he remembered also hearing
the story here in question told him by his nurse. So
far as he could recall it, the version was the same as
my aunt's, except that he does not recollect hearing
anything about the stream of water.

Several points in the story call for notice : among
others, one naturally asks at the outset why the other
reapers did not wake the sleeping man. The answer
is that the Welsh seem to have agreed with other

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 603

peoples, such as the Irish ^, in thinking it dangerous
to wake a man when dreaming, that is, when his soul
might be wandering outside his bod_^' ; for it might
result in the soul failing to find the way back into the
body which it had temporarily left. To illustrate this
from Wales I produce the following story, which has
been written out for me by Mr. J. G. Evans. The
scene of it was a field on the farm of Cadabowen,
near ILan y Bydair, in the Vale of the Teifi : — ' The
chief point of the madfatt incident, which happened in
the early sixties, was this. During one mid-morning
hoe hogi, that is to say, the usual rest for sharpening the
reaping-hooks, I was playing among the thirty or forty
reapers sitting together : my movements were probably
a disturbing element to the reapers, as well as a source
of danger to my own hmbs. In order, therefore, to
quiet me, as seems probable, one of the men directed
my attention to our old farm labourer, who was asleep
on his back close to the uncut corn, a little apart from
the others. I was told that his soul {ened) had gone out
of his mouth in the form of a black lizard {madfatt du),
and was at that moment wandering among the standing
corn. If I woke the sleeper, the soul would be unable
to return ; and old Thomas would die, or go crazy ; or
something serious would happen. I will not trust my
memory to fill in details, especially as this incident once
formed the basis of what proved an exciting story told
to my children in their childhood. A generation hence
they may be able to give an astonishing instance of
"genuine" Welsh folklore. In the meanwhile, I can

' For instance, when Cuchulainn had fallen asleep under the cITect of
fairy music, Fergus warned his friends that he was not to be disturbed, as he
seemed to be dreaming and seeing a vision : see Windisch's Insche Texte,
p. 208; also the Revue Ccltique, v. 231. For parallels to the two stories in
this paragraph, see Tylor's first chapter on Animism in his Frintitive Cul/ure,
and especially the legend of King Gunthram, i. 442.

6o4 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

bear testimony to that " black lizard " being about the
most living impression in my " memory." I see it, even
now, wriggling at the edge of the uncut corn. But as to
its return, and the waking of the sleeper, my memory
is a blank. Such are the tricks of " memory " ; and
we should be charitable when, with bated breath, the
educated no less than the uneducated tell us about
the uncanny things they have "seen with their own
eyes." They believe what they say, because they trust
their memory: I do not. I feel practically certain I
never saw a lizard in my life, in that particular field in
which the reapers were.' Mr. Evans' story differs, as it
has been seen, from my aunt's version in giving the
soul the shape of a lizard ; but the little black fellow in
the one and the black lizard in the other agree not only
in representing the soul as material, but also as forming
a complete organism within a larger one. In a word,
both pictures must be regarded as the outcome of
attempts to depict the sleeper's inner man.

If names and souls could be regarded as material
substances, so could diseases ; and I wish to say a word
or two now on that subject, which a short story of my
wife's will serve to introduce. She is a native of the
ILanberis side of Snowdon ; and she remembers going
one morning, when a small child, across to the neigh-
bourhood of Rhyd-du with a servant girl called Cadi,
whose parents lived there. Now Cadi was a very good
servant, but she had little regard for the more civilized
manners of the ILanberis folk ; and when she returned
with the child in the evening from her mother's cottage,
she admitted that the little girl was amazed at the lan-
guage of Cadi's brothers and sisters ; for she confessed
that, as she said, they swore like colliers, whereas the
little girl had never before heard any swearing worth
speaking of. Well, among other things which the

x] DIFFICULTIES OF THE FOLKLORIST 605

little girl saw there was one of Cadi's sisters having
a bad leg dressed : when the rag which had been on
the wound was removed, the mother made one of her
other children take it out and fix it on the thorn
growing near the door. The little girl being inquisi-
tive asked why that was done, and she was told that it
was in order that the wound might heal all the faster.
She was not very satisfied with the answer, but she
afterwards noticed the same sort of thing done in her
own neighbourhood. Now the original idea was doubt-
less that the disease, or at any rate a part of it — and in
such matters it will be remembered that a part is quite
equal to the whole — was attached to the rag ; so that
putting the rag out, with a part of the disease attached
to it, to rot on the bush, would bring with it the dis-
appearance of the whole disease.

Another and a wider aspect of this practice was the
subject of notice in the chapter on the Folklore of the
Wells, pp. 359-60, where Mr. Hartland's hypothesis was
mentioned. This was to the effect that if any clothing,
or anything else which had been identified with your
person, were to be placed in contact with a sacred tree,
sacred well, or sacred edifice, it would be involved in
the effluence of the divinity that imparts its sacred
character to the tree, well, or temple ; and that your
person, identified with the clothing or other article,
would also be involved or soaked in the same divine
effluence, and made to benefit thereby. We have since
had this kind of reasoning illustrated, pp. 405-7 above,
by the modern legend of Crymlyn, and the old one of
ILyn ILiwan; but the difficulty which it involves is
a very considerable one: it is the difficulty of taking
seriously the infantile order of reasoning which under-
lies so much of the philosophy of folklore. I cannot
readily forget one of the first occasions of my coming,

6o6 CELTIC FOLKLORE

so to say, into living contact with it. It was at Tuam
in Connaught, whither I had gone to learn modern Irish
from the late Canon Ulick J. Bourke. There one day in
1871 he presented me with a copy of The Bull 'Ineffabilis '
in Four Languages (Dublin, 1868), containing the Irish
version which he had himself contributed. On the blue
cover was a gilt picture of the Virgin, inscribed Sine
Labe Concepta. No sooner had I brought it to my
lodgings than the woman who looked after the house
caught sight of it. She was at once struck with awe
and admiration ; so I tried to explain to her the nature
of the contents of the volume. ' So the Father has
given you that holy book ! ' she exclaimed ; ' and you are
now a holy man ! ' I was astonished at the simple and
easy way in which she believed holiness could be trans-
ferred from one person or thing to another ; and it has
always helped me to realize the fact that folklorists
have no occasion to invent their people, or to exaggerate
the childish features of their minds. They are still with
us as real men and real women, and at one time the
whole world belonged to them ; not to mention that
those who may, by a straining of courtesy, be called
their leaders of thought, hope speedily to reannex the
daring few who are trying to tear asunder the bonds
forged for mankind in the obscurity of a distant past.
I shall never forget the impression made on my mind
by a sermon I heard preached some years later in the
cathedral of St. Stephen in Vienna. That magnificent
edifice in a great centre of German culture was
crowded with listeners, who seemed thoroughly to
enjoy what they heard, though the chief idea which
they were asked to entertain could not possibly be
said to rise above the level of the philosophy of the
Stone Age.

CHAPTER XI
Folklore Philosophy

To look for consistency in barbaric philosophy is to disqualify ourselves
for understanding it, and the theories of it which aim at symmetry are their
own condemnation. Yet that philosophy, within its own irregular confines,
works not illogically. — Edward Clodd.

It will be remembered that in the last chapter
a story was given, p. 602, which represented the soul
as a little fellow somewhat resembling a monkey ; and
it will probably have struck the reader how near this
approaches the idea prevalent in medieval theology and
Christian art, which pictured the soul as a pigmy or
diminutive human being. I revert to this in order to
point out that the Christian fancy may possibly have
given rise to the form of the soul as represented in the
Welsh story which I heard in Cardiganshire and Pro-
fessor Sayce in Monmouthshire ; but this could hardly
be regarded as touching the other Cardiganshire stoiy,
in which the soul is likened to a madfatt or lizard.
Moreover I would point out that a belief incompatible
with both kinds of story is suggested by one of the
uses of the Welsh word for soul, namely, maid.
I heard my father, a native of the neighbourhood of
Eglwys Fach, near the estuary of the Dyfi, use the
word of some portion of the inside of a goose, but
I have forgotten what part it was exactly. Professor
Anwyl of Aberystwyth, however, has sent me the follow-
ing communication on the subject : — ' I am quite familiar
with the expression yr enaid, " the soul," as applied to
the soft flesh sticking to the ribs inside a goose. The

6o8 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

flesh in question has somewhat the same appearance
and structure as the hver. I have no recollection of
ever hearing the term yr enaid used in the case of any
bird other than a goose ; but this may be a mere accident,
inasmuch as no one ever uses the term now except to
mention it as an interesting curiosity.' This applica-
tion of the word enaid recalls the use of the English
word * soul ' in the same way, and points to a very crude
idea of the soul as material and only forming an internal
portion of the body: it is on the low level of the
notion of an English pagan of the seventeenth century
who thought his soul was 'a great bone in his body^'
It is, however, not quite so fooHsh, perhaps, as it looks
at first sight ; and it reminds one of the Mohammedan
belief that the os coccygis is the first formed in the
human body, and that it will remain uncorrupted till
the last day as a seed from which the whole is to be
renewed in the resurrection ^.

On either savage theory, that the soul is a material
organism inside a bulkier organism, or the still lower
one that it is an internal portion of the larger organism
itself, the idea of death would be naturally much the
same, namely, that it was what occurred when the body
and the soul became permanently severed. I call
attention to this because we have traces in Welsh
literature of a very different notion of death, which must
now be briefly explained. The Mabinogi of Math ab
Mathonwy relates how Math and Gwydion made out of
various flowers a most beautiful woman whom they
named Blodeuwed^, that is to say h.vQuilr\s, or flowerlike,

' See Mr. Gomme's presidential address to the Folk- Lore Society, printed
in Folk-Lore for 1892, pp. 6-7.

^ See Sale's preliminary discourse to his translation of the Koran, § iv.

' Perhaps we may regard this as the more Goidelic account of Blodeuwed's
origin: at any rate, traces of a different one have been noticed in a note at
p. 439 above.

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 609

and gave to wife to ILew Lawgyffes ; how she, as it
were to prove what consummate artists they had been,
behaved forthwith like a woman of the ordinary origin,
in that she fell in love with another man named Gronw
Pebyr of Penttyn ; and how she plotted with Gronw as
to the easiest way to put her husband to death. Pre-
tending to be greatly concerned about the welfare of
DLew and very anxious to take measures against his
death {angheu), she succeeded in finding from him in
what manner one could kill (ttact) him. His reply was,
'Unless God kill me ... it is not easy to kill me';
and he went on to describe the strange attitude in
which he might be killed, namely, in a certain position
when dressing after a bath : then, he said, if one cast
a spear at him it would effect his death [anglicu), but
that spear must have been a whole year in the making,
during the hour only when the sacrifice was proceeding
on Sunday. Blodeuwed thanked heaven, she said, to
find that all this was easy to avoid. But still her
curiosity was not satisfied ; so one day she induced ILew
to go into the bath and show exactly what he meant.
Of course she had Gronw with his enchanted spear in
readiness, and at the proper moment, when ILew was
dressing after the bath, the paramour cast his spear at
him. He hit him in the side, so that the head of the
spear remained in ILew, whilst the shaft fell off: ILew
flew away in the form of an eagle, uttering an unearthly
cry. He was no more seen until Gwydion, searching
for him far and wide in Powys and Gwyned, came to
Arfon, where one day he followed the lead of a
mysterious sow, until the beast stopped under an oak
at Nantlte. There Gwydion found the sow devouring
rotten flesh and maggots, which fell from an eagle when-
ever the bird shook himself at the top of the tree. He
suspected this was Lew, and on singing three englyns
RHYS R r

6io CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

to him the eagle came lower and lower, till at last he
descended on Gwydion's lap. Then Gwydion struck
him with his wand, so that he assumed his own shape
of ILew ILawgyffes, and nobody ever saw a more
wretched looking man, we are told : he was nothing
but skin and bones. But the best medical aid that
could be found in Gwyned" was procured, and before
the end of the year he was quite well again.

Here it will be noticed, that though the fatal wound-
ing of ILew, at any rate visibly, means his being changed
into the form of an eagle, it is treated as his death.
When the Mabinogion were edited in their present
form in a later atmosphere, this sort of phraseology
was not natural to the editor, and he shows it when he
comes to relate how Gwydion punished Blodeuwed, as
follows : — Gwydion, having overtaken her in her flight,
is made to say, ' I shall not kill thee {Ny ladaf i di) :
I shall do what is worse for thee, and that is to let thee
go in the form of a bird.' He let her go in fact in the
form of an owl. According to the analogy of the other
part of the story this meant his having killed her : it
was her death, and the words ' I shall not kill thee ' are
presumably not to be regarded as belonging to the
original story. To come back to the eagle, later Welsh
literature, re-echoing probably an ancient notion, speaks
of a nephew of Arthur, called Eliwlod, appearing to
Arthur as an eagle seated likewise among the branches
of an oak. He claims acquaintance and kinship with
Arthur, but he has to explain to him that he has died :
they have a dialogue ^ in the course of which the eagle
gives Arthur some serious Christian advice. But we

' One version of it is given in the Myvyrian Archaiology, i. 176-8 ; and
two other versions are to be found in the Cynitnrodor, viii. 177-89, where it
is suggested that the author was lolo Goch, who flourished in the fourteenth
pentury. See also my Arthurian Legend, pp. 57-8.

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 6ii

have in this sort of idea doubtless the kind of origin to
which one might expect to trace the prophesying eagle,
such as Geoffrey mentions more than once: see his
Historia, ii. 9 and xii. 18 \ Add to these instances of
transformation the belief prevalent in Cornwall almost
to our own day, that Arthur himself, instead of dying,
was merely changed by magic into a raven, a form in
which he still goes about ; so that a Cornishman will
not wittingly fire at a raven -. This sort of transforma-
tion is not to be severed from instances supplied by
Irish literature, such as the story of Tuan mac Cairill,
related in the Book of the Dim Cow, fo. i5'^-i6^. Tuan
relates to St. Finnen of Magbile, in the sixth century,
the early history of Ireland from the time of Partholan
down, which he was enabled to do because he had lived
through it all, passing from one form to another without
losing his memory. First of all he was a man, and
when old age had come upon him he was transformed
into a stag of the forest. For a while he was youthful
and vigorous ; but again old age overtook him, and he
next became a wild boar. When old age and decrepi-
tude overcame him next he was renewed in the form of
a powerful bird, called in the original 5^?^. The next
renewal was in the form of a salmon: here the manu-
script fails us. The form of a salmon was also the one
taken by the woman Liban when she was overwhelmed
by the flood, which became the body of water known as
Lough Neagh : her handmaid at the same time became
an otter (fo. 40''). There was an ancient belief that the soul
leaves the body hke a bird flying out of the mouth of the
man or woman dying, and this maybe said to approach the

1 See also the notes on these passages, given in San-Marte's edition of
Geoffrey, pp. 219, 463-5, and his Bcitnigc ziir bretonischeii unci cdtisdi-
gernianischm Hddensage (Quedlinburg and Leipsic, 1847), p. 8i.

^ See Choice Notes, pp. 69-70.

R r 2

6i2 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

favourite Celtic notion illustrated by the transformations
here instanced, to which may be added the case of the
Children of Lir, pp. 93, 549, changed by the stroke of their
wicked stepmother's wand into swans, on Lough Erne.
The story has, in the course of ages, modified itself into
a belief that the swans haunting that beautiful water
at all seasons of the year, are the souls of holy women
who fell victims to the repeated visitations of the pagan
Norsemen, when Ireland was at their cruel mercy \
The Christian form which the Irish peasant has given
the legend does not touch its relevancy here. Perhaps
one might venture to generalize, that in these islands
great men and women were believed to continue their
existence in the form of eagles, hawks or ravens, swans
or owls. But what became of the souls of the obscurer
majority of the people ? For an answer to this perhaps
we can only fall back on the Psyche butterfly, which
may here be illustrated by the fact that Cornish tradition
applies the term ' pisk}^ ' both to the fairies and to moths,
believed in Cornwall by many to be departed souls ■^. So
in Ireland : a certain reverend gentleman named Joseph
Ferguson, writing in 1810 a statistical account of the
parish of Ballymoyer, in the county of Armagh, states
that one day a girl chasing a butterfly was chid by
her companions, who said to her: 'That may be the
soul of your grandmother ^.' This idea, to survive, has
modified itself into a belief less objectionably pagan, that
a butterfly hovering near a corpse is a sign of its ever-
lasting happiness.

The shape-shifting is sometimes complicated by
taking place on the lines of rebirth : as cases in point

* See Wood-Marlin's Pagan Ireland (London, 1895), p. 140.

' See Choice Notes, p. 61, where it is also stated that the country people
in Yorkshire used to give the name of sou/s to certain night-flying white
moths. See also the Athenceum, No. 1041, Oct. 9, 1847.

' For this also I am indebted to Wood-Martin's book, p. 140.

XI] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY tv^

may be mentioned Lug, reborn as Ciichulainn \ and the
repeated births of Etain. This was rendered possible
in the case of Cuchulainn, for instance, by Lug taking
the form of an insect which was unwittingly swallowed
by Dechtere, who thereby became Cuchulainn's mother ;
and so in the case of Etain ^ and her last recorded'
mother, the queen of Etar king of Eochraidhe. On
Welsh ground we have a combination of transformations
and rebirth in the history of Gwion Bach in the story
of Tahessin. Gwion was in the service of the witch
Ceridwen ; but having learned too much of her arts, he
became the object of her lasting hatred ; and the inci-
dent is translated as follows in Lady Charlotte Guest's
Mabinogion, iii. 358-9:— 'And she went forth after
him, running. And he saw her, and changed himself
into a hare and fled. But she changed herself into a
greyhound and turned him. And he ran towards a
river, and became a fish. And she in the form of an
otter-bitch chased him under the water, until he was
fain to turn himself into a bird of the air. Then she, as
a hawk, followed him and gave him no rest in the sky.
And just as she was about to swoop upon him, and
he was in fear of death, he espied a heap of winnowed
wheat on the floor of a barn, and he dropped amongst
the wheat, and turned himself into one of the grains.
Then she transformed herself into a high-crested black
hen, and went to the wheat and scratched it witli her
feet, and found him out and swallowed him. And, as
the story says, she bore him nine months, and when she
was delivered of him, she could not find it in her heart

1 See the Book of the Dun Coiv, fo. 128, and Wiiidisch's Insdit Tt.xU,
pp. 136-45. An abstract of the story will be found in the Hibbfti I^luns
on Celtic Heathendom, p. 502.

2 See ihe Book of the Dun Cow, fo. i29''-i32' ; Windisdi's Inscht Tt.xit,
PP- "7-33, more especially pp. 127-31; also my Arthunan U£,tHJ,
PP- 29-33-

6i4 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch;

to kill him, by reason of his beauty. So she wrapped
him in a leathern bag, and cast him into the sea to the
mercy of God on the twenty-ninth day of April. And at
that time the weir of Gwydno was on the strand between
Dyvi and Aberystwyth, near to his own castle, and the
value of an hundred pounds was taken in that weir every
May eve.' The story goes on to relate how Gwydno's
son, Elphin, found in the weir the leathern bag contain-
ing the baby, who grew up to be the bard Taliessin.
But the fourteenth century manuscript called after the
name of Taliessin teems with such transformations as
the above, except that they are by no means confined
to the range of the animal and vegetable kingdoms.
I heard an amusing suggestion of metempsychosis the
other day : it is related of a learned German, who was
sitting at table, let us say, in an Oxford hotel, with most
of his dinner in front of him. Being, however, a man
of immediate foresight, and anxious to accustom himself
to fine English, he was not to be restrained by scruples
as to any possible discrepancy between words like bekom-
men and become. So to the astonishment of everybody
he gravely called out to the waiter, ' Hereafter I vish to
become a Velsh rabbit.' This would have done admirably
for the author of certain poems in the Book of Taliessin,
where the bard's changes are dwelt upon. From them
it appears that the transformation might be into anything
that the mind of man could in any way individualize.
Thus Taliessin claims to have been, some time or other,
not only a stag or a salmon, but also an axe, a sword,
and even a book in a priest's hand, or a word in writing.
On the whole, however, his history as a grain of corn
has most interest here, as it differs from that which has
just been given : the passage ^ is sadly obscure, but

See the Book of Taliessin, poem vii, in Skene's Four Ancient Books of
Wales, ii. 136-7 ; also poem viii, p. 137 et seq.

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 6i-

I understand it to say that the grain was duly sown
on a hill, that it was reaped and finally brought on tho
hearth, where the ears of corn were emptied of their
grains by the ancient method of dexterously applying
a flame to them \ But while the light was being applied
the grain which was Taliessin, falling from the operator's
hand, was quickly received and swallowed by a hostile
hen, in whose interior it remained nine nights; but
though this seemingly makes Taliessin's mother a bird,
he speaks of himself, without mentioning any inter-
vening transformation, as digwas or young man. Such
an origin was perhaps never meant to be other than
incomprehensible. Lastly as to rebirth, I may say that
it has often struck me that the Welsh habit, especially
common in Carnarvonshire and Anglesey, of one child
in a family being named, partially or wholly, after a
grandparent, is to be regarded as a trace of the sur\-ival
from early times of a belief in such atavism as has been
suggested above ^.

The belief in transformations or transmigrations, such
as have been mentioned, must have lent itself to various
developments, and two at least of them are deserving of
some notice here. First may be mentioned one which
connects itself intimately with the druid or magician : he
is master of his own transformations, as in the case of
Ceridwen and Gwion, for he had acquired his magic
by tasting of the contents of Ceridwen's Cauldron of
Sciences, and he retained his memory continuously
through his shape-shiftings, as is best illustrated, per-
haps, by the case of Tuan mac Cairill. The ne.xt step .
was for him to realize his changes, not as matters ot the

^ Some account of this process will be found in lilton's Ont^tns of En^li^M
History f London, 1882), p. 33, where he has drawn on Martin's l)f^n/>tHm
of the Western Islands of Scotland, published in 1703 : sec pp. 204 5.

- For one or two instances of the nomenclature in question, sec pp. 76-7
above.

6i6 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

past but as present and possible ; in fact, to lay claim to
being anybody or anything he likes at any moment.
Of this we have a remarkable instance in the case of
Amairgen, seer and judge of the Milesians or Sons of
Mil, in the story of their conquest of Ireland, as told in
the Book of Leinster, fo. 12^. As he first sets his right
foot on the land of Erin he sings a lay in which he
says, that he is a boar, a bull, and a salmon, together
with other things also, such as the sea-breeze, the
rolling wave, the roar of the billows, and a lake on the
plain. Nor does he forget to pretend to wisdom and
science beyond other men, and to hint that he is the
divinity that gives them knowledge and sense. The
similarity between this passage and others in the Book
of Taliessin has attracted the attention of scholars : see
M. d'Arbois de Jubainville's Cycle mythologique irlandaisy
pp. 242 et seq. On the whole, Taliessin revels most in
the side of the picture devoted to his knowledge and
science : he has passed through so many scenes and
changes that he has been an eye-witness to all kinds of
events in Celtic story. Thus he was with Bran on his
expedition to Ireland, and saw when Mordwyt Tyttion
was slain in the great slaughter of the Meal-bag
Pavilion. This, however, was not all ; he represents
himself as also a sywedyd'^^ ' vates or prophet, astrologer

' SywedyS is probably a word of Goidelic origin: compare Irish sui,.
' a sage,' genitive si'iad, and derivative stiithe, ' wisdom.' Stokes suggests
the derivation su-vei, in which case *?«' = su-vi, for su-viss = su-vet-s, and
su-ithe = suvetia, while the Welsh sywedyd is formally sn-vetws or su-veiitps.
Welsh has also syw, from siii, like dryw, 'a druid,' from Goidelic dn'ti. Syw,
it is true, now only means elegant, tidy ; but Dr. Davies of Maftwyd believed
its original signification to have been ' sapiens, doctns,peritus.' The root vet
is most probably to be identified with the wet of Med. Welsh givet-id, ' a
saying,' dy-wawt, ' dLvit' whence it appears that the bases were vet and vat,
with the latter of which Irish faith, 'a poet or prophet,' Latin votes, agrees,
as also the Welsh gwawd, ' poetry, sarcasm,' and in Mod. Welsh, ' any kind of
derision.' In the Book of Taliessin syw has, besides the plurals sywyon and
sywydon (Skene, ii. 142, 152), possibly an older plural, sywet (p. 155) = 5M-

xil FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 617

and astronomer,' a sage who boasts his knowledge of
the physical world and propounds questions which he
challenges his rivals to answer concerning earth and
sea, day and night, sun and moon. Me is not only
Taliessin, but also Gwion, and hence one infers his
magical powers to have been derived. If he regards
anybody as his equal or superior, that seems to have
been Talhaiarn, to whom he ascribes the greatest
science. Talhaiarn is usually thought of only as a
great bard by Welsh writers, but it is his science and
wisdom that Taliessin admires \ whereby one is to
understand, doubtless, that Talhaiarn, like Taliessin, was
a great magician. To this day Welsh bards and bardism
have not been quite dissociated from magic, in so far as
the witch Ceridwen is regarded as their patroness.

The boasts of Amairgen are characterized by
M. d'Arbois de Jubainville as a sort of pantheism, and
he detects traces of the same doctrine, among other
places, in the teaching of the Irishman, known as Scotus
Erigena, at the court of Charles the Bald in the ninth
century : see the Cycle mythologiqiic, p. 248. In any
case, one is prepared by such utterances as those of
Amairgen to understand the charge recorded in the
Senchus Mdr, i. 23, as made against the Irish druids or
magicians of his time by a certain Connla Cainbhreth-
ach, one of the remarkable judges of Erin, conjectured
by O'Curry— on what grounds I do not know— to have
lived in the first century of our era. The statement
there made is to the following effect :— ' After her rame
Connla Cainbhrethach, chief doctor of Connaught; In-
excelled the men of Erin in wisdom, for he was tillrtl

vet-es, while for suithe = su-vetia we seem to have syzvyd or sncyd pp. 143.
152, 193, ; but all the passages in point are more or less obscure. I mu,l

confess. _ , /■ ti- 1 . n

1 See the Book of TaUrsstu, in Skene's Four Anao,t Books 0/ U aUs, u.

130-1, J34, 142, 151-2, 155-

6r8 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

*
with the grace of the Holy Ghost ; he used to contend
with the druids, who said that it was they that made
heaven and earth, and the sea, &c., and the sun and
moon, &c.' This view of the pretensions of the druids
is corroborated by the fact that magic, especially the
power of shape-shifting at will, was regarded as power
par excellence \ and by the old formula of wishing one
well, which ran thus : Bendacht dee octis andee fort, * the
blessing of gods and not-gods upon thee ! ' The term
* gods ' in this context is explained to have meant persons
of power 2, and the term 'not-gods' farmers or those
connected with the land, probably all those whose lives
were directly dependent on farming and the cultivation
of the soil, as distinguished from professional men such
as druids and smiths. This may be further illustrated
by a passage from the account of the second battle of
Moytura, published by Stokes with a translation, in the
Revue Celtiqiie, xii. 52-130. See more especially pp. 74-6,
where we find Lug offering his services to the king,
Nuada of the Silver Hand. Among other quahfications
which Lug possessed, he named that of being a
sorcerer, to which the porter at once replied : * We
need thee not ; we have sorcerers already. Many are
our wizards and our folk of might ' — that is, those of our

' As, for instance, in the account given of Uath mac Imomain in Fled
Bricrenn: see the Book of the Dun Cow, fo. no'', and Windisch's /r/sc/;c
Texie, p. 293.

^ The Book of the Dun Coiv, fo. 77", and the Book of Leinster, fo. 75'':
compare also the story of Tuan mac Cairill in the Book of the Dun Cow,
fo. ]6'', where the Tuatha De Danann are represented as Tiiatha Dee ocus
Ande, ' the tribes of gods and not-gods,' to whom one of the manuscripts
adds a people of legendary Ireland called the Galiuin. See the story as
recently edited by Professor Kuno Meyer in Nutt's Voyage of Bran, ii. 291-
300, where, however, the sense of § 12 with its allusion to the fall of Lucifer
is missed in the translation. It should read, I think, somewhat as follows : —
'Of these are the Tuatha Dee and Ande, whose origin is unknown to the
learned, except that they think it probable, judging from the intelligence of
the Tuatha and their superiority in knowledge, that they belong to the
exiles who came from heaven.'

XI] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY Sig

people who possess po^ver~~arlnc/ifcmnac/,/ai. Wizards
(druM) and hic/d cumachfai came, it is observed, alike
under the more general designation of sorcerers

{corrguinigli).

One seems to come upon traces of the same classifi-
cation of a community into professionals and non-
professionals, for that is what it comes to, in an obscure
Welsh term, Teulu Oeth ac Anocth, which may be con-
jectured to have meant 'the Household of Octli and An-
oeth' in the sense of Power and Not-power\ However

' See Evans' Black Book of Carmarthen, fo. ss'' ; also the MaM„ogion,
pp. ro4, 306. The Irish lucht mniach/ai would be in Welsh literally rendered
flzvyt/i cyfoeth, 'the cyfocth tribe or host,' as it were. Yoxcyfoeth. in Med.Wclsh,
meant power or dominion, whence cyfoethog, ' powerful,' and /lottgv/oet/ioir,
•almighty' ; but in Mod. Welsh nfoeih and cyfoethog have been degraded to
mean ' riches 'and 'rich' respectively. Now if we dropped the prefix cum
from the Irish cnmachtai, and its equivalent cj/ from the Welsh cyfocth, wc
should have Iiicht amiachtai reduced to an approximate analogy to lltcyth
Oetli, ' the Oeth tribe,' for which we have the attested equivalent Teulu
Oethj 'the OctJi household or family.' Oeth, however, seems to have
meant powerful rather than power, and this seems to have been its force in
Gwalchmai's poetry of the twelfth century, where I find it twice : see the
Myvyrian Arch., i. 196'', 203*. In the former passage we have oeth dyl>y<iaf
0 dybwyf ryd, ' I shall be powerful if I be free,' and in the latter oeth yni
uihrwyd, ' mightily was I astonished or dismayed.' Anotth was the nega-
tive oi oeth, and meant weak, feeble, frivolous : so we find its plural, amxlhtti,
applied in the story of Kulhwch to the strange quests on which Kulhwch
had to engage himself and his friends, before he could hope to obtain Olwcn
to be his wife. This has its parallel in the use of the adjective giiatt, ' weak,'
in the following instance among them : — Arthur and his men were ready to
set out in search of Mabon son of Modron, who was said to have been kid-
napped, when only three nights old, from between his mother Modron and
the wall ; and though this had happened a fabulously long time before Arthur
was born, nothing had ever been since heard of Mabon's fate. Now Arthur's
men said that they would set out in search of him, but they considered that
Arthur should not accompany them on feeble quests of the kind : their words
were (p. 128), ny etii di iiynct ath lit y gcissad pcth >;/or uan ar rri hvnn, 'thou
canst not go with thy army to seek a thing so weak as these arc." Merc wc
have uan as the synonym of an-oeth ; but Oeth ac Anotth probably became a
phrase which was seldom analysed or understood ; so wc have besides Tfulu
Oeth ac Anoeth, a Caer Oeth ac Anoeth, or fortress of O. and A., an.l a
CarcharCaer Octhac Anoeth, or the Prison of Caer O. and A , which is more
shortly designated also Carchar Oeth ac Anoeth, or the Prison of O. an.l A
A late account of the building of that strange prison and fortress by
Manawyd-an is given in the lolo MSS., pp. 185 6, 263. and it is needless to

620 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

that may be, the professional class of men who were
treated as persons of power and gods seem to have
attained to their position by virtue of the magic of which
they claimed to be masters, and especially of their
supposed faculty of shape-shifting at will. In other
words, the druidic pantheism ^ which Erigena was able
to dress in the garb of a fairly respectable philosophy
proves to have been, in point of genesis, but a few
removes from a primitive kind of savage folklore.

None of these stories of shape-shifting, and of being
born again, make any allusion to a soul. To revert, for
instance, to ILew ILawgyffes, it is evident that the eagle
cannot be regarded as his soul. The decayed state of
the eagle's body seems to imply that it was somehow
the same body as that of ILew at the time when he was
wounded by Gronw's poisoned spear : the festering of
the eagle's flesh looks as if considered a continuation of
the wound. It is above all things, however, to be noted
that none of the stories in point, whether Irish or
Welsh, contain any suggestion of the hero's life coming
to an end, or in any way perishing ; ILew lives on to
be transformed, under the stroke of Gwydion's wand,
from being an eagle to be a man again ; and Tuan mac

point out that Manawydan, son of ILyr, was no other than the Manannan mac
Lir of Irish literature, the greatest wizard among the Tuatha De or Tuatha
De Danann ; for the practical equivalence of those names is proved by the
Book of the Dun Coiv, fo. le''. For further details about Oeth and Anoeth,
Silvan Evans' Geiriadiir may be consulted, s. v. Anoeth, where instances are
cited of the application of those terms to tilled land and wild or uncultivated
land. Here the words seem to have the secondary meanings of profitable
and unprofitable lands, respectively : compare a somewhat analogous use of
grynt, ' strength, force,' in a passage relating to the mutilated horses of
Matholwch — hyt nod oed rym a etiit ar meirch, ' so that no use was possible
in the case of the horses,' meaning that they were of no use whatever, or
that they had been done for ; see the Oxford Mabinogion, p. 29, and Lady
Charlotte Guest's, iii. 107, where the translation ' and rendered them useless '
is barely strong enough.

' It is right, however, to state that M. d'A. de Jubainville's account of
the views of Erigena is challenged by Mr. Nutt, ii. 105.

XI] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 621

Cairill persists in various forms till he meets St. Finncn
in the sixth century. Then in the case of Etain, we are
told in the Book of the Dun Cow, fo. 129", that her first-
mentioned birth and the next one were separated b\-
more than a thousand years. So practically wc may
say that these stories implied that men and women
were imperishable, that they had no end necessarily to
their existence. This sort of notion may be detected in
ILew's words when he says, ' Unless God kill me ... it
is not easy to kill me.' The reference to the Almighty
may probably be regarded as a comparatively late inter-
polation due to Christian teaching. A similar instance
seems to occur in a poem in the Black Book of Carmar-
then, fos, 47''-8'\ where Arthur loudly sings the praises
of his friend Cai. The couplet in point runs thus :—

Ny bei ditv ae digonhei.
Oet diheit aghev kei.

Unless it were God that wrought it.
Hard to effect were the death of Cai.

I am not sure, however, of the meaning; for, among
other things, diheit, which I am inclined to interpret as
' hard to reach ' or ' not easy to effect,' has been rendered
otherwise by others ^ In any case, the other instance
seems to imply that at one time the heroes of H^ew's
world were not necessarily expected to die at all ; and
when they happened. to do so, it was probably regarded,
as among savages at the present day, as a result brought
about by magic. Any reader who may feel astonisiu-d
at such a crudeness of belief, will find something to
contrast and compare in the familiar doctrine, that but
for the fall of Adam and Eve we should have nvwv
heard of death, whether of man or of beast. But if he
proceeds to ask questions about the economy of our
world in case nobody died, he must be satisfied to be

1 For instance, by Silvan Evans in his GctnaJur, where, s. v. diha^t, he
suggests * unmerited ' or ' undeserved' as conveying the sense mcint.

622 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

told that to ask any such question is here not only
useless but also irrelevant.

Now, suppose that in a society permeated by the
crude kind of notions of which one finds traces in
the Mabinogion and other old Welsh literature, a man
arose who had a turn for philosophizing and trying to
think things out: how would he reason? It seems
probable that he would argue, that underneath all the
change there must be some substratum which is per-
manent. If Tuan, he would say, changed from one
form to another and remembered all that he had gone
through, there must have been something which lasted,
otherwise Tuan would have come to an end early in the
story, and the later individual would not be Tuan at all.
Probably one thing which, according to our folklore
philosopher's way of thinking, lasted through the trans-
formations, was the material of Tuan's body, just as
one is induced to suppose that ILew's body, and that of
the eagle into which he was transformed, were con-
sidered to be one and the same body labouring under
the mortifying influence of the wound inflicted on ILew
by Gronw's enchanted spear. Further, we have already
found reasons to regard the existence of the soul as
forming a part of the creed of some at any rate of the
early inhabitants of this country, though we have no
means of gathering what precise attributes our philo-
sopher might ascribe to it besides the single one, perhaps,
of continuing to exist. In that case he might otherwise
describe Tuan's shape-shifting as the entrance of Tuan's
soul into a series of different bodies. Nowthe philosopher
here sketched agrees pretty closely with the little that
is known of the Gaulish druid, such as he is described
by ancient authors ^ The latter seem to have been

^ The reader will find them quoted under the word Dniida in Holder's
Alt-celtischer Sprachschats: see also M. Alexandre Bertrand's Religion dcs

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 623

agreed in regarding him as believing in the immortality
of the soul, and several of them appear to have thought
his views similar to those of Pythagoras and his school.
So we may perhaps venture to suppose that the druids,
like Pythagoras, believed in the transmigration of souls,
including that from the human to an animal form and
the reverse. If, in the absence of an explicit statement,
one may ascribe this latter form of that belief to the
druids, the identity of their creed becomes almost com-
plete with that of our conjectured folklore philosopher.
At one time I was inclined to fancy that the druids of
Gaul had received no unimportant part of their
teaching from Greek philosophy by way of Massilia.
but I am now more disposed to believe their doctrines
to have been gradually developed, in the way above
suggested, from the unfailing resources of that folklore
which revelled in scenes of shape-shifting and rebirth.
Possibly the doctrines of Pythagoras may have them-
selves had a like origin and a somewhat parallel
development, or let us say rather that the Orphic
notions had, which preceded Pythagoreanism.

But as to Gaul generally, it is not to be assumed that
the Gaulish druids and all the other Gauls held the
same opinion on these questions : we have some evi-
dence that they did not. Thus the Gauls in the neigh-
bourhood of Massilia \ who would accept a creditor's
promise to pay up in the next world, can hardly have
contemplated the possibility of any such creditor being
then a bird or a moth. Should it be objected that
the transformations, instanced above as Hrythonic and
Goidelic, were assumed only in the case of magicians
and other professional or privileged persons, and that

Gaulois, especially the chapter entitled Lcs Druul.s, pp. 35^-76, anJ Null'*
Voyage 0/ Bran, ii. 107-12.

1 See Valerius Maxim us, ii. 6. 10.

624 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

we are not told what was held to happen in the case of
the rank and file of humanit}^ it is enough to answer
that neither do we know what the druids of Gaul held
to be the fate of the common people of their com-
munities. No lever can be applied in that direction to
disturb the lines of the parallel.

In previous chapters, pp. 45, 54, 61, 88, 97, 229, in-
stances from Welsh sources have been given of the
fairies concealing their names. But Wales is not the only
Celtic land where we find traces of this treatment of one's
name : it is to be detected also on Irish ground. Thus,
when a herald from an enemy's camp comes to parley
with Cuchulainn and his charioteer, the latter, being first
approached, describes himself as the ' man of the man
down there,' meaning Cuchulainn, to whom he pointed ;
and when the herald comes to Cuchulainn himself, he
asks him whose man he is : Cuchulainn describes him-
self as the ' man of Conchobar mac Nessa.' The herald
then inquires if he has no more definite designation, and
Cuchulainn replies that what he has given will suffice ^ :
neither of the men gives his name. Thus Celts of both
groups, Brythons and Goidels, are at one in yielding
evidence to the same sort of cryptic treatment of per-
sonal names, at some stage or other in their past history.

The student of man tells us, as already pointed out,
that the reason for the reluctance to disclose one's name
was of the same nature as that which makes savages,
and some men belonging to nations above the savage
state feel anxious that an enemy should not get posses-
sion of anything identified with their persons, such as
a lock of one's hair, a drop of one's blood, or anything
closely connected with one's person, lest it should give
the enemy power over one's person as a whole, espe-
cially if such enemy is suspected of possessing any skill

' See the Book of the Dun Cow, fo. 68*.

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 625

in handling the terrors of magic. In other words, the
anthropologist would say that the name was regarded
as identified with the person ; and, having said this, he
has mostly felt satisfied that he has definitively disposed
of the matter. Therein, however, he is possibly wrong ;
for when he says that the name was probably treated
as a part of the man, that only leads one to ask the
question, What part of the man ? At any rate, I can see
nothing very unreasonable in such a question, though
I am quite willing to word it diff'erently, and to ask : Is
there any evidence to show with what part of a man his
name was associated ?

As regards the Aryan nations, we seem to have a clue
to an answer in the interesting group of Aryan words
in point, from which I select the following :— Irish ainm,
'a name,' plural anmann; Old Welsh ami, now ciiw,
also 'a name' ; Old Bulgarian ime>'- (for *ienmcn, *anman);
Old Prussian emnes, emmcns, accusative omian ; and
Armenian miwan (for a stem *rt«;;w;/)— all meaning a
name. To these some scholars' would add, and it may be
rightly, the English word name itself, the Latin nomni,
the Sanskrit ndman, and the Greek ovoiia ; but, as some
others find a difficulty in thus grouping these words,
I abstain from laying any stress on them. In lact,
I have every reason to be satisfied with the wide
extent of the Aryan world covered by tiie other in-
stances enumerated as Celtic, Prussian, Bulgarian, and

Armenian.

Now, such is the similarity between Welsh eniu,
'name,' and enaid, 'soul,' that I cannot help referring
the two words to one and the same origin, especially
when I see the same or rather greater similarity lUus-

. Notably Johannes Sch.nidt in Kuhn's Zal^^, ^Z.!:!::" ^^^^^'^ ^
gives the following gradations of the stem .n question .-uam„a„.
3. naman ; 4. ndman.

KHYS S S

626 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

trated by the Irish words, ainm, ' name/ and amm, ' soul.'
This similarity between the Irish words so pervades the
declension of them, that a beginner frequently falls into
the error of confounding them in medieval texts. Take,
for instance, the genitive singular, anma, which may
mean either animce or noniinis ; the nominative plural,
anmmid, which may be either animce or nomina ; and the
gen. anmand, either animarum or nominum^ as the dative
anmannaih may likewise be either animahus or nommibus.
In fact, one is at first sight almost tempted to suppose
that the partial differentiation of the Irish forms was
only brought about under the influence of Latin, with
its distinct forms of anima and nonien. That would be
pressing the point too far ; but the direct teaching of the
Celtic vocables is that they are all to be referred to
the same origin in the Aryan word for ' breath or breath-
ing,' which is represented by such words as Latin
anima, Welsh anadl, ' breath,' and a Gothic anan, ' blow
or breathe,' whence the compound preterite ttz-on, twice
used by Ulfilas in the fifteenth chapter of St. Mark's
Gospel to render efeTryeuo-e, ' gave up the ghost.'

Now the lessons which the words here grouped
together contain for the student of man is, that the
Celts, and certain other widely separated Aryans, unless
we should rather say the whole of the Aryan family,
were once in the habit of closely associating both the
soul and one's name with the breath of life. The
evidence is satisfactory so far as it goes ; but let us go
a little more into detail, and see as exactly as we can to
what it commits us. Commencing at the beginning, we
may set out with the axiom that breathing is a physical
action, and that in the temperate zone one's breath is
not unfrequently visible. Then one may say that the
men who made the words — Welsh, enaid (for an earlier
anafio-s),' souV ; Irish, anim {from an earlier stem, animon);

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 627

Latin, anima, also ammus, 'feeling, mind, soul'; and
Greek, avei^os, 'air, wind'— must have in some way
likened the soul to one's breath, which perhaps first
suggested the idea. At all events they showed not only
that they did not contemplate the soul as a bone, or any
solid portion of a man's frame, or even as a manikin re-
siding inside it : in fact they had made a great advance in
the direction of the abstract notion of a spirit, in which
some of them may have been helped by another associa-
tion of ideas, namely, that indicated by speaking of the
dead as shades or shadows, iimbrce, a-Kial. Similarly,
the words in point for 'name' seem to prove that some
of the ancient Aryans must have, in some way, associated
one's name with the breath of life. On the other hand,
we find nothing to show that the name and the soul were
directly compared or associated with one another, while
the association of the name with the breath represents,
probably, a process as much earlier as it is cruder, than
likening the soul to the breath and naming it accordingly.
This is countenanced to some extent by the general
physiognomy, so to say, of words like enatd, anima, as
contrasted with enw, amm, nomen, name. Speaking
relatively, the former might be of almost any date in
point of comparative lateness, while the latter could not,
belonging as they do to a small declension which was
not wont to receive accessions to its numbers.

In what way, then, or in what respect did early folk-
lore identify the name with the breath ? Before one
could expect to answer this question in anything like
a convincing fashion, one would have to examine the
collector of the folklore of savages, or rather to induce
him to cross-examine them on the point. For instance,
among the Singhalese \ when in the ceremony of name-
giving the father utters the baby's name in a low

' See Clodd's Totu Tit Tot, p. 97.
S S 2

628 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

whisper in the baby's ear, is that called breathing the
name ? and is the name so whispered called a breath or
a breathing ? In the case of the savages who name their
children at their birth, is the reason ever advanced that
a name must be given to the child in order to make it
breathe, or, at least, in order to facilitate its breathing?
Some such a notion of reinforcing the child's vitality
and safety would harmonize well enough with the fact
that, as Mr. Clodd ^ puts it, * Barbaric, Pagan, and
Christian folklore is full of examples of the importance
of naming and other birth-ceremonies, in the behef that
the child's life is at the mercy of evil spirits watching
the chance of casting spells upon it, of demons covetous
to possess it, and of fairies eager to steal it and leave
a "changeling" in its place.' Provisionally, one must
perhaps rest content to suppose the association of the
name to have taken place with the breath regarded as
an accompaniment of hfe. Looked at in that sense, the
name becomes associated with one's life, and, speaking
roughly, with one's person ; and it is interesting to
notice that one seems to detect traces in Welsh litera-
ture of some confusion of the kind. Thus, when the
hero of the story of Kulhwch and Olwen was christened
he was named Kulhwch, which is expressed in Welsh
as ' forcing or driving Kulhwch on him ' [gyrru kidhSch
arnaS^); KulhSch, be it noticed, not the name Kulhwch.
Similarly when Bran, on the eve of his expedition to
Ireland, left seven princes, or knights as they are also
called, to take charge of his dominions, we have an
instance of the kind. The stead or town was named
after the seven knights, and it is a place which is now
known as Btyn y Saith Marchog, 'the Hill of the
Seven Knights,' near Gwydelwern, in Merionethshire.
But the wording of the Mabinogi of Bran wen is o acha6s

^ Tom Tit Tot, p. 89. 2 x^e Oxford Mabino^ion, p. 100.

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 6S9

hynny y dodet seith marchaSc ar y dre/^, meaning 'for
that reason the stead was called Seven Knights,'
literally 'for that reason one put Seven Knights on
the stead.' In Guest's Mabinogion, iii. 116, this will be
found rendered wrongly, though not wholly without
excuse — 'for this reason were the seven knights
placed in the town.' It is probable that the redactor
of the stories from which the two foregoing instances
come — and more might be cited — was not so much
courting ambiguities as adhering to an old form of
expression which neglected from the first to distinguish,
in any formal way, between names and the persons
or things which they would, in modern phraseology, be
said to represent ^.

An instance has been already mentioned of a man's
name being put or set on him, or rather forced on him :
at any rate, his name is on him both in Welsh and
Irish, and the latter language also speaks of it as

* The Oxford Mabitiogion, p. 35.

^ As to Irish, I would not lay much stress on the question 'What is
your name ? ' being put, in a fourteenth or fifteenth century version of the
French story of Fierabras, as ca hainm fii'i — literally, 'what name art thou?'
see the Revue Celtiqite, xix. 28. It may be mentioned here that the Irish
writers of glossaries had a remarkable way of appearing to identify words
and things. Thus, for instance, Cormac has Crtiimther J. Gcedelg indi as
presbyter^ which O'Donovan (edited by Stokes) has translated, p. 30, as
' Cruimther, i. e. the Gaelic of presbyter': literally it would be rather ' of the
thing which is presbyter.' Similarly, Cormac's explanation of the Irish
ainiinn, now aoibhinn, * delightful,' runs thus in Latin, Amiind ab eo quod est
amoenum^ ' from the word amoenus,' literally, ' from that which is amoenus.'
But this construction is a favourite one of Latin grammarians, and instances
will be found in Professor Lindsay's Latin Language (Oxford, 1894), pp. 26,
28, 42, 53. On calhng his attention to it, he kindly informed me that it can
be traced as far back as Varro, from whose Lingua Latina^ vi. 4, he cites
Meridies ab eo quod niedius dies. So in this matter, Irish writers have merely
imitated their Latin models ; and one detects a trace of the same imitation in
some of the Old Welsh glosses, for instance in the Juvencus Codex, where we
have Jcps explained as irhinn issid crist, ' that which is Christ,' evidently
meaning, ' the word X/jicttoj or Christus.' So with regia, rendered by gulai,
' a state or country,' in celsi thronus est cui regia caeli ; which is glossed issit
padiu itau gulat, ' that is the word gulat for him ' = ' he means his country ':
see Kuhn's Beitrdge, iv. 396, 411.

630 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

cleaving or adhering to him. Neither language con-
templates the name, however closely identified with
him, as having become an inseparable part of him, or
else as something he has secured for himself. In the
neo-Celtic tongues, both Welsh and Irish, all things
which a man owns, and all things for which he takes
credit, are with him or by him ; but all things which he
cannot help having, whether creditable or discreditable,
if they are regarded as coming from without are on him,
not with him. Thus, if he is wealthy there is money
with him ; but if he is in debt and owes money, the
money is on him. Similarly, if he rejoices there is joy
with him ; whereas if he is ashamed or afraid, shame
or fear is on him. This is a far-reaching distinction, of
capital importance in Celtic phraseology, and judged by
this criterion the name is something from without the
man, something which he cannot take credit to himself
for having acquired by his own direct willing or doing.
This is to be borne in mind when one speaks of the
name as identified or closely bound up with one's life
and personality. But this quahfied identification of the
name with the man is also what one may infer from
savage folklore ; for many, perhaps most, of the nations
who name their children at their birth, have those
names changed when the children grow up. That is
done when a boy has to be initiated into the mysteries
of his tribe or of a guild, or it may be when he has
achieved some distinction in war. In most instances,
it involves a serious ceremony and the intervention of
the wise man, whether the medicine-man of a savage
system, or the priest of a higher religion ^ In the
ancient Wales of the Mabinogion, and in pagan Ireland,

' Some instances in point, accompanied with comments on certain emi-
nently instructive practices and theories of the Church, will be found in
Clodd's Tom Tit Tot, pp. 100-5.

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 631

the name-giving was done, subject to certain conditions,
at the will and on the initiative of the druid, who was at
the same time tutor and teacher of the youth to be
renamed \ Here I may be allowed to direct attention to
the two following facts : the druid, recalling as he does
the magician of the Egypt of the Pentateuch and the
shaman of the Mongolian world of our own time, repre-
sented a profession probably not of Celtic origin. In
the next place, his method of selecting names from
incidents was palpably incompatible with what is known
to have been the Aryan system of nomenclature, by
means of compounds, as evinced by the annals of most
nations of the Aryan family of speech : such compounds,
I mean, as Welsh Pen-wyn, 'white-headed,' Gaulish
Ylevvo-ovivhos, or Greek "l-n-nap^os, "Apxt-TTTTos, and the like.
Briefly, one may say that the association of the name
with the breath of hfe was probably Aryan, but without,
perhaps, being unfamiliar to the aborigines of the
British Isles before their conquest by the Celts. On
the other hand, in the druid and his method of naming
we seem to touch the non-Aryan substratum, and to
detect something which was not Celtic, not Aryan ^.

Perhaps the reader will not regard it as wholly
irrelevant if here I change the subject for a while from
one's name to other words and locutions in so far as
they may be regarded as illustrative of the mental
surroundings in which the last paragraph leaves the
name. I allude especially to the exaggerated influ-
ence associated with a form of words, more particu-
larly among the Irish Celts. O'Curry gives a tragic

' For some instances of name-giving by the druid, the reader may con-
sult T/ie Welsh People, pp. 66-70 ; and druidic baptism will be found
alluded to in Stokes' edition of Coir Aiimann, and in Stokes and Windisch's
Irische Texte, iii. 392, 423. See also the Revue Celtique, xix. 90.

■^ See The Welsh People, more especially pp. 71-4, where it has been
attempted to discuss this question more at length.

632 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

instance : the poet Nede mac Adnai, in order to obtain
possession of the throne of Connaught, asked an
impossible request of the king, who was his own
father's brother and named Caier. When the king
declared his inability to accede to his demand the poet
made the refusal his excuse for composing on the king
what was called in Irish an ciir or der, written later aor,
* satire,' which ran approximately thus :—

Evil, death, short life to Caier !

May spears of battle wound Caier !

Caier quenched, Caier forced, Caier underground !

Under ramparts, under stones with Caier !

O'Curry goes on to relate how Caier, washing his
face at the fountain next morning, discovered that it
had three blisters on it, which the satire had raised, to
wit, disgrace, blemish, and defect, in colours of crimson,
green, and white. So Caier fleeing, that his plight
might not be seen of his friends, came to Dun Cearmna
(now the Old Head of Kinsale, in county Cork), the
residence of Caichear, chief of that district. There Caier
was well received as a stranger of unknown quality,
while Nede assumed the sovereignty of Connaught.
In time, Nede came to know of Caier being there, and
rode there in Caier's chariot. But as Nede approached
Caier escaped through his host's house and hid himself
in the cleft of a rock, whither Nede followed Caier's
greyhound ; and when Caier saw Nede, the former
dropped dead of shame \ This abstract of the story as
told by O'Curry, will serve to show how the words of
the satirist were dreaded by high and low among the
ancient Irish, and how their demands had to be at once
obeyed. It is a commonplace of Irish literature that
the satirist's words unfailingly raised blisters on the

^ See Stokes' Cormac's Glossary, translated by O'Donovan, p. 87, and
O'Curry's Manners and Customs of the Ancient Irish, li. 218-9.

XI] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 633

face of him at whom they were aimed. A portion at
least of the potency of the poet's words seems to have
been regarded as due to their being given a certain
metrical form. That, however, does not show how the
poet had acquired his influence, and one cannot shut
one's eyes to the fact that the means he might adopt to
make his influence felt and his wishes instantly attended
to, implied that the race with which he had to deal
was a highly sensitive one : I may perhaps apply to it
the adjective thin-skinned, in the literal sense of that
word. For the blisters on the face are only an exag-
geration of a natural phenomenon. On this point my
attention has been called by a friend to the following
passages in a review of a work on the pathology of the
emotions ^ : —

* To both the hurtful and curative effects of the
emotions M. Fere devotes much attention, and on
these points makes some interesting remarks. That
the emotions act on the body, more by their effects on
the circulation than by anything else, is no new thesis,
but M. Fere is developing some new branches of it.
That the heart may be stopped for a few seconds, and
that there may be localised flush and pallor of the skin,
owing to almost any strong emotion, whether it be joy,
anger, fear, or pain, is a matter of common observation ;
and that there may be many changes of nutrition due
to vaso-motor disturbance is a point easy to establish.
The skin is particularly easily affected; passion and
pain may produce a sweat that is truly hemorrhagic
(Parrot) ; and the scientific world is obliged to admit
that in the stigmata of Louise Lateau the blood vessels
were really broken, and not broken by anything else

1 See Mind (or 1893, p. 390 : the review is by Mr. A. T. Myers, and the title
of the book noticed is La Paihologie des Emotions, Etudes physiologiques et
cliniques, par Charles Firi, midecin de Bicetre (Paris, 1892).

634 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

than an emotional state as cause. In a shipwreck
Follain tells us that the pilot was covered in an hour
with pustules from his fear ; and the doctor sees many
dermafo-iiettroses, such as nettle-rash, herpes, pem-
phigus, vitiligo, &c., from the choc moral.'

I can illustrate this from my own observation : when
I was an undergraduate there was with me at college
a Welsh undergraduate, who, when teased or annoyed
by his friends, was well known to be subject to a sort of
rash or minute pustules on his face : it would come on
in the course of an hour or so. There is a well-known
Welsh line on this subject of the face which is to the
point : —

Ni cliel griict gysfit(t cciloit.

The cheek hides not the heart's affliction.

So a man who was insulted, or whose honour was
assailed, might be said to be thereby put to the blush or
to be otherwise injured in his face ; and the Irish word
enech, ' face,' is found commonly used as a synonym for
one's honour or good name. The same appears to have
been the case with the Welsh equivalent, zvjmeb, * face,'
and dyn di-wyneb, literally * a faceless man,' appears to
be now used in Carnarvonshire and Glamorgan in the
sense of one who is without a sense of honour, an un-
principled fellow. So when Welsh law dealt with insults
and attacks on one's honour the payment to be made to
the injured person was CdiWedi gwynebwerth, 'the price of
one's face,' or gwyncbwarth^ ' the payment for disgracing
one's face.' Irish law arranged for similar damages, and
called them by analogous names, such as enech-gn's,
' a fine for injuring or raising a blush on the face,' and
enech-ldg or eiicch-lann, ' honour price ' ; compare also
enech-ruice, 'a face-reddening or blushing caused by
some act or scandal which brought shame on a family.'
Possibly one has to do with traces of somewhat the

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 635

same type of ' face,' though it has faded away to the
verge of vanishing, when one speaks in Enghsh of
keeping another in countenance.

It has been suggested that if a magician got a man's
name he could injure him by means of his arts : now
the converse seems to have been the case with the Irish
tier or satire, for to be effective it had, as in the instance
of Caier, to mention the victim's name ; and a curious
instance occurs in the Book of Leinster^ fo. 117, where
the poet Atherne failed to curse a person whose name
he could not manipulate according to the rules of his
satire. This man Atherne is described as inhospitable,
stingy, and greedy to the last degree. So it is related
how he sallied forth one day, taking with him a cooked
pig and a pot of mead, to a place where he intended to
gorge himself without being observed. But no sooner
had he settled down to his meal than he saw a man
approaching, who remarked to him on his operating on
the food all alone, and unceremoniously picked up the
porker and the pot of mead. As he was coolly walking
away with them, Atherne cried out after him, ' What is
thy name?' The stranger replied that it was nothing
very grand, and gave it as follows : —

Seihor. ethor . othor . sele . dele, dreng gerce
Mec gerlusce . ger ger. dir dir issed nioainmse.

Sethor-Ethor-Othor-Sele-Dele-Dreng gerce

Son of Gerlusce ger-ger-dir-dir, that is my name.

The story goes on to say that Atherne neither saw
his meal any more nor succeeded in making a satire on
the name of the stranger, who accordingly got away
unscathed. It was surmised, we are told, that he was
an angel come from God to teach the poet better
manners. This comic story brings us back to the
importance of the name, as it implies that the cursing
poet, had he been able to seize it and duly work it

636 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

into his satire, could not have failed to bring about
the intruder's discomfiture. The magician and folklore
philosopher, far from asking with Juliet, 'What's in a
name ?' would have rather put it the other way, ' What's
not in a name ? ' At any rate the ancients believed
that there was a great deal in a name, and traces of
the importance which they gave it are to be found
in modern speech : witness the article on name or its
equivalent in a big dictionary of any language possessed
of a great literature.

It has been seen that it is from the point of view
of magic that the full importance of one's name was
most keenly realized by our ancient Celts ; that is, of
magic more especially in that stage of its history when
it claimed as its own a certain degree of skill in the
art of verse-making. Perhaps, indeed, it would be more
accurate to suppose that verse-making appertained from
the outset to magic, and that it was magicians, medicine-
men, or seers, who, for their own use, first invented the
aids of rhythm and metre. The subject, however, of magic
and its accessories is far too vast to be treated here : it has
been touched upon here and there in some of the pre-
vious chapters, and I may add that wizardry and magic
form the machinery, so to say, of the stories called in
Welsh the * Four Branches of the Mabinogi' n?imt\yth.os&
of Pwytt, Branwen, Manawydan, and Math. Now these
four, together with the adventure of ILud and ILevelys,
and, in a somewhat quahfied sense, the story of Kulhwch
and Olwen, represent in a Brythonicized form the
otherwise lost legends of the Welsh Goidels ; and, like
those of the Irish Goidels, they are remarkable for their
wizardry. Nor is that all, for in the former the kings
are mostly the greatest magicians of their time : or shall
I rather put it the other way, and say that in them the
greatest magicians function as kings ? Witness Math son

xi] FOLKLORE PHILOSOPHY 637

of Mathonwy king of Gwyned, and his sister's son,
Gwydion ab Don, to whom as his successor he duly
taught his magic ; then come the arch-enchanter Arawn,
king of Annwn, and Caswatlon ab Beh, represented as
winning his kingdom by the sheer force of magic. To
these might be added other members of the kingly
families whose story shows them playing the role of
magicians, such as Rhiannon, who by her magic arts
foiled her powerful suitor, Gwawl ab Clud, and secured
as her consort the man of her choice, Pwytt prince of
Dyfed. Here also, perhaps, one might mention Manaw-
ydan ab ILyr, who, as Manannan mac Lir, figures in the
stories of the Goidels of Erin and Man as a consummate
wizard and first king of the Manx people : see p. 314
above. In the Mabmogi, however, no act of magic is
ascribed to Manawydan, though he is represented
successfully checkmating the most formidable wizard
arrayed against him and his friends, to wit, ILwyd ab
Kilcoed. Not only does one get the impression that
the ruling class in these stories of the Welsh Goidels
had their magic handed down from generation to genera-
tion according to a fixed rule of maternal succession
(pp. 326, 503, 505), but it supplies the complete answer to
and full explanation of questions as to the meaning of
the terms already mentioned, Tuatha De ocus Ande, and
Lttcht Cumachtai, together with its antithesis. Within
the magic-wielding class exercising dominion over the
shepherds and tillers of the soil of the country, it is
but natural to suppose that the first king was the first
magician or greatest medicine-man, as in the case of
Manannan in the Isle of Man. This must of course be
understood to apply to the early history of the Goidelic
race, or, perhaps more correctly speaking, to one of the
races which had contributed to its composition: to the
aborigines, let us say, by whatsoever name or names

638 CELTIC FOLKLORE

you may choose to call them, whether Picts or Ivernians.
It is significant, among other things, that our traditions
should connect the potency of ancient wizardry with
descent in the female line of succession, and, in any case,
one cannot be wrong in assuming magic to have begun
very low down in the scale of social progress, probably
lower than religion, with which it is essentially in
antagonism. As the crude and infantile pack of notions,
collectively termed S3^mpathetic magic — beginning with
the belief that any effect may be produced by imitating
the action of the cause of it, or even doing anything that
would recall it ^ — grew into the panoply of the magician,
he came to regard himself, and to be regarded by others,
as able for his own benefit and that of his friends to
coerce all possible opponents, whether men or demons,
heroes or gods. This left no room for the attitude of
prayer and worship : religion in that sense could only
come later.

' See Frazer's Golden Bough, i. 9, where a few most instructive instances
are given.

CHAPTER XII
Race in Folklore and Myth

The method of philological mythology is thus discredited by the
disputes of its adherents. The system may be called orthodox, but it is
an orthodoxy which alters with every new scholar who enters the sacred
enclosure. — Andrew Lang.

It has been well said, that while it is not science to
know the contents of myths, it is science to know why
the human race has produced them. It is not my inten-
tion to trace minutely the history of that science, but
I may hazard the remark, that she could not be said
to have reached years of discretion till she began to
compare one thing with another; and even when
mythology had become comparative mythology, her
horizon remained till within recent years comparatively
narrow. In other words, the comparisons were wont
to be very circumscribed : you might, one was told,
compare the myths of Greeks and Teutons and
Hindus, because those nations were considered to be
of the same stock; but even within that range com-
parisons were scarcely contemplated, except in the case
of myths enshrined in the most classical literatures of
those nations. This kind of mythology was eclectic
rather than comparative, and it was apt to regard myths
as a mere disease of language. By-and-by, however,
the student showed a preference for a larger field
and a wider range ; and in so doing he was, whether

640 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

consciously or unconsciously, beginning to keep step
with a larger movement extending to the march of all
the kindred sciences, and especially that of language.

At one time the student of language was satisfied
with mummified speech, wrapped up, as it were, in the
musty coils of the records of the past : in fact, he often
became a mere researcher of the dead letter of lan-
guage, instead of a careful observer of the breath of life
animating her frame. So long as that remained the
case, glottology deserved the whole irony of Voltaire's
well-known account of etymology as being in fact,
' une science ou les voyelles ne font rien, et les con-
sonnes fort peu de chose.' In the course, however, of
recent years a great change has come over the scene :
not only have the laws of the Aryan consonants gained
greatly in precision, but those of the Aryan vowels
have at last been discovered to a considerable extent.
The result for me and others who learnt that the Aryan
peasant of idyllic habits harped eternally on the three
notes of a, i, u, is that we have to unlearn this and
a great deal more : in fact, the vowels prove to be far
more troublesome than the consonants. But difficult
as these lessons are, the glottologist must learn them,
unless he is content to remain with the stragglers who
happen to be unable to move on. Now the change to
which I allude, in connexion with the study of language,
has been inseparably accompanied with the paying of
increased attention to actual speech, with a more careful
scrutiny of dialects, even obscure dialects such as the
literary man is wont to regard with scorn.

Similarly the student of mythology now seeks the
wherewithal of his comparisons from the mouth of the
traveller and the missionary, wherever they may roam ;
not from the Rt^- Veda or the Iliad alone, but from the
rude stories of the peasant, and the wild fancies of

xii] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 641

the savage from Tierra del Fuego to Greenland's icy
mountains. The parallel may be drawn still closer.
Just as the glottologist, fearing lest the written letter
may have slurred over or hidden away important pecu-
liarities of ancient speech, resorts for a corrective to the
actuality of modern Aryan, so the mythologist, apt to
suspect the testimony of the highly respectable bards
of the Rig- Veda, may on occasion give ear to the fresh
evidence of a savage, however inconsequent it may
sound. The movements to which I allude in glottology
and mythology began so recently that their history has
not yet been written. Suffice it to say that in glottology,
or the science of language, the names most intimately
connected with the new departure are those of Ascoli,
J. Schmidt, and Fick, those of Leskien, Brugmann,
Osthoff, and De Saussure ; while of the names of the
teachers of the anthropological method of studying
myths, several are by this time household words in
this country. But, so far as I know, the first to give a
systematic exposition of the subject was Professor Tylor,
in his work on Primitive Culture, published first in 187 1.
Such has been the intimate connexion between
mythology and glottology that I may be pardoned for
going back again to the latter. It is applicable in its
method to all languages, but, as a matter of fact, it came
into being in the domain of Aryan philology, so that it
has been all along principally the science of comparing
the Aryan languages with one another. It began with
Sir William Jones' discovery of the kinship of Sanskrit
with Greek and Latin, and for a long time it took the
lead of the more closely related sciences : this proved
partly beneficial and partly the reverse. In the case of
ethnology, for instance, the influence of glottology
has probably done more harm than good, since it has
opened up a wide field for confounding race with

KHYS T t

642 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

language. In the case of mythology the same influence
has been partly helpful, and it has partly fallen short
of being such. Where names could be analysed with
certainty, and where they could be equated, leaving
little room for doubt, as in the case of that of the Greek
Zev?, the Norse Tyr, and the Sanskrit Dyaits, the
science of language rendered a veritable help to mytho-
logy ; but where the students of language, all pointing
in different directions, claimed each to hold in his hand
the one safety-lamp, beyond the range of which the
mythologist durst not take a single step except at the
imminent risk of breaking his neck, the help may be
pronounced, to say the least of it, as somewhat doubtful.
The anthropological method of studying myths put an
end to the unequal relation between the students of the
two sciences, and it is now pretty well agreed that the
proper relationship between them is that of mutual aid.
This will doubtless prove the solution of the whole
matter, but it would be premature to say that the period
of strained relations is quite over, since the mythologist
has so recently made good his escape from the embar-
rassing attentions of the students of language, that he
has not yet quite got out of his ears the bewildering
notes of the chorus of discordant cries of * Dawn,'
* Sun,' and * Storm-cloud.'

Now that I have touched on the friendly relations
which ought to exist between the science of language
and the science of myth, I may perhaps be allowed to
notice a point or two where it is possible or desirable
for the one to render service to the other. The student
of language naturally wants the help of the student of
myth, ritual, and religion on matters which most
immediately concern his own department of study ; and
I may perhaps be excused for taking my stand on
Celtic ground, and calling attention to some of my own

xri] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 643

difficulties. Here is one of them : when one would say
in English ' It rains ' or ' It freezes,' I should have to
say in my own language, Y mae hi'n bwrw glaw and
Y mae Mn rhewi, which literally means ' She is casting
rain ' and ' She is freezing.' Nor is this sort of locution
confined to weather topics, for when you would say
* He is badly off' or ' He is hard up,' a Welshman
might say, Y mae Mn ctrwg arno or Y mae Mn galed
arno, that is literally, ' She is evil on him ' or ' She is
hard on him.' And the same feminine pronoun fixes
itself in other locutions in the language. Now I wish
to invoke the student of myth, ritual, and religion to
help in the identification of this ubiquitous 'she' of
the Welsh. Whenever it is mentioned to Englishmen,
it merely calls to their minds the Highland 'she' of
English and Scotch caricature, as for instance when
Sir Walter Scott makes Donald appeal in the following
strain to Lord Menteith's man, Anderson, who had learnt
manners in France : ' What the deil, man, can she no
drink after her ain master without washing the cup and
spilling the ale, and be tamned to her!' The High-
lander denies the charge which our caricature tries to
fasten on him ; but even granting that it was once
to some extent justified, it is easy to explain it by a
reference to Gaelic, where the pronouns se and sibh, for
' he ' and ' you ' respectively, approach in pronunciation
the sound of the English pronoun * she.' This may
have led to confusion in the mouths of Highlanders
who had but very imperfectly mastered English. In
any case, it is far too superficial to be quoted as
a parallel to the M, 'she,' in question in Welsh.
A cautious Celtist, if such there be, might warn us,
before proceeding further with the search, to make
sure that the whole phenomenon is not a mere accident
of Welsh phonetics, and that it is not a case of two

T t 2

644 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

pronouns, one meaning ' she ' and the other * it,' being
confounded as the result merely of phonetic decay.
The answer to that is, that the language knows nothing
of any neuter pronoun which could assume the form of
the hi which occupies us ; and further, that in locutions
where the legitimate representative of the neuter might
be expected, the pronoun used is a different one, ef,
e, meaning both ' he ' and ' it,' as in i-e for 'i-ef, ' it is he,
she, it or they,' nag-e, 'not he, she, it or they,' ef a allai
orfeallai, 'perhaps, peradventure, /^z^/-t?7r^, il est possible'
The French sentence suggests the analogous question,
what was the original force of denotation of the ' il ' in
such sentences as ' il fait beau,' * il pleut,' and ' il
neige ' ? In such cases it now denotes nobody in parti-
cular, but has it always been one of his names ? French
historical grammar may be able, unaided, to dispose of
the attenuated fortunes of M. //, but we have to look for
help to the student of myth and allied subjects to enable
us to identify the great 'she' persistently eluding our
search in the syntax of the Welsh language. Only
two feminine names suggest themselves to me as in
any way appropriate : one is tynghed, ' fate or fortune,'
and the other is Don, mother of some of the most
nebulous personages in Celtic literature.

There is, however, no evidence to show that either of
them is really the ' she ' of whom we are in quest ; but
I have something to say about both as illustrating the
other side of the theme, how the study of language may
help mythology. This I have so far only illustrated
by a reference to the equation of Zevs with Dyaiis and
their congeners. Within the range of Celtic legend
the case is similar with Don, who figures on Welsh
ground, as I have hinted, as mother of certain heroes of
the oldest chapters of the Mabinogion. For it is from
her that Gwydion, the bard and arch-magician, and

xiil RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 645

Gofannon the smith his brother, are called sons of
Don ; and so in the case of Arianrhod, daughter of Don,
mother of ILew, and owner of the sea-laved castle of Caer
Arianrhod, not far distant from the prehistoric mound
of Dinas Dintte, near the western mouth of the Menai
Straits, as already mentioned in another chapter, p. 208
above. In Irish legend, we detect Don under the Irish
form of her name, Datm or Domt, genitive Danann or
Dottann, and she is almost singular there in always
being styled a divinity. From her the great mythical
personages of Irish legend are called Tuatha De
Danamt, or ' the Goddess Danu's Tribes,' and sometimes
Fir Dm, or ' the Men of the Divinity.' The last stage
in the Welsh history of Don consists of her translation
to the skies, where the constellation of Cassiopeia is
supposed to constitute E.ys Don or Don's Court, as the
Corona Borealis is identified with Caer Arianrhod or
' the Castle of Don's Daughter ' ; but, as was perhaps
fitting, the dimensions of both are reduced to com-
parative littleness by Caer Gwydion, 'the Magician
Gwydion's Battlements,' spread over the radiant expanse
of the whole Milky Way ^ Now the identification of
this ancient goddess Danu or Don as that in whom
the oldest legends of the Irish Goidels and the Welsh
Goidels converge, has been the work not so much of
mythology as of the science of language ; for it was the
latter that showed how to call back a little colouring
into the vanishing lineaments of this faded ancestral
divinity ^.

» See Guest's Mabinogion, iii. 255, where, however, Don is wrongly
treated as a male.

■■* One has, however, to admit that the same agency may also mar the
picture. Since the above was written I have read in Stokes' Festschrift,
pp. 7-19, a very interesting article by L. Chr. Stern, in which he discusses
some of the difficulties attaching to the term Tuatha De Danann. Among
other things he suggests that there was a certain amount of confusion
between Danann and ddna, genitive of dan, ' art or profession '—the word

646 CELTIC FOLKLORE [en.

For my next illustration, namely tynghed, ' fate/ I
would cite a passage from the opening of one of the most
Celtic of Welsh stories, that of Kulhwch and Olwen.
Kulhwch's father, after being for some time a widower,
marries again, and conceals from his second wife the
fact that he has a son. She finds it out and lets her
husband know it ; so he sends for his son Kulhwch,
and the following is the account of the son's interview
with his stepmother, as given in Lady Charlotte Guest's
translation, ii. 252 : — ' His stepmother said unto him,
"It were well for thee to have a wife, and I have
a daughter who is sought of every man of renown in
the world." " I am not of an age to wed," answered
the youth. Then said she unto him, " I declare to
thee, that it is thy destiny not to be suited- with a wife
until thou obtain Olwen, the daughter of Yspadaden
Penkawr." And the youth blushed, and the love of
the maiden diffused itself through all his frame, although
he had never seen her. And his father inquired of
him, " What has come over thee, my son, and what
aileth thee ? " " My stepmother has declared to me,
that I shall never have a wife until I obtain Olwen,
the daughter of Yspadaden Penkawr." " That will be

meant also ' lot or destiny,' being probably of the same origin as the Latin
donum, in Welsh dawn, which means a gift, and especially ' the gift of the
gab.' But it would invert the natural sequence to suppose any such
a formula as Tuatha De Ddna to have preceded Tuatha De Danann ; for
why should anybody substitute an obscure vocable Danann for ddna of
well-known meaning ? Dr. Stern has some doubts as to the Welsh Don
being a female ; but it would have been more satisfactory if he had proved his
surmise, or at any rate shown that Don has nothing to do with Danann or
Donann. I am satisfied with such a passage in the Mabinogi of Math as that
where Gwydion, addressing Math, describes Arianrhod, daughter of Don,
in the words, dy nith uerch dy clidaer, ' thy niece daughter of thy sister':
see the Mabinogion, p. 68, and, for similar references to other children of
Don, consult pp. 59 and 65. Arianrhod is in the older Triads, i. 40, ii. 15,
called daughter of Beli, whom one can only have regarded as her father.
So for the present I continue to accept Stokes' rendering of Tuatha De
Danann as ' the Folks of the Goddess Danu.'

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 647

easy for thee," answered his father. "Arthur is thy
cousin. Go, therefore, unto Arthur to cut thy hair,
and ask this of him as a boon."'

The physical theory of love for an unknown lady
at the first mention of her name, and the allusion to
the Celtic tonsure, will have doubtless caught the
reader's attention, but I only wish to speak of the
words which the translator has rendered, *I declare to
thee, that it is thy destiny not to be suited with a wife
until thou obtain Olwen.' More closely rendered, the
original might be translated thus : * I swear thee a
destiny that thy side touch not a wife till thou obtain
Olwen.' The word in the Welsh for destiny is tynghet
(for an earlier tuncet), and the corresponding Irish word
is attested as tocad. Both these words have a ten-
dency, like ' fate,' to be used mostly m peiorem partem.
Formerly, however, they might be freely used in an
auspicious sense likewise, as for instance in the woman's
name Tiinccetace, on an early inscribed stone in Pem-
brokeshire. If her name had been rendered into Latin
she would have probably been called Fortimata, as a
namesake of good fortune. I render the Welsh mi
a tynghaf dynghet iW^ into English, *I swear thee a
destiny'; but, more literally still, one might possibly
render it ' I swear thee a swearing,' that is, ' I swear
thee an oath,' meaning ' I swear for thee an oath which
will bind thee.' The stepmother, it is true, is not repre-
sented going through the form of words, for what she
said appears to have been a regular formula, just like
that of putting a person in Medieval Irish story under
gessa or bonds of magic ; but an oath or form of impre-
cation was once doubtless a dark reality behind this

' See the Oxford il/(7imo^/oM, p. 102; Guest's trans., ii. 252. The combination
occurs also in the Book of Aneurin: see Stephens' Gododin (London, 1888),
p. 322.

648 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

formula. In the southern part of my native county of
Cardigan, the phrase in question has been in use within
the last thirty years, and the practice which it denotes
is still so well known as to be the subject of local
stories. A friend of mine, who is not yet fifty, vividly
remembers listening to an uncle of his relating how
narrowly he once escaped having the oath forced on
him. He was in the hilly portion of the parish of ILan-
wenog, coming home across countr}^ in the dead of a
midsummer's night, when leaping over a fence he unex-
pectedly came down close to a man actively engaged
in sheep-stealing. The uncle instantly took to his heels,
while the thief pursued him with a knife. If the
thief had caught him, it is understood that he would have
held his knife at his throat and forced on him an oath of
secrecy. I have not been able to ascertain the wording
of the oath, but all I can learn goes to show that it was
dreaded only less than death itself. In fact, there are
stories current of men who failed to recover from Ihe
effects of the oath, but lingered and died in a com-
paratively short time. Since I got the foregoing story
I have made inquiries of others in South Cardiganshire,
and especially of a medical friend of mine, who speaks
chiefly as to his native parish of ILangyntto. I found
that the idea is perfectly famihar to him and my other
informants ; but, strange to say, from nobody could
I gather that the illness is considered to result neces-
sarily from the violent administration of the tynghed to
the victim, or from the latter's disregarding the secrecy of
it by disclosing to his friends the name of the criminal.
In fact, I cannot discover that any such secrecy is
emphasized so long as the criminal is not publicly
brought before a court of justice. Rather is it that
the tynghed effects blindly the ruin of the sworn man's
health, regardless of his conduct. At any rate, that is

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 649

the interpretation ^which I am forced to put on what
I have been told.

The phrase tyngu tynghed'^^ intelligible still in Wales,
recalls another instance of the importance of the spoken
word, to wit, the Latin fatiim. Na}^ it seems to sug-
gest that the latter might have perhaps originally been
part of some such a formula as alicui fatum fari, 'to say
one a saying,' in the pregnant sense of applying to him
words of power. This is all the more to the point, as it
is well known how closely Latin and Celtic are related
to one another, and how every advance in the study of
those languages goes to add emphasis to their kinship.
From the kinship of the languages one may expect, to
a certain extent, a similarity of rites and customs, and
one has not to go further for this than the very story
which I have cited. When Kulhwch's father first
married, he is said to have sought a gwreic kynmwyt
ac ef^, which means ' a wife of the same food with him.'
Thus the wedded wife was she, probably, who ate with
her husband, and we are reminded of the food cere-
mony which constituted the aristocratic marriage in
ancient Rome : it was called confarreatio, and in the
course of it an offering of cake, called farreum libum,
used to be made to Jupiter, A great French student of
antiquity, M. Fustel de Coulanges, describes the cere-
mony thus ^ :— * Les deux epoux, comme en Grece, font

1 It will be noticed that there is a discrepancy between the gutturals of
these two words : tyjigu, ' to swear' (O. Ir. tongu, ' I swear '), has w^— the
Kulhwch spelling, tynghaf, should probably be iyngaf—wh\\e tynghed and its
Irish equivalent imply an nc. I do not know how to explain this, though
I cannot doubt the fact of the words being treated as cognate. A somewhat
similar difference, however, occurs in Welsh dwyn, 'to bear, carry, steal,'
and dwg, ' carries, bears ' : see the Revue Celtique, vi. 18-9.

? See the Oxford Mabinogion, p. loo, and Guest's trans., ii. 249, where it is
rendered ' a wife as a helpmate,' which is more commonplace than suggestive.

'' La Cite antique (Paris, 1864), p. 50 ; see also Joachim Marquardt's
Privatleben der Romer {Leipsic, 1886), pp. 49-51, and among the references
there given may be mentioned Dionysius of Halicarnassus, ii. 25.

650 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

un sacrifice, versent la libation, prononcent quelques
prieres, et mangent ensemble un gateau de fleur de
farine {panis farreus).' Lastly, my attention has been
directed to the place given to bread in the stories of
ILyn y Fan Fach and ILyn Elfarch. For on turning
back to pp. 3-6, 17-8, 28, the reader will find too much
made of the bread to allow us to suppose that it had no
meaning in the courtship. The young farmer having
fallen in love at first sight with the lake maiden, it looks
as if he wished, by inducing her to share the bread he
was eating, to go forthwith through a form of marriage
by a kind of confarreation that committed her to a
contract to be his wife without any tedious delay.

To return to the Latin fatum, I would point out that
the Romans had a plurality of fata ; but how far they
were suggested by the Greek ixolpai is not quite
clear : nor is it known that the ancient Welsh had
more than one tynghed. In the case, however, of old
Norse literature, we come across the Fate there as
one bearing a name which is perhaps cognate with the
Welsh tynghed. I allude to a female figure, called
{)okk, who appears in the touching myth of Balder's
death. When Balder had fallen at the hands of Loki
and Hodr, his mother Frigg asked who would like to
earn her good will by going as her messenger to treat
with Hell for the release of Balder. Hermodr the
Swift, another of the sons of Woden, undertook to set
out on that journey on his father's charger Sleipnir.
For nine dreary nights he pursued his perilous course
without interruption, through glens dark and deep, till
he came to the river called Yell, when he was ques-
tioned as to his errand by the maid in charge of the
Yell bridge. On and on he rode afterwards till he
came to the fence of Hell's abode, which his horse
cleared at full speed. Hermodr entered the hall, and

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 651

there found his brother Balder seated in the place of
honour. He abode with him that night, and in the
morning he asked Hell to let Balder ride home with
him to the Anses. He urged Hell to consider the grief
which everybody and everything felt for Balder. She
replied that she would put that to the test by letting
Balder go if everything animate and inanimate would
weep for him ; but he would be detained if anybody or
anything declined to do so. Hermodr made his way
back alone to the Anses, and announced to Frigg the
answer which Hell had given to her request. Mes-
sengers were sent forth without delay to bid all the
world beweep Woden's son out of the power of Hell.
This was done accordingly by all, by men and animals,
by earth and stones, by trees and all metals, 'as you
have doubtless seen these things weep,' says the writer
of the Prose Edda, ' when they pass from frost to
warmth.' When the messengers, however, were on
their way home, after discharging their duty, they
chanced on a cave where dwelt a giantess called f>okk,
whom they ordered to join in the weeping for Balder ;
but she only answered : —

|>okk will weep dry tears

At Balder's bale-fire.
What is the son of man, quick or dead, to me !

Let Hell keep what she holds '.

In this ogress f^okk, deaf to the appeals of the tenderer
feelings, we seem to have the counterpart of our Celtic
tocad and tynghed', and the latter's name as a part of the
formula in the Welsh story, while giving us the key of
the myth, shows how the early Aryan knew of nothing

* See Vigfusson and Powell's Corpus Poeticmn Boreale, i. 126, 181-3, 197 ;
the Prose Edda in Edda Snoryonis Sturloei (Copenhagen, 1848), i. 90-2,
102, 104, 172-86 ; and Simrock's Edda (Stuttgart, 1855), pp. 292-3, 295-6,
299, 316-20.

652 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ctr.

more binding than the magic force of an oath. On the
one hand, this conception of destiny carries with it
the marks of its humble origin, and one readily agrees
with Cicero's words, Dc Divinatione, ii. 7, when he says,
miile sane et plenum siiperstitionis fati nomen ipsum.
On the other hand, it rises to the grim dignity of a
name for the dark, inexorable power which the whole
universe is conceived to obey, a power before which
the great and resplendent Z€.vs of the Ar3^an race is
a mere puppet.

Perhaps I have dwelt only too long on the policy of
'give and take' which ought to obtain between mythology
and glottology. Unfortunately, one can add without fear
of contradiction, that, even when that policy is carried
out to the utmost, both sciences will still have difficulties
more than enough. In the case of m3'thology these
difficulties spring chiefly from two distinct sources,
from the blending of history with myth, and from the
mixing of one race with another. Let us now consider
the latter: the difficulties from this source are many
and great, but every fresh acquisition of knowledge
tending to make our ideas of ethnology more accurate,
gives us a better leverage for placing the myths of
mixed peoples in their proper places as regards the
• races composing those peoples. Still, we have far fewer
propositions to lay down than questions to ask : thus
to go no further afield than the well-known stories
attaching to the name of Heracles, how many of them
are Aryan, how many Semitic, and how many Aryan
and Semitic at one and the same time? That is the
sort of question which besets the student of Celtic
mythology at every step ; for the Celtic nations of
the present day are the mixed descendants of Aryan
invaders and the native populations which those Aryan
invaders found in possession. So the question thrusts

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 653

itself on the student, to which of these races a particular
myth, rite, or custom is to be regarded as originally
belonging. Take, for instance. Bran's colossal figure,
to which attention has already been called, pp. 552-3
above. Bran was too large to enter a house or go on
board a ship : is he to be regarded as the outcome of
Celtic imagination, or of that of a people that preceded
the Celts in Celtic lands? The comparison with the
Gaulish Tricephal would seem to point in the direction
of the southern seaboard of the Baltic (p. 553) : what
then?

The same kind of question arises in reference to the
Irish hero Cuchulainn : take, for instance, the stock
description of Cuchulainn in a rage. Thus when
angered he underwent strange distortions : the calves
of his legs came round to where his shins should have
been ; his mouth enlarged itself so that it showed his
liver and lungs swinging in his throat ; one of his eyes
became as small as a needle's, or else it sank back into
his head further than a crane could have reached, while
the other protruded itself to a corresponding length ;
every hair on his body became as sharp as a thorn, and
held on its point a drop of blood or a spark of fire. It
would be dangerous then to stop him from fighting,
and even when he had fought enough, he required for
his cooling to be plunged into three baths of cold
water ; the first into which he went would instantly
boil over, the second would be too hot for anybody else
to bear, and the third only would be of congenial
warmth. I do not ask whether that strange picture
betrays a touch of the solar brush, but I should be
very glad to know whether it can be regarded as an
Aryan creation or not.

It is much the same with matters other than mytho-
logical : take, for instance, the bedlamite custom of the

654 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

couvade \ which is presented to us in Irish Hterature in
the singular form of a cess, * suffering or indisposition,'
simultaneously attacking the braves of ancient Ulster.
We are briefly informed in the Book of the Dim Cow, fo.
6o% that the women and boys of Ulster were free from
it. So was any Ultonian, we are told, who happened to
be outside the boundaries of his country, and so were
Cuchulainn and his father, even when in Ulster. Any
one who was rash enough to attack an Ultonian warrior
during this his period of helplessness could not, it is
further stated, expect to live afterwards either prosper-
ously or long. The question for us, however, is this :
was the couvade introduced by the Aryan invaders of
Ireland, or are we rather to trace it to an earlier race ?
I should be, I must confess, inclined to the latter view,
especially as the couvade was known among the
Iberians of old, and among the ancient Corsicans ^. It
may, of course, have been both Aryan and Iberian, but
it will all the same serve as a specimen of the sort of
question which one has to try to answer.

* Two versions of a story to account for the Ultonian couvade have been
published with a translation into German, by Prof. WindiscTi, in the Berichte
der k. sacks. Gesellscliaft der IVissenschaften [phil.-hist. Classe) for 1884,
pp. 338 et seq. Sundry references to the couvade will also be found in my
Hibbert Lectures, where certain mythological suggestions made with refer-
ence to it require to be reconsidered. But when touching on this point it
occurred to me that the wholesale couvade of the Ultonian braves, at one
and the same time of the year, implied that the birth of Ultonian children,
or at any rate those of them that were to be reared, took place (in some
period or other of the history of their race) at a particular season of the
year, namely, about the beginning of the winter, that is when food would be
most abundant. I have since been confirmed in this view by perusing
Westermarck's work on the History of Human Marriage, and by reading
especially his second chapter entitled ' A Human Pairing Season in Primitive
Times.' For there I find a considerable body of instances in point, together
with a summary treatment of the whole question. But in the case of pro-
miscuity, such as originally prevailed doubtless at the Ultonian Court, the
question what men were to go into couvade could only be settled by the con-
finement of them all, wherein we have an alternative if not an additional
reason for a simultaneous couvade.

^ See Strabo, iii. 165, and Diodorus, v. 14.

xiij RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 655

Another instance, the race origin of which one would
like to ascertain, offers itself in the curious belief, that,
when a child is born, it is one of the ancestors of the
family come back to live again. Traces of this occur
in Irish hterature, namely, in one of the stories about
Cuchulainn. There we read to the following effect : —
The Ultonians took counsel on account of Cuchulainn,
because their wives and girls loved him greatly ; for
Cuchulainn had no consort at that time. This was
their counsel, namely, that they should seek for Cuchu-
lainn a consort pleasing to him to woo. For it was
evident to them that a man who has the consort of his
companionship with him would be so much the less
likely to attempt the ruin of their girls and to receive
the affection of their wives. Then, moreover, they were
anxious and afraid lest the death of Cuchulainn should
take place early, so they were desirous for that reason
to give him a wife in order that he might leave an heir;
for they knew that it was from himself that his rebirth
{athgein) would be. That is what one reads in the
eleventh-century copy of the ancient manuscript of the
Book of the Dim Cow, fo. 121'' ; and this atavistic belief,
which was touched upon in connexion with the trans-
formations discussed in the last chapter, I need
scarcely say, is well known elsewhere to the anthro-
pologist, as one will find on consulting the opening
pages of Dr. Tylor's second volume on Primitive Cul-
ture. He there mentions the idea as familiar to Ameri-
can Indians, to various African peoples, to the Maoris
and the aborigines of Australia, to Cheremiss Tartars
and Lapps. Among such nations the words of Don
Diegue to his victorious son, the Cid, could hardly fail to
be construed in a sort of literal sense when he exclaims:—

ton illustre audace

Fait bien revivre en toi les heros de ma race.

656 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Let us return to Cuchulainn, and note the statement,
that he and his father, Sualdaim, were exempt from the
couvade, which marks them out as not of the same
race as the Ultonians, that is to say, as the Fir Ulaid, or
' True Ultonians ' — presumably ancient inhabitants of
Ulster. Furthermore, we have an indication whence
his family had come, for Cuchulainn's first name was
Setanta Beg, ' the Little Setantian,' which points to the
coast of what is now Lancashire, as already indicated at
p. 385 above. Another thing which marks Cuchulainn
as of a different racial origin from the other Ultonians
is the belief of the latter, that his rebirth must be from
himself. The meaning of this remarkable statement is
that there were two social systems face to face in Ulster
at the time represented by the Cuchulainn story, and
that one of them recognized fatherhood, while the other
did not. Thus for Cuchulainn's rebirth to be from
himself, he must be the father of a child from whom
should descend a man who would be a rebirth or avatar
of Cuchulainn. The other system implied was one
which reckoned descent by birth alone ^ ; and the
Cuchulainn story gives one the impression that it con-
templated this system as the predominant one, while
the Cuchulainn family, with its reckoning of fatherhood,
comes in as an exception. At all events, that is how
I now understand a passage, the full significance of
which had till recently escaped me.

Allusion has already been made to the story of
Cuchulainn being himself a rebirth, namely, of Lug,
and the story deserves still further consideration in its
bearing on the question of race, to which the reader's
attention has been called. It is needless, however, to say
that there are extant fragments of more stories than

' For some more detailed remarks on the reckoning of descent by birth,
see T/ie Welsh People, pp. 36 et seq.

xii] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 657

one as to Cuchulainn's origin. Sometimes, as in the
Book of Leinster, fo. 119% he is called gein Loga, or
Lug's offspring, and in the epic tale of the Tain Bo
Cuailnge, Lug as his father comes from the Sid or
Faery to take Cuchulainn's place in the field, when the
latter was worn out with sleeplessness and toil. Lug
sings over him e'li Loga, or ' Lug's enchantment,' and
Cuchulainn gets the requisite rest and sleep ^ : this we
read in the Book of the Dim Cow, fo. 78^. In another
version of the story, Cuchulainn is an incarnation of
Lug : the narrative relates how a foster-son was accepted
by Dechtere, sister to Conchobar MacNessa, king of
Ulster. But her foster-son died youug, to the great
grief of Dechtere ; and her lamentations for him on
the day of his funeral having made her thirsty, she
inadvertently swallowed with her drink a diminutive
creature which sprang into her mouth. That night
she had a dream, in which a man informed her that
she was pregnant, that it was he who was in her womb,
that he had been her foster-son, and that he was Lug ;
also that when his birth should take place, the name
was to be Setanta. After an incident which I can only
regard as a clumsy attempt to combine the more primi-
tive legend with the story which makes him son of
Sualdaim, she gives birth to the boy, and he is duly
called Setanta ^ : that was Cuchulainn's first name.
Now compare this with what Dr. Tylor mentions in

* In Welsh eli means ' ointment,' probably so called from spells pronounced
over it when used as a remedy. In the Twrch Trwyth story (Oxford
Mabinogton, p. 138) one of Arthur's men bears the curious designation of
Reid6n nab Eli Atiter, which might be Englished ' R. son of the Restoring
Ointment,' unless one should rather say ' of the Restoring Enchantment.'

2 See the Book of the Dun Cow, fo. 128'', and Windisch's Irische Texte,
pp. 138-9. The rebirth of Lug as Cuchulainn has been touched upon in
my Hibbert Lectures, p. 431 ; but since then the whole question of rebirth has
been discussed at length in Nutt and Meyer's volumes entitled The Voyage of
Bran (London, 1895).

RHYS U U

658 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

the case of the Lapps, namely, that ' the future mother
was told in a dream what name to give her child, this
message being usually given her by the very spirit of
the deceased ancestor, who was about to be incarnate
in her^' If the mother got no such intimation in a
dream, the relatives of the child had to have recourse
to magic and the aid of the wise man, to discover the
name to be given to the child.

Here let it suffice to say, that the similarity is so
close between the Irish and the Lapp idea, and so
unlike anything known to have been Aryan, that it is
well worth bearing in mind. The behef in rebirth
generally seems to fit as a part of the larger belief in
the transmigration of souls which is associated with the
teachings of the ancient druids, a class of shamans or
medicine-men who were probably, as already hinted,
not of Celtic or Aryan origin ; and probably the beliefs
here in question were those of some non- Aryan people
of these islands, rather than of any Aryans who settled in
them. This view need hardly be regarded as incom-
patible with the fact, that Lug's name, genitive Loga,

' Tylor's PriniHive Culture, ii. 4, where he gives a reference to Gustav
Klemm's Culturgeschichte, in. 77, and Klemm's authority proves to be Jessen,
whose notes are given in a ' tractatus ' bound with Knud Leem De
Lapponibus Finmarchice (Copenhagen, 1767) : Jessen's words in point
read as follows, p. 33 : — Et baptisniuin qitidem, qricni ipsi Laugo, i. e. lava-
crunt appellabant, quod attiiiet, observanduni occuirit, fceuiittant Lapponicam,

jam partui vicinmn, atque m eo statu Sarakkce inipensius commendatatn, de
nonnnc, nascituro infanti imponetido, per uisownia plertimque a Jahniekio
quodant admonitam fuisse et simid de Jabmehio illo, qui, ut ipsi quident loqui
atnarunt, in hoc piicro resuscitandus foret, cdodant. Hujusmodi per insomnia

fadas admonitioncs niegost nuncuparunt Lappones. Si gravida mulier
a Jabmekio hac ratione edoda non fuerit, rccens iiaii infantis vel parenti vel
cognatis incitbuit, per to Myran, in tympana, securi vel balteo sitsceptum, vel
etiant Noaaidum consulcndo, explorare, quo potissimum nomine infans
appellandus esset. In the body of Leem's work, p. 497, one reads, that if
the child sickens or cries after baptism, this is taken to prove that the right
ancestor has not been found ; but as he must be discovered and his name
imposed on the child, resort is had to a fresh baptism to correct the effects
of the previous one.

xn] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 659

would seem to have meant light, and that Lug was
a sun-god, very possibly a Celtic sun-god : or more cor-
rectly speaking, that there was a series of Lugs, so to
say, or sun-gods, called in ancient Spain, Switzerland,
and on the banks of the Rhine, Lugoves \ For one is
sorely tempted to treat this much as a rescue from
the wreckage of the solar myth theory, as against
those who, having regard mainly to Lug's professional
skill and craft as described in Irish story, make of him a
kind of Hermes or Mercury. In other words, we have
either to regard a Celtic Lug as having become the
centre of certain non-Celtic legends, or else to suppose
neither Lug nor his name to be of Aryan origin at all.
It is hard to say which is the sounder view to take.

The next question which I wish to suggest is as to
the ethnology of the fairies ; but before coming to that,
one has to ask how the fairies have been evolved. The
idea of fairies, such as Welshmen have been familiar
with from their childhood, clearly involves elements of
two distinct origins. Some of those elements come
undoubtedly from the workshop of the imagination, as,
for example, the stock notion that their food and drink
are brought to the fairies by the mere force of wish-
ing, and without the ministration of servants ; or the
notion, especially prevalent in Arfon, that the fairies
dwell in a country beneath the lakes of Snowdon ; not
to mention the more general connexion of a certain
class of fairies with the world of waters, as indicated
in chapter vii. Add to this that the dead ancestor has
also probably contributed to our bundle of notions
about them ; but that contains also an element of
fact or something which may at any rate be con-
ceived as historical. Under this head I should place

' See Holder's Alt-celtischer Sprachschatz, s, v. Lugus ; also the index to
my Hibbert Lectures, s. v. ILeu, Lug, Lugoves.

U U 2

66o CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

the following articles of faith concerning them : the
sallowness of their skins and the smallness of their
stature, their dwelling underground, their disHke of iron,
and the comparative poverty of their homes in the
matter of useful articles of furniture, their deep-rooted
objection to the green sward being broken up by the
plough, the success of the fairy wife in attending to the
domestic animals and to the dairy, the limited range
generally of the fairies' ability to count; and lastly,
one may perhaps mention their using a language of
their own (p. 279), which would imply a time when the
little people understood no other, and explain why they
should be represented doing their marketing without
uttering a syllable to anybody (p. 161).

The attribution of these and similar characteristics to
the fairies can scarcely be all mere feats of fancy and
imagination : rather do they seem to be the result of
our ancestors projecting on an imaginary world a primi-
tive civilization through which tradition represented their
own race as having passed, or, more probably, a civiliza-
tion in which they saw, or thought they saw, another
race actually living. Let us recur for examples also
to the two lake legends which have just been mentioned
(p. 650) : in both of them a distinction is drawn between
the lake fairy's notion of bread and that of the men
and women of the country. To the fairy the latter's bread
appeared crimped or overbaked : possibly the back-
ward civilization, to which she was supposed to belong,
was content to support itself on some kind of unleavened
bread, if not rather on a fare which included nothing
deserving to be called bread at all. Witness Giraldus
Cambrensis' story of Eliodorus, in which bread is con-
spicuous by its absence, the nearest approach to it
being something of the consistency of porridge: see
p. 270 above. Then take another order of ideas : the

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 66r

young man in both lake legends lives with his mother
(pp. 3, 27): there is no father to advise or protect him :
he is in this respect on a level with Undine, who is the
protegee of her tiresome uncle, Kuhleborn. Seemingly,
he belongs to a primitive society where matriarchal
ideas rule, and where paternity is not reckoned ^ This
we are at liberty at all events to suppose to have been
the original, before the narrator had painted the mother
a widow, and given the picture other touches of his
later brush.

To speak, however, of paternity as merely not
reckoned is by no means to go far enough ; so here we
have to return to take another look at the imaginary
aspect of the fairies, to which a cursory allusion has
just been made. The reader will possibly recall the
sturdy smith of Ystrad Meurig, who would not reduce
the notions which he had formed of the fairies when he
was a child to conformity with those of a later genera-
tion around him. In any case, he will remember the
smith's statement that the fairies were all women : see
p. 245. The idea was already familiar to me as a Welsh-
man, though I cannot recollect how I got it. But the
smith's words brought to my mind at once the story of
Condla Ruad or the Red, one of the fairy tales first
recorded in Irish literature (p. 291). There the damsel
Vv^ho takes Condla away in her boat of glass to the realm
of the Everliving sings the praises of that delectable
country, and uses, among others, the following words,
which occur in the Book of the Dun Cow, fo. 120 : —

Ni fil cenel and nammd acht nmd ociis ingcna"^.
There is no race there but women and maidens alone.

* For more on this subject see the chapter on the Pictish question in The
Welsh People, pp. 36-74.

* It is right to say that the story represents the fairies as hving under the
rule of a ri, a title usually rendered by ' king ' ; but ri (genitive rig-) was
probably at one time applicable to either sex, just as we find Gaulish names

662 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

Now what people could have come by the idea of
a race of women only ? Surely no people who con-
sidered that they themselves had fathers : it must have
been some community so low in the scale of civilization
as never to, have had any notion whatsoever of paternity:
it is their ignorance that would alone render possible
the notion of a race all women. That this was a matter
of belief in the past of many nations, is proved by the
occurrence of widely known legends about virgin
mothers ^ ; not to mention that it has been lately estab-
lished, that there are savages who to this day occupy
the low place here indicated in the scale of civilization.
Witness the evidence of Spencer and Gillen in their
recently published work on The Native Tribes of Central
Australia, and also what Frazer, author of The Golden
Bough, says of a passage in point, in the former, as
follows : —

' Thus, in the opinion of these savages, every con:
ception is what we are wont to call an immaculate
conception, being brought about by the entrance into
the mother of a spirit apart from any contact with
the other sex. Students of folklore have long been
familiar with notions of this sort occurring in the
stories of the birth of miraculous personages, but this
is the first case on record of a tribe who believe in
immaculate conception as the sole cause of the birth
of every human being who comes into the world. A
people so ignorant of the most elementary of natural

like Biturix and Visurix borne by women. The wonder, however, is that
such a line as that just quoted has not been edited out of the verses long
ago, just as one misses any equivalent for it in Joyce's English expansion of
the story in his Old Celtic Romances, pp. 106-11. Compare, however, the
Land of the Women in the Voyage of Maildnn (Joyce, pp. 152-6), and in
Meyer and Nutt's Voyage of Bran, i. 30-3.

' This conclusion has been given in a note at the foot of p. 37 of The
Welsh People ; but for a variety of instances to illustrate it see Hartland's
chapters on Supernatural Birth in his Legend of Perseus.

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 663

processes may well rank at the very bottom of the
savage scale ^'

Nevertheless, it is to some population in that low
position, in the remote prehistory of this country, that
one is to trace the belief that the fairies were all women.
It is to be regarded as a position distinctly lower than
that of the Ultonians in the time of Cuchulainn ; for the
couvade seems to me to argue a notion of paternity —
perhaps, in their case, as clear a notion of paternity as
was possible for a community which was not quite out
of the promiscuous stage of society.

The neo-Celtic nations of these islands consist,
speaking roughly, of a mixture of the invading Celts
with the earlier inhabitants whom the Celts found in
possession. These two or more groups of peoples
may have been in very different stages of civiliza-
tion when they first came in contact with one another.
They agreed doubtless in many things, and perhaps,
among others, in cherishing an inherited reluctance
to disclose their names, but the Celts as Aryans
were never without the decimal system of counting.
Like the French, the Celtic nations of the present day
show a tendency, more or less marked, to go further
and count by scores instead of by tens. But the
Welsh are alone among them in having, in certain

' See Frazer's article on ' The Origin of Totemism ' in the Foiiniglitly Review
for April, 1899, p. 649. The passage to which it refers will be found at
p. 265 of Spencer and Gillen's volume, where one reads as follows : —
'Added to this we have amongst the Arunta, Luritcha, and Ilpirra tribes,
and probably also amongst others such as the Warramunga, the idea firmly
held that the child is not the direct result of intercourse, that it may come
without this, which merely, as it were, prepares the mother for the
reception and birth also of an already-formed spirit child who inhabits one
of the local totem centres. Time after time we have questioned them on
this point, and always received the reply that the child was not the direct
result of intercourse.' It is curious to note how readily the Australian
notion here presented would develop into that of the Lapps, as given at
p. 658 from Jessen's notes.

664 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

instances, gone back from counting by tens to count-
ing by fives, which they do when they count between
ID and 20: for 16, 17, 18, and 19 are in Welsh i on
15, 2 on 15, 3 on 15, and 4 on 15 respectively ;
and similarly with 13 and 14 ^ We have seen how
the lake fairy reckoned by fives (pp. 8, 418) all the
live stock she was to have as her dowry; and one
otherwise notices that the fairies deal invariably in the
simplest of numbers. Thus if you wish, for example,
to find a person who has been led away by them,
ten to one you have to go ' this day next year ' to the
spot where he disappeared. Except in the case of the
alluring light of the full moon, it is out of the question
to reckon months or weeks, though it is needless to say
that to reckon the year correctly would have been in
point of fact far more difficult ; but nothing sounds
simpler than ' this day next year.' In that simple
arithmetic of the fairies, then, we seem to have a trace
of a non-Aryan race, that is to say, probably of some
early inhabitants of these islands.

Unfortunately, the language of those inhabitants
has died out, so that we cannot appeal to its numerals
directly ; and the next best course to adopt is to take
as a sort of substitute for their language that of possible
kinsmen of a pre-Celtic race in this country. Now
the students of ethnology, especially those devoted to the
investigation of skulls and skins, tell us that we have
among us, notably in Wales and Ireland, living repre-
sentatives of a dark-haired, long-skulled race of the

' This feature of Welsh has escaped M. de Charencey, in his instructive
letter on ' Numeration basque et celtique,' in No. 48 of the Bulletin
de la Soc. de Linguistique de Paris, pp. cxv-cxix. In passing, I may be
allowed to mention a numerical curiosity which occurs in Old Irish : it
has probably an important historical significance. I refer to the word for
* seven men ' occurring sometimes as morfeser, which means, as it were,
a magnus seviratus or ' big sixer.'

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 665

same description as one of the types which occur, as
they allege, among the Basque populations of the
Pyrenees. We turn accordingly to Basque, and what
do we find ? Why, that the first five numerals in that
language are bat, bi, iru, laii, host, all of which appear to
be native ; but when we come to the sixth numeral we
have sei, which looks like an Aryan word borrowed
from Latin, Gaulish, or some related tongue. The case
is much the same with 'seven,' for that is in Basque
zazpi, which is also probably an Ar3^an loan-word.
Basque has native words, zortzi and bederatzi, for eight
and nine, but they are longer than the first five, and
appear to be of a later formation affecting, in common
with sei and zazpi, the termination i. I submit, there-
fore, that here we have evidence of the former existence
of a people in the West of Europe who at one time
only counted as far as five. Some of the early peoples
of the British Isles may have been on the same level,
so that our notions about the fairies have probably been
derived, to a greater or less extent, from ideas formed
by the Celts concerning those non-Celtic, non-Aryan
natives of whose country they took possession.

As regards my appeal to the authority of craniology,
I have to confess that it is made with a certain amount
of reservation, since the case is far less simple than it
looks at first sight. Thus, in August, 1891, the Cam-
brian Archaeological Association, including among' them
Professor Sayce, visited the south-west of Ireland.
During our pleasant excursions in Kerry, the question
of race was one of our constant topics ; and Professor
Sayce was reminded by what he saw in Ireland of his
visit to North Africa, especially the hilly regions of the
country inhabited by the Berbers. Among other things,
he used to say that if a number of Berbers from the
mountains were to be brought to an Irish village and

666 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

clad as Irishmen, he felt positive that he should not be
able to tell them from the Irishmen themselves, such
as we saw on our rambles in Kerry. This struck me as
all the more remarkable, since his reference was to fairly
tall, blue-eyed men whose hair could not be called black.
On the other hand, owing perhaps to ignorance and
careless ways of looking at things around me, I am a
little sceptical as to the swarthy long-skulls : they did
not seem to meet us at every turn in Ireland ; and as
for Wales, which I know as well as most people do,
I cannot in my ignorance of craniology say with any
confidence that I have ever noticed vast numbers of
that type. I should like, however, to see the heads of
some of the singers whom I have noticed at our Eisted-
fodau at Cardiff, Aberdare, and Swansea, placed under
the hands of an experienced skull-man. For I have
long suspected that we cannot regard as of Aryan
origin the vocal talent so general in Wales, and so
conspicuous in our choirs of working people as to
astonish all the great musicians who have visited our
national festival. Beyond all doubt, race has not a little
to do with the artistic feelings : a short-skull may be as
unmusical, for example, as I am ; but has anybody in
this country ever known a narrow long-skull to be the
reverse of unmusical ? or has any one ever considered
how few clergymen of the tall, fair-haired, blue-eyed
type have been converted to the ritualistic and aesthetic
movement in the Church of England ?

As it seems to me that the bulk of the Welsh people
would have to be described as short-skulls, it would be
very gratifying to see those who are wont to refer
freely to the dark-complexioned long-skulls of Wales
catch a respectable number of specimens. I trust there
are plenty to be found ; and of course I do not care how
they are taken, whether it be by an instantaneous pro-

xii] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 667

cess of photography or in the meshes of some anthropo-
metric sportsman, hke Dr. Beddoe. Let them be
secured anyhow, so that one may rest assured that the
type is still numerically safe, and be able to judge with
one's own eyes how heads long and swarthy look on
the shoulders of living Welshmen, We might then be
in a position also to compare with them the prevalent
description of fairy changehngs; for when the fairies
steal nice, blond babies, they usually place in their stead
their own aged-looking brats with short legs, sallow
skins, and squeaky voices. Unfortunately for me, all
the adult changelings of whom I happen to have heard
any account had died some years before I began to turn
my attention to the population of Faery, with the ex-
ception, perhaps, of one whose name I obtained under
the seal of secrecy. It was that of the wife of a farmer
living near Nefyn, in West Carnarvonshire. It was
whispered that she was a changeling, so I am inchned
to regard her as no other than one of the representa-
tives of the same aboriginal stock to which one might
conjecture some of her neighbours also to belong ; she
ought to be an extreme specimen of the type. It is to
be hoped that the photographer and his anthropometric
brother have found her out in time and in good
humour ; but it is now many years since I heard of her.
To return again to the fairies, some of them are
described as more comely and good-looking than the
rest (pp. 83, 250), but the fairy women are always
pictured as fascinating, though their offspring as
changelings are as uniformly presented in the light of
repulsive urchins ; but whole groups of the fairy popu-
lation are sometimes described as being as ugly of face
as they were thievish in disposition— those, for instance,
of ILanfabon, in Glamorganshire (p. 262). There is one
district, however, which is an exception to the tenor

668 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

of fairy physiognomy : it is that of the Pennant
neighbourhood, in Carnarvonshire, together with the
hills and valleys, roughly speaking, from Cwm Strattyn
to ILwytmor and from Drws y Coed to Dolbenmaen.
The fairies of that tract are said to have been taller
than the others, and characterized by light or even flaxen
hair, together with eyes of clear blue : see pp. 89,
93-7, 105-8. Nor is that all, for we are told that they
would not let a person of dark complexion come near
them (p. 96). The other fairies, when kidnapping, it
is true, preferred the blond infants of other people to
their own swarthy brats, which, perhaps, means that
it was a policy of their people to recruit itself with
men of the superior physique of the more powerful
population around them. The supposed fairy ances-
tress of the people of the Pennant Valley bears, in the
stories in point, such names as Penelope, Bella, Pehsha,
and Sibi, while her descendants are still taunted with
their descent— a quarrel which, within living memory,
used to be fought out with fists at the fairs at Penmorfa
and elsewhere. This seems to indicate a comparatively
late settlement ^ in the district of a family or group of
families from without, and an origin, therefore, some-
what similar to that of the Simychiaid and Cowperiaid
(p. 67) of a more eastern portion of the same count}',
rather than anything deserving to be considered with
the rest of the annals of Faery. Passing by this oasis,
then, such snap-shot photographs as I have been able
to take, so to speak, of fairyland cleared of the glamour
resting on its landscape, seem to disclose to the eye a
swarthy population of short stumpy men occupying the

' The non-Welsh names of the fairy ancestress ought possibly to lead one
to discover the origin of that settlement ; and a careful study perhaps of
the language of the Bdsiaid or Bellisians, if their Welsh has any dialectic
peculiarities, might throw further light on their past.

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 669

most inaccessible districts of our country. They appear
to have cared more for soap than clothing^ and they Hved
on milk taken once a day, when they could get it. They
probably fished and hunted, and kept domestic animals,
including, perhaps, the pig ; but they depended largely
on what they could steal at night or in misty weather.
Their thieving, however, was not resented, as their visits
were beheved to bring luck and prosperity (p. 251).
Their communities formed as it were islands, owing to
the country round about them having been wrested from
them by later comers of a more warlike disposition and
provided with better weapons. But the existence of
the scattered groups of the fairies was in no danger
of coming to a violent end : they were safe in conse-
quence of the superstitious beliefs of their stronger
neighbours, who probably regarded them as formidable
magicians, powerful, among other things, to cause or to
cure disease as they pleased. Such, without venturing
to refresh my memory by perusing what has been
written about dwarf races in other parts of the world,
are the impressions made on my mind in the course of
analysing and sifting the folklore materials crowded into
this volume. That applies, of course, in so far only as
regards the fairies in their character of a real people
as distinguished from them as creatures of the imagina-
tion. But, as I have no wish to earn the displeasure of
my literary friends, let me hasten to say that I acknow-
ledge the latter, the creatures of the imagination, to
be the true fairies, the admiration of one's childhood and
the despair of one's later years : the other folk— the
aborigines whom I have been trying to depict — form only

» Our stories frequently delight in giving the fairy women fine dresses
and long trains ; but I would rely more on the Ystrad Meurig smith's
account (p. 245), and the case of the Pennant fairy who tears to shreds the
gown offered her (p. 109).

670 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

a sort of substratum, a kind of background to the fairy
picture, which I should be the last man to wish to mar.

It is needless to say that we have no trace of any
fairies approaching the minute dimensions of Shake-
speare's Queen Mab ; for, after all, our fairies are mostly
represented as not extravagantly unlike other people
in personal appearance — not so unhke, in fact, that
other folk might not be mistaken for them now and
then as late as the latter part of the fifteenth century.
Witness the following passage from Sir John Wynne's
History of the Gwydir Family, p. 74 : —

' Haveing purchased this lease, he removed his dwell-
ing to the castle of Dolwydelan, which at that time was
in part thereof habitable, where one Howell ap Jevan
ap Rys Gethin, in the beginning of Edward the Fourth
his raigne, captaine of the countrey and an outlaw, had
dwelt. Against this man David ap Jenkin rose, and
contended with him for the sovreignety of the countrey ;
and being superiour to him, in the end he drew a
draught for him, and took him in his bed at Penanmen
with his concubine, performing by craft, what he could
not by force, and brought him to Conway Castle. Thus,
after many bickerings betweene Howell and David ap
Jenkin, he being too weake, was faigne to flie the
countrey, and to goe to Ireland, where he was a yeare
or thereabouts. In the end he returned in the summer
time, haveing himselfe, and all his followers clad in
greene, who, being come into the countrey, he dis-
persed here and there among his friends, lurking by
day, and walkeing in the night for feare of his adver-
saries ; and such of the countrey as happened to have
a sight of him and his followers, said they were the
fairies, and soe ran away.'

But what has doubtless helped, above all other things,
to perpetuate the belief in the existence of fairies may

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 671

be said to be the popular association with them of the
circles in the grass, commonly known in English as fairy
rings. This phenomenon must have answered for ages
the purpose for our ancestors, practically speaking, of
ocular demonstration, as it still does no doubt in many
a rustic neighbourhood.

The most common name for the fairies in Welsh is
y Tylwyth Teg, ' the Fair or Beautiful Family ' ; but in
South Cardiganshire we have found them called Plant
Rhys-Dwfn, ' the Children of Rhys the Deep '(pp. 151, 158),
while in Gwent and Morgannwg they are more usually
known sisBendtfhy Mamatt,' the Blessing of the Mothers'
(p. 174). Our fourteenth century poet, D. ab Gwilym,
uses the first-mentioned term, Tylwyth Teg, in poem
xxxix, and our prose literature has a word corr, cor in
the sense of a dwarf, and corves for a she dwarf. The
old Cornish had also cor, which in Breton is written
korr^, with a feminine korrez, and among the other
derivatives one finds korrik, ' a dwarf, a fairy, a wee little
sorcerer,' and korrigez or korrigan, ' a she dwarf, a fairy
woman, a diminutive sorceress.' The use of these words
in Breton recalls the case of the cor, called Rhudlwm or

^ The difference between Mod. Welsh cor and Breton Morris one of spelling,
for the reformed orthography of Welsh words only doubles the r where it is
dwelt on in the accented syllable of a longer word : in other terms, when
that syllable closes with the consonant and the next syllable begins with it.
Thus fo*" has, as its derivatives, cdr-rach, 'a dwarf,' plural co-rdchod, cor-ryn,
' a male dwarf,' plural co-iynnod. Some of these enter into place-names,
such as Cwm Corryn near ILanaelhaearn (p. 217) and Cwm Corryn draining
into the Vale of Neath ; so possibly with Corwen for Cor-waen, in the sense of
' the Fairies' Meadow.' Cor and corryn are also used for the spider, as mgwe'r
cor or gwe'r corryn, 'a spider's web,' the spider being so called on account of
its spinning, an occupation in which the fairies are represented likewise
frequently engaged ; not to mention that gossamer {gwawn) is also some-
times regarded as a product of the fairy loom (p. 103). The derivation of
cor is not satisfactorily cleared up : it has been conjectured to be related
to a Med. Irish word cert, ' small, little,' and Latin curius, ' shortened or
mutilated.' To me this means that the origin of the word still remains to be
discovered.

672 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

else Eidilig, teaching his magic to Cotl, son of Cottfrewi :
see pp. 326, 503, 505. Then we have uncanny dwarfs in
the romances, such, for example, as the rude cor in the
service of Edern ab Nud, as described in French in
Chretien's romance of Erecet Enide and in Welsh in that
of Gereint vab Erbin, also the cor and corres who figure
in the story of Peredur. The latter had belonged to
that hero's father and mother till the break-up of the
family, when the dwarfs went to Arthur's Court, where
they lived a whole year without speaking to anybody.
When, however, Peredur made his rustic appearance
there, they hailed him loudly as the chief of warriors
and the flower of knighthood, which brought on
them the wrath of Cai, on whom they were eventually
avenged by Peredur. In the case ^ of both Edern and
Peredur we find the dwarfs loyally interested in the
fortunes of their masters and their masters' friends. With
them also the shape-shifting Menw, though not found
placed in the same unfavourable light, is probably to be
ranged, as one may gather from his name and his role
of wizard scout for Arthur's men (p. 510). In the like
attachment on the part of the fairies, which was at times
liable to develop into devotedness of an embarrassing
nature (p. 250), we seem to have one of the germs of the
idea of a household fairy or banshee, as illustrated by
the case of the ugly wee woman in the Pantannas
legend (p. 188); and it seems natural to regard the
interested voices in the Kenfig legend, and other stories
of the same kind (p. 452), as instances of amalgamating
the idea of a fairy with that of an ancestral person.

At all events, we have obtained something to put
by the side of the instances already noticed of the fairy

* For Edern's dwarf see Foerster's Erec, lines 146-274 and passim, the
Oxford Mabinogion, pp. 248-61, and Guest's trans., ii. 73-92 ; and for
Peredur's the latter books, pp. 197-9 and i. 304-7 respectively.

xu] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 673

girl who gives, against her will at first, her services in
the dairy of her captor (pp. 45, 87) ; of the other fairy who
acts as a nurse for a family in the Pennant Valley, till
she is asked to dress better (p. 109) ; and of Bwca'r Trwyn
who works willingly and well, both at the house and in
the field, till he has tricks played on him (pp. 593-6). To
make this brief survey complete, one has to mention
the fairies who used to help Eilian with her spinning
(pp. 21 1-3), and not to omit those who were found to
come to the rescue of a woman in despair and to assist
her on the condition of getting her baby. The motive here
is probably not to be confounded with that of the fairies
who stealthily exchanged babies : the explanation seems
in this case to be that the fairies, or some of the fairies,
were once regarded as cannibals, which is countenanced
by such a story as that of CanrigBwt/Canrig the Stumpy.'
At E^anberis the latter is said to have lived beneath the
huge stone called y Groirilech, 'the Dolmen,' opposite
Cwmglas and near the high-road to the Pass. When the
man destined to dispatch her came, she was just finishing
her dinner off a baby's flesh. There are traces of a similar
story in another district, for a writer who published in
the year 1802 uses the following words : — * There was
lately near Cerrig y Drudion, in Merionethshire, a sub-
terraneous room composed of large stones, which was
called Carchar Cynric Rwth, i. e. ** The Prison of Cynric
Rwth," which has been taken notice of by travellers/
Cynric Rwth may be rendered * Cynric the Greedy or
Broad-mouthed.' A somewhat similar ogress is located
by another story on the high ground at Bwlch y Rhiw
Felen, on the way from ILangotten to ILandegla, and she
is represented by the local tradition as contemporary
with Arthur \ I am inclined to think the Cwmglas crom-

' The story of Canrig (or Cantrig) Bwt is current at ILanberis, but I do
not recollect seeing it in print : I had it years ago from my father-in-law.
RHYS X X

674 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

lech natural rather than artificial ; but I am, however,
struck by the fact that the fairies are not unfrequently
located on or near ancient sites, such as seem to be
Corwrion (pp. 57, 526), the margin of ILyn Irdyn (pp. 148,
563), Bryn y Pibion (pp. 212-4), Dinltaen (p. 227), Carn
Bodiian (p. 227), on which there are, I am told, walls and
hut foundations similar to those which I have recently
seen on Carn Fadrun in the same district, Moedin
camp (p. 245), and, perhaps, Ynys Geinon Rock and the
immediate vicinity of Craig y Nos, neither of which,
however, have I ever visited (p. 254), Local acquaint-
ance with each fairy centre would very possibly enable
one to produce a list that would be suggestive.

In passing one may point out that the uncanny dwarf
of Celtic story would seem to have served, in one way
or another, as a model for other dwarfs in the French
romances and the literatures of other nations that came
under the influence of those romances, such as that of
the English. But the subject is too large to be dealt with
here ; so I return to the word cor, in order to recall to
the reader's mind the allusion made, at p. 196, to a certain
people called Coranneit or Coranyeit, pronounced in later
Welsh Coraw/a/(a^, 'Corannians.' They come in the Adven-
ture of ILud and ILevelys, and there they have ascribed to
them one of the characteristics of consummate magicians,
namely, the power of hearing any word that comes in
contact with the wind ; so it was, we are told, impossible

The statement as to Carchar Cynric Rwth comes from William Williams'
Observations on the Snowdon Mountains (London, 1802). The Bwlch y Rhiw
Felen legend was read by me to the British Archaeological Association at its
meeting at ILangotten, and it was printed in its Journal ior December, 1878.
It is right to say that the ILangoiten story calls the woman a giantess, but
I attach no importance to that, as the picture is blurred and treated in part
allegorically. Lastly, the use of the word carchar, ' prison,' in the term
Carchar Cynric Rwth recalls Carchar Oeth ac Anoeth, or ' the Prison of Oeth
and Anoeth,' p. 619 above : the word would appear to have been selected
because in both cases the structure was underground.

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 675

to harm them. ILud, however, was advised to circumvent
them in the following manner :— he was to bruise certain
insects in water and sprinkle the water on the Coran-
nians and his own people indiscriminately, after calling
them together under the pretence of making peace
between them ; for the sprinkling would do no harm to
his own subjects, while it would kill the others. This
unholy water proved effective, and the Corannians all
perished. Now the magic power ascribed to them, and
the method of disposing of them, combine to lend them
a fabulous aspect, while their name, inseparable as it
seems from cor, ' a dwarf,' warrants us in treating them
as fairies, and in regarding their strange characteristics
as induced on a real people. If we take this view, that
Coraniaid was the name of a real people, we are at
liberty to regard it as possible, that their name suggested
to the Celts the word cor for a dwarf, rather than that
cor has suggested the name of the Corannians. In either
case, I may mention that Welsh writers have sometimes
thought — and they are probably right — that we have a
closely related word in the name of Ptolemy's Coritani
or Coritavi. He represents the people so called as
dwelling, roughly speaking, between the Trent and
Norfolk, and possessed of the two towns of Lindum,
* Lincoln,' and Ratce (p. 547), supposed to have been
Leicester. There we should have accordingly to sup-
pose the old race to have survived so long and in such
numbers, that the Celtic lords of southern Britain called
the people of that area by a name meaning dwarfs.
There also they may be conjectured to have had quiet
from invaders from the Continent, because of the inac-
cessible nature of the fens, and the lack of inviting
harbours on the coast from the country of the Iceni up
to the neighbourhood of the Humber. How far their
territory extended inland from the fens and the sea one

X X 2

676 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

cannot say, but it possibly took in one-half of what is
now Northamptonshire, with the place called Pytchley,
from an older Pihtes Lea, meaning the Meadow of the
Pict, or else of a man named Pict. In any case it
included Croyland in the fens between Peterborough
and the Wash. It was there, towards the end of the
seventh century, that St. Guthlac built his cell on the side
of an ancient mound or tumulus, and it was there he was
assailed by demons who spoke Bryttisc or Brythonic,
a language which the saint knew, as he had been an
exile among Brythons. For this he had probably not
to travel far ; and it is remarkable that his father's cog-
nomen or surname was Penwall, which we may regard
as approximately the Brythonic for ' Wall's End.' That
is to say, he was ' So-and-so of the Wall's End,' and
had got to be known by the latter designation instead
of his own nomen, which is not recorded, for the
reason, possibly, that it was so Brythonic as not to
admit of being readily reduced into an Anglian or Latin
form. It is not quite certain that he belonged to the
royal race of Mercia, whose genealogy, however, boasts
such un-English names as Pybba, Penda, and Peada;
but the life ^ states, with no little emphasis, that he was
a man whose pedigree included the most noble names
of illustrious kings from the ancient stock of Icel : that
is, he was one of the Iclingas or Icklings ^. Here
one is tempted to perpetrate a little glottologic alchemy

' See the Acta Sanctonim, A.pv\\ 11, where one finds published the Latin
life written by Felix not long after Guthlac's death. See also an Anglo-
Saxon version, which has been edited with a translation by Ch. W. Goodwin
(^Lond n, 1848).

^ In connexion with them Mr. Bullock Hall reminds me of Icklingham,
in West Suffolk ; and there seem to be several Ickletons, and an Ickleford,
most or all of them, I am told, on the Icknield Way. The name Icel, whose
genitive Ides is the form in the original life, has probably been inferred
from the longer word Iclingas, and inserted in due course in the Mercian
pedigree, where it occupies the sixth place in descent from Woden.

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 677

by changing / into n, and to suppose Iclingas the form
taken in Enghsh by the name of the ancient people of
the Iceni. In any case, nothing could be more reason-
able to suppose than that some representatives of
the royal race of Prasutagus and Boudicca, escaping the
sword of the Roman, found refuge among the Cori-
tanians at the time of the final defeat of their own people :
it is even possible that they were already the ruling
family there. At all events several indications con-
verge to show that communities speaking Brythonic
were not far off, to wit, the p names in the Mercian
genealogy, Guthlac's father's surname, Guthlac's exile
among Brythons, and the attack on him at Croyland by
Brythonic speaking foes. Portions of the Coritanian
territory were eminently fitted by nature to serve as
a refuge for a broken people with a belated language :
witness as late as the eleventh century the stand made
in the Isle of Ely by Hereward against the Norman
conqueror and his mail-clad knights ^

Among the speakers of Goidelic in Ireland and the
Highlands of Scotland the fairies take their designation
chiefly from a word sid or siih (genitive side or sida),
which one may possibly consider as of a common
origin with the Latin word sedes, and as originally mean-
ing a seat or settlement, but it sooner or later came to
signify simply an abode of the fairies, whence they were
called in Medieval Irish aes side, 'fairy io\k' fer side,
' a fairy man,' and beti side, ' a fairy woman or banshee.'

' Since the above was written, Dr. Ripley's important work on the Races
of Europe (London, 1900) has reached me, but too late to study. I notice,
however, that he speaks of an island of ancient population to the north of
London and extending over most of the counties of Hertford, Buckingham,
Bedford, Rutland, and Northampton, as far as those of Cambridge and
Lincoln. A considerable portion of this area must have been within the
boundaries of Coritanian territory, and it is now characterized, according to
him, by nigrescence, short stature, and rarity of suicide, such as remind him
of Wales and Cornwall : see his maps and pp. 322, 328, 521.

678 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

By the side of sid, an adjective side, ' of or belonging
to the s/d,' appears to have been formed, so that they are
found also called simply side, as in Fiacc's Hymn, where
we are told that before the advent of St. Patrick the
pagan tribes of Erin used to worship side or fairies ^
Borrowed from this, or suggested by it^, we have in
Welsh Caer Sidi, * the Fortress of the Fairies,' which is
mentioned twice in the Book ofTaliessin ^. It first occurs
at the end of poem xiv, where we have the following
lines, which recall Irish descriptions of Tir nan Og
or the Land of the Young : —

Ys kyweir vyg kadeir ygkaer sidi.

APys plabd heint a heneint a no yndi.

Ys gwyr tnana6yt a phryderi.

Teir oryan y am tan agan recdi.

Ac am y banneii ffrydyeti gdcilgi.

Ar ffynnhadn ffr6yihla6n yssyd oduchti.

Ys whegach nor g6in g6yn yllyn yndi.

Perfect is my seat in the fort of Sidi,

Nor pest nor age plagues him who dwells therein :

Manawydan and Pryderi know it.

Three organs play before it about a fire.

Around its corners Ocean's currents flow,

And above it is the fertile fountain,

And sweeter than white wine is the drink therein.

The wine is elsewhere mentioned, but the arrangement
of the organs around a fire requires explanation, which
1 cannot give. The fortress is on an island, and in
poem XXX of the Book of Taliessin we read of Arthur
and his men sailing thither in his ship Prydwen : the
poem is usually called the ' Spoils of Annwn,' and the
lines in point run thus: —

Bu kyweir karchar gSeir ygkaer sidi,
Tr6y ebostol p6yll aphrydcri.

' See Fiacc's Hymn in Stokes' Goidelica, p. 127, 1. 41.

^ The Welsh passages unfortunately fail to show whether it was pro-
nounced sidi or sidi : should it prove the latter, I should regard it as the
Irish word borrowed.

^ Skene's Four Ancient Books of Wales, ii. 153-5, i8i-a.

xii] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 679

Neb kyn noc ef nyt aeth idi.
Yr gad6yn tromlas kywirivas ae ketwi.
Arac preideu annSfyn tost yt geni.
Ac yt ura6t parahaSt ynbard wedi.
Tri lloneit prytwen yd aetliam ni idi.
Nam seith ny dyrreith o gaer sidi.

Perfect was the prison of Gwair in Caer Sidi,
Thanlcs to Pwytt and Pryderi's emissary.
Before him no one entered into it,
To the heavy, dark chain held by a faithful youth ;
And before the spoils of Annwn sorely he sang,
And thenceforth remains he till doom a bard.
Three freights of Prydwen went we thither,
But only seven returned from Caer Sidi.

The incidents in these Hnes are mostly unintelHgible
to me, but the incarceration of Gweir or Gwair, together
with other imprisonments, including that of Arthur in
Caer Oeth and Anoeth (p. 619), are mentioned also in the
Triads : see i. 50, ii. 7, 49, iii. 61. It is not improbable
that the legend about Gwair located his prison on Lundy,
as the Welsh name of that island appears to have been
Ynys Wair, ' Gwair's Isle.' Pwytt and Pryderi did not
belong to Annwn, nor did Pryderi's friend Manawydan ;
but the Mabinogi of Pwytt relates how for a whole year
Pwytt exchanged crown and kingdom with Arawn king
of Annwn, from whom he obtained the first breed of
domestic pigs for his own people (pp. 69, 525).

In the lowlands of Scotland, together with the Orkneys
and Shetlands, the Picts have to a certain extent taken
the place of our fairies, and they are colloquially called
Pechts. Now judging from the remains there ascribed
to the Pechts, their habitations were either wholly under-
ground or else so covered over with stones and earth
and grass as to look like natural hillocks and to avoid
attracting the attention of strangers. This was helped
by making the entrance very low and as inconspicuous
as possible. But one of the most remarkable things about
these sids is that the cells within them are frequently

68o CELTIC FOLKLORE

[CH.

SO small as to prove beyond doubt, that those who
inhabited them were of a remarkably short stature,
though it is demonstrated by the weight of the stones
used, that the builders were not at all lacking in bodily
strength \ Here we have, accordingly, a small people
like our own fairies. In Ireland one of the most famous
kings of the fairies was called Mider of Bri Leith, where
he resided in a sid or mound in the neighbourhood of
Ardagh, in the county of Longford ; and thither Irish
legend represents him carrying away Etain, queen of
Eochaid Airem, king of Ireland during a part of Con-
chobar MacNessa's time. Now Eochaid was for a
whole year unable to find where she was, but his druid,
Dalan, wrote Ogams and at last found it out. Eochaid
then marched to Bri Leith, and began to demolish
Mider's sid, whereupon Mider was eventually so
frightened that he sent forth the queen to her husband,
who then went his way, leaving the mound folk to
digest their wrath. For it is characteristic of them that
they did not fight, but chose to bide their time for
revenge. In this instance it did not arrive till long
after Eochaid's day^. I may add that Etain was herself
one of the side or fairies; and one of Mider's reasons
for taking her away was, that she had been his wife in
a previous stage of existence. Now it is true that the
fairy Mider is described as resembling the other heroes
of Irish story, in having golden yellow hair and bright

' For more about Picts and Pechts see some most instructive papers
recently published by Mr. David MacRitchie, such as 'Memories of the
c /• /". ^'''**"'' ^'^'^■?"«''->'' last January, ' Underground Dwellings' in
Scotttsh Notes and Queries, last March, and ' Fairy Mounds ' in the Antiquary,
last February and March.

= See p. 424 above, where, however, the object of the Ogams written on
four tw.gs of yew has been misconceived. I think now that they formed
Simply so many letters of inquiry addressed by Dalan to other druids in
different parts of Ireland. We seem to have here a ray of light on the
early history of Ogam writing.

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 68 1

blue eyes \ but he differs completely from them in being
no warrior but a great wizard; and though he is not said
to have been of small stature, the dwarfs were not far off.
For in describing the poet Atherne, who was notorious
for his stinginess (p. 635), the story-teller emphasizes
his words by representing him taking from Mider
three of his dwarfs and stationing them around his
own house, in order that their truculent looks and rude
words might drive away anybody who came to seek
hospitahty or to present an unwelcome request ^, a role
which recalls that of Edern ab Nud's dwarf already
mentioned (p. 672). Here the Irish word used is corr,
which is probably to be identified with the Brythonic
cor, ' a dwarf,' though the better known meaning of corr
in Irish is ' crane or heron.' From the former also is
hardly to be severed the Irish corrgtdm'gh, ' sorcerers,'
and corrguinacht^, or the process of cursing to which the
corrguinigh resorted, as, for instance, when Nede. called
forth the fatal blisters on Caier's face (p. 632). The
role would seem exactly to suit the little people, who
were consummate magicians.

Let me for a moment leave the little people, in order
to call attention to another side of this question of race.
It has recently been shown * by Professor J. Morris
Jones, of the University College of North Wales, that
the non-Aryan traits of the syntax of our insular Celtic
point unmistakably to that of old Egyptian and Berber,

* See the Book of the Dun Cow, fo. 130''.
^ See the Book of Leinster, fo. 117*.

^ Corrguinigh occurs in the story of ' The Second Battle of Moytura,'
where Stokes has rendered it 'sorcerers' in the Revue Celtique, xii. 77; and
corrguinacht heads an article in O'Davoren's Glossary, published in Stokes'
Three Irish Glossaries, p. 63, where it is defined as beth for leth cois j for leth
laimh 7 for leth suil ag denant na glaime dicinn, ' to be on one foot and with
one hand and one eye doing the gldm dicenn.' The gldm dicenn was
seemingly the special elaboration of the art of making /)?Vrf fl?^ nes, which we
have tragically illustrated in the case of Caier.

* In Appendix B to The Welsh People, pp. 617-41.

682 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

together with kindred idioms belonging to the southern
shore of the Mediterranean Sea. He has thereby reduced
to articulate speech, so to say, the physiognomical con-
victions of Professor Sayce (p. 665), to which the reader's
attention has been called. To the linguistic argument
he appends a statement cited from a French authority
and bearing on the question of descent by birth, to the
effect, that when among the Berbers the king dies or
is deposed, as happens often enough, it is not his son
that is called to succeed, but the son of his sister, as
in the case of the historical Picts of Scotland down to
the twelfth century or thereabouts. Here I would add,
that my attention has been called by Professor Sayce
to old Egyptian monuments representing the Libyan
chiefs with their bodies tattooed, a habit which seems
not to be yet extinct among the Touaregs and Kab3des^
Lastly, Mr. Nicholson has recently directed attention to
the fact that some princes of ancient Gaul are represented
with their faces tattooed on certain coins found in the
west of France so far south as the region once occupied
by the ancient Pictones. We have a compendious com-
mentary on this in the occurrence of a word Chortonicum
in a High German manuscript written before the year
814: I allude to the Wessobrunn Codex at Munich, in
which, among a number of geographical names con-
nected with Gaul and other countries, that vocable is so
placed as to allow of our referring it to Poitou or to all
Gaul as the country once of the ancient Pictones. The
great German philologist Pott, who called attention to it,
brought it at once into relation with Criiithne, plural
Cruitkni, ' the Picts of Britain and Ireland,' a word
which has been explained at p. 281 above ^.

' See Rosellini's Monunienti dell' Egitto (Pisa, 1832), vol. i. plates clvi,
clx, and Maspero's Histoire Ancienne (Paris, 1897), ii. 430.

^ One may now consult Nicholson's paper on ' The Language of the

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 683

Now at last I come to the question, what pre-Celtic
race or races make themselves evident in the mass of
things touched on in this and the foregoing chapters?
The answer must, I think, recognize at least two. First
comes the race of the mound folk, consisting of the short
swarthy people variously caricatured in our fairy tales.
They formed isolated fractions of a widely spread race
possessed of no political significance whatsoever ; but,
with the inconsistency ever clinging to everything con-
nected with the fairies, the weird and uncanny folk
emerging from its underground lairs seems to have
exercised on other races a sort of permanent spell of
mysteriousness amounting to adoration. In fact, Irish
literature tells us that the side were worshipped (p. 678).
Owing to his faculty of exaggeration, combined with
his inability to comprehend the little people, the Celt
was enabled to bequeath to the great literatures of
Western Europe a motley train of dwarfs and brownies,
a whole world of wizardry and magic. The real race of
the little people forms the lowest stratum which we can
reach, to wit, at a level no higher, seemingly, than that
of the present-day natives of Central Australia. Thus
some of the birth stories of Cuchulainn and Etain seem
to have passed through their hands, and they bear a
striking resemblance to certain notions of the Lapps
(pp. 657-8). In fact, the nature of the habitations of our
little people, together with other points which might be
mentioned, would seem at first sight to betoken affinity
with the Lapps ; but I am warned by experts ^ that

Continental Picts ' : see Meyer and Stern's Zeitschrift, iii. 326-8, 331-2,
and note especially his reference to Herodian, iii. 14, § 8. For Chortoni-
cum see Die althochdentschen Glossm (edited by Steinmeyer and Sievers),
iii. 610 ; also my paper on ' The Celts and the other Aryans of the P and
Q Groups' read before the Philological Society, February 20, iBgi, p. 11.

1 I am chiefly indebted to my friend Professor A. C. Haddon for refer-
ences to information as to the dwarf races of prehistoric times. I find also

684 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

there are serious craniological difficulties in the way
of any racial comparison with the Lapps, and that one
must look rather to the dwarf populations once widely
spread over our hemisphere, and still to be found here
and there in Europe, as, for example, in Sicily. To
come nearer our British Isles, the presence of such
dwarfs has been established with regard to Switzerland
in neolithic times ^.

The other race may be called Picts, which is probably
the earliest of the names given it by the Celts ; and
their affinities appear to be Libyan, possibly Iberian. It
was a warlike stock, and stood higher altogether than
the mound inhabitants ; for it had a notion of paternity,
though, on account of its promiscuity, it had to reckon
descent by birth (pp. 654-6). To it probably belonged all
the great family groups figuring in the Mabinogion and
the corresponding class of literature in Irish : this would
include the Danann-Don group and the Lir-DLyr group,
together with the families represented by Pwytt and
Rhiannon, who were inseparable from the ILyr group
in Welsh, just as the Lir group was inseparable from the

that he, among others, has anticipated me in my theory as to the origins of
the fairies : witness the following extract from the syllabus of. a lecture
delivered by him at Cardiff in 1894 on Fairy Tales : — ' What are the fairies ?
— Legendary origin of the fairies. It is evident from fairy literature that
there is a mixture of the possible and the impossible, of fact and fancy. Part
of fairydom refers to (i) spirits that never were embodied : other fairies are
(,2) spirits of environment, nature or local spirits, and household or domestic
spirits; (3) spirits of the organic world, spirits of plants, and spirits of
animals ; (4) spirits of men or ghosts ; and (5) witches and wizards, or men
possessed with other spirits. All these and possibly other elements enter into
the fanciful aspect of fairyland, but there is a large residuum of real occur-
rences ; these point to a clash of races, and we may regard many of these
fairy sagas as stories told by men of the Iron Age of events which happened
to men of the Bronze Age in their conflicts with men of the Neolithic Age,
and possibly these, too, handed on traditions of the Palaeolithic Age.'

' See the Berlin Zeitschrift fiir Ethnologie for 1894, vol. xxvi. pp. 189-
254, which are devoted to an elaborate paper by Dr. Jul. Kollmann, entitled
' Das Schweitzersbild bei Schaffhausen und Pygmaen in Europa.' It closes
with a long list of books and articles to be consulted on the subject.

XII] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 685

Tuatha De Danann in Irish legend (pp. 548-9). The
Picts made slaves and drudges of the mound-haunting
race, but how far any amalgamation may have taken
place between them it is impossible to say. Even
without any amalgamation, however, the little people,
if employed as nurses to their Pictish lords' children,
could not help leaving their impress in time on the
language of the ruling nationality. But it may be that
the treatment of the Picts, by Scottish legend, as a kind
of fairies really points to amalgamation, though it is not
impossible that archaeology may be able to classify the
remains of the dwellings ascribed to the Pechts, that
is, to assign a certain class to the warlike Picts of his-
tory and another to the dwarf race of the sids. A certain
measure of amalgamation may also be the meaning of the
Irish tradition, that when the Milesian Irish came and
conquered, the defeated Tuatha De Danann gave up
their life above ground and retired inside the hills like
the fairies. This account of them may be as worthless
as the story of the extermination of the Picts of Scot-
land : both peoples doubtless lived on to amalgam.ate
in time with the conquering race ; but it may mean that
some of them retreated before the Celts, and concealed
themselves after the manner of the little people — in
underground dwellings in the less accessible parts of
the country. In any case, it may well be that they
got their magic and druidism from the dwellers of the
sids. In the next place, it has been pointed out
(pp. 550-1) how the adjective hen, 'old, ancient,' is
applied in Welsh to several of the chief men of the Don
group, and by this one may probably understand that
they were old not merely to those who told the stories
about them in Welsh, but to those who put those
stories together in Goidelic ages earlier. The geo-
graphy of the Mabinogion gives the prehistoric remains

686 CELTIC FOLKLORE [ch.

of Penmaen Mawr and Tre'r Ceiri to the Don group ;
but by its name, Tre'r Ceiri should be the ' Town of the
Keiri,' a word probably referring to the Picts (pp. 279-83):
this, so far as it goes, makes the sons of Don belong by
race to the Picts. Lastly, it is the widely spread race
of the Picts, conquered by the Celts of the Celtican or
Goidelic branch and amalgamating with their conquerors
in the course of time, that has left its non-Aryan impress
on the syntax of the Celtic languages of the British
Isles.

These, it is needless to say, are conjectures which
I cannot establish ; but possibly somebody else may.
For the present, however, they cannot fail to suggest
a moral, habitually ignored with a light heart by most
people — including the writer of these words — that men
in his plight, men engaged in studies which, owing to
a rapid accumulation of fresh facts or the blossoming of
new theories, are in a shifting condition, should abstain
from producing books or anything longer than a maga-
zine article now and then. Even such minor produc-
tions should be understood to be liable to be cast into
a great bonfire lit once a year, say on Halloween. This
should help to clear the air of mistaken hypotheses,
whether of folklore and myth or of history and language,
and also serve to mark Nos Galangaeaf as the com-
mencement of the ancient Celtic year. The business
of selecting the papers to be saved from the burning
might be delegated to an academy constituted, roughly
speaking, on the lines of Plato's aristocracy of intellect.
Such academy, once in the enjoyment of its existence,
would also find plenty of work in addition to the inquisi-
tional business which I have suggested : it should, for
example, be invested with summary jurisdiction over
fond parents who venture to show any unreasonable
anxiety to save their mental progeny from the annual

xii] RACE IN FOLKLORE AND MYTH 687

bonfire. The best of that class of writers should be
ordered by the academy to sing songs or indite original
verse. As for the rest, some of them might be told off
to gesticulate to the gallery, and some to administer the
consolations of platitude to stragglers tired of the march
of science. There is a mass of other useful work which
would naturally devolve on an academy of the kind here
suggested. I should be happy, if space permitted, to
go through the particulars one by one, but let a single
instance suffice : the academy might relieve us of the
painful necessity of having seriously to consider any
further the proposal that professors found professing
after sixty should be shot. This will serve to indicate
the kind of work which might advantageously be
entrusted to the august body which is here but roughly
projected.

There are some branches of learning in the happy posi-
tion of having no occasion for such a body academical.
Thus, if a man will have it that the earth is flat, as flat
in fact as some people do their utmost to make it, ' he
will most likely,' as the late Mr. Freeman in the Satur-
day Review once put it, ' make few converts, and will be
forgotten after at most a passing laugh from scientific
men.' If a man insists that the sum of two and two is
five, he will probably find his way to a lunatic asylum,
as the economy of society is, in a manner, self-acting.
So with regard to him who carries his craze into the
more material departments of such a science as chemistry:
he may be expected to blow out his own eyes, for the
almighty molecule executes its own vengeance. ' But,'
to quote again from Mr. Freeman, if that man's ' craze
had been historical or philological '—and above all if it
had to do with the science of man or of myth—' he might
have put forth notions quite as absurd as the notion that
the earth is flat, and many people would not have been

688 CELTIC FOLKLORE

in the least able to see that they were absurd. If any
scholar had tried to confute him we should have heard
of " controversies " and "differences of opinion.'" In
fact, the worst that happens to the false prophet who
shines in any such a science is, that he has usually only
too many enthusiastic followers. The machinery is, so
to say, not automatic, and hence it is that we want the
help of an academy. But even supposing such an
academy established, no one need feel alarmed lest
opportunities enough could no longer be found for
cultivating the example of those of the early Christians
who had the rare grace to suffer fools gladly.

Personally, however, I should be against doing any-
thing in a hurry; and, considering how little his fellows
dare expect from the man who is just waiting to be final
and perfect before he commit himself to type, the estab-
lishment of an academy invested with the summary
powers which have been briefly sketched might,
perhaps, after all, conveniently wait a while : my own
feeling is that almost any time, say in the latter half of
the twentieth century, would do better than this year
or the next. In the meantime one must be content to
entrust the fortunes of our studies to the combined
forces of science and common sense. Judging by what
they have achieved in recent years, there is no reason to
be uneasy with regard to the time to come, for it is as
true to-day as when it was first written, that the best of
the prophets of the Future is the Past.

ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS

p. 8i. I learn that the plural of bodach glas was in Welsh bodachod
gletsion, a term which Elis o'r Nant remembers his mother applying to a
kind of fairies dressed in blue and fond of leading people astray. She used to
relate how a haymaking party once passed a summer's night at the cowhouse
(bendy) of Bryn Bygelyd" (also Bryn Mygelyd), and how they saw in the dead
of night a host of these dwarfs {corynnod) in blue dancing and capering about
the place. The beudy in question is not very far from Dolwyd'elan, on the
way to Capel Curig. A different picture of the bodach is given in Jenkins'
Bed Gelert, p. 82 ; and lastly one may contrast the Highland Bodach
Glas mentioned at p. 520 above, not to mention still another kind, namely
the one in Scott's Waverley.

P. 130. To SarnyrAfai^c a.ddK.ynyr Afanc, nearTLani'mzm {Beauties of
Wales, N. Wales, p. 841), and Bed yr Afanc, ' the Afanc's Grave,' the name
of some sort of a tumulus, I am told, on a knoll near the Pembrokeshire
stream of the Nevern. Mr. J. Thomas, of Bancau Bryn Berian close by,
has communicated to me certain echoes of a story how an afanc was
caught in a pool near the bridge of Bryn Berian, and how it was taken up
to be interred in what is now regarded as its grave. A complete list of
the afanc place-names in the Principality might possibly prove instructive.
As to the word afanc, what seems to have happened is this : (i) from mean-
ing simply a dwarf it came to be associated with such water dwarfs as those
mentioned at p. 432 ; (2) the meaning being forgotten, the word was
applied to any water monster ; and (3) where afanc occurs in place-names
the Hu story has been introduced to explain it, whether it fitted or not. This
I should fancy to be the case with the Bryn Berian barrow, and it would be
satisfactory to know whether it contains the remains of an ordinary dwarf.
Peredur's lake afanc may have been a dwarf ; but whether that was so or not,
it is remarkable that the weapon which the afanc handled was a liechwaeiv or
flake-spear, that is, a missile tipped with stone.

P. 131. With the role of the girl in the afanc story compare that of
Tegau, wife of Caradog Freichfras, on whom a serpent fastens and can only
be allured away to seize on one of Tegau's breasts, of which she loses the
nipple when the beast is cut off. The defect being replaced with gold, she
is ever after known as Tegau Eur-fron, or ' Tegau of the golden Breast.'
That is a version inferred of a story which is discussed by M. Gaston Paris
in an article, on Caradoc et le Serpent, elicited by a paper published (in
the November number of Modern Language Notes for 1898) by Miss C. A.

RHYS Y y

690 CELTIC FOLKLORE

Harper, of Bryn Mawr College, U.S. : see the Romania, xxviii. 214-31.
One of Miss Harper's parallels, mentioned by M. Paris at p. 220, comes
from Campbell : it is concerning a prince who receives from his stepmother
a magic shirt which converts itself into a serpent coiled round his neck, and
of which he is rid by the help of a woman acting in much the same way as
Tegau. We have an echo of this in the pedigrees in the Jesus College MS.
20 : see the Cymmrodor, viii. 88, where one reads of G6ga6ti keneu menrud
a V14 neidyr vl6ydyn am y vonSgyl, ' Gwgon the whelp of Menrud (?) who
was a year with a snake round his neck ' — his pedigree is also given. In
M. Paris' suggested reconstruction of the story (p. 228) from the different
versions, he represents the maiden who is to induce the serpent to leave
the man on whom it has fastened, as standing in a vessel filled with milk,
while the man stands in a vessel filled with vinegar. The heroine exposes
herself to the reptile, which relinquishes his present victim to seize on one
of the woman's breasts. Now the appropriateness of the milk is explained
by the belief that snakes are inordinately fond of milk, and that belief has,
I presume, a foundation in fact : at any rate I am reminded of its introduc-
tion into the plot of more than one English story, such as Stanley Weyman's
book From the Memoirs of a Minister of France (London, 1895), p. 445,
and A. Conan Doyle's Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (London, 1893),
pp. 199-209. In Wales, however, it is to a woman's milk that one's interest
attaches : I submit two references which will explain what I mean. The
first of them is to Owen's Welsh Folk-Lore, p. 349, where he says that
' traditions of flying snakes were once common in all parts of Wales,' and
adds as follows: — 'The traditional origin of these imaginary creatures was
that they were snakes, which by having drunk the milk of a woman, and by
having eaten of bread consecrated for the Holy Communion, became trans-
formed into winged serpents or dragons.' The other is to the Brython for
1861, p. 190, where one reads in Welsh to the following effect : — ' If a snake
chances to have an opportunity to drink of a woman's milk it is certain to
become a gwiber. When a woman happens to be far from her child, and
her breasts are full and beginning to give her pain, she sometimes milks
them on the ground in order to ease them. To this the peasantry in parts
of Cardiganshire have a strong objection, lest a snake should come there and
drink the milk, and so become a gwiber.^ The word gwiber is used in the
Welsh Bible for a viper, but the editor of the Brython explains, that in our
folklore it means a huge kind of snake or dragon that has grown wings
and has its body cased in hard scales : for a noted instance in point
he refers the reader to the first number of the Brython, p. 3. It is believed
still all over Wales that snakes may, under favourable circumstances,
develop wings : in fact, an Anglesey man strongly wished, to my knowledge,
to offer to the recent Welsh Land Commission, as evidence of the wild and
neglected state of a certain farm, that the gorse had grown so high and the
snakes so thriven in it that he had actually seen one of the latter flying right
across a wide road which separated two such gorse forests as he described :
surprised and hurt to find that this was not accepted, he inferred that the
Commissioners knew next to nothing about their business.

Pp. 148, 170. With ' the spell of security' by catching hold of grass may
perhaps be compared a habit which boys in Cardiganshire have of suddenly

ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS 691

picking up a blade of grass when they want a truce or stoppage in a sort of
game of tig or touchwood. The grass gives the one who avails himself
of it immunity for a time from attack or pursuit, so as to allow him to begin
the game again just where it was left off.

P. 228. Bodennud would probably be more correctly written Bodermyd,
and analysed possibly into Bod--Dermyd, involving the name which appears
in Irish as Diarniait and Derniot.

P. 230. Since this was printed I have been assured by Mr. Thomas
Prichard of ILwydiarth Esgob, in Anglesey, that the dohir byr is more
commonly called clivy'' byr, and that it is the disease known in English as
' black quarter.'

Pp. 259, 268. I am assured on the part of several literary natives of
Glamorgan that they do not know ddr for daear, ' ground, earth.' Such nega-
tive evidence, though proving the literary form dacar to prevail now, is not
to be opposed to the positive statement, sent by Mr. Hughes (p. 173) to me,
as to the persistence in his neighbourhood of (f«r and clar (for claear, 'luke-
warm '), to which one may add, as unlikely to be challenged by anybody, the
case oi Itdnt for haearn, ' iron.' The intermediate forms have to be represented
as daer, claer, and haern, which explain exactly the gaem of the Book of
St. Chad, for which modern literary Welsh Yidi's, gaeaf, 'winter': see the
preface to the Book oflLavt Ddv, p. xlv.

P. 290. It ought to have been pointed out that the fairies, whose food
and drink it is death to share, represent the dead.

P. 2gi. For Conla read Connla or Condla : the later form is Colla. The
Condla in question is called Condla Ritad in the story, but the heading to it
has Edra Condla Chaim, ' the Adventure of C, the Dear One.'

P. 294. I am now inclined to think that butch was produced out of the
northern pronunciation oi witch by regarding its w as a mutation consonant
and replacing it, as in some other instances, by b as the radical.

P. 308. With the Manx use of rowan on May-day compare a passage
to the following effect concerning Wales — I translate it from the faulty
Welsh in which it is quoted by one of the competitors for the folklore
prize at the Liverpool Eisted'fod, 1900 : he gave no indication of its
provenance : — Another bad papistic habit which prevails among some Welsh
people is that of placing some of the wood of the rowan tree {coed cerdin or
criafol) in their corn lands {fla/yrieii) and their fields on May-eve {Nos
Glamau) with the idea that such a custom brings a blessing on their fields,
a proceeding which would better become atheists and pagans than Christians.

P. 325. In the comparison with the brownie the fairy nurse in the
Pennant Valley has been overlooked : see p. 109.

P. 331, line I. For I. 42-3 read ii. 42-3.

Pp. 377, 395. With the story of Ffynnon Gyvver and the other fairy
wells, also with the wells which have been more especially called sacred in
this volume, compare the following paragraph from Martin's Description of
the Western Islands of Scotland (London, 1703), pp. 229-30 : it is concerning

Yy %

692 CELTIC FOLKLORE

Gigay, now more commonly written Gigha, the name of an island near the
west coast of Kintyre : — 'There is a well in the north end of this isle called
Toubir-more, i. e. a great well, because of its effects, for which it is famous
among the islanders ; who together with the inhabitants use it as a Catholicon
for diseases. It's covered with stone and clay, because the natives fancy
that the stream that flows from it might overflow the isle ; and it is always
opened by a Diroch, i. e. an inmate, else they think it would not exert its
vertues. They ascribe one very extraordinary effect to it, and 'tis this ; that
when any foreign boats are wind-bound here (which often happens) the
master of the boat ordinarily gives the native that lets the water run a piece
of money, and they say that immediately afterwards the wind changes
in favour of those that are thus detain'd by contrary winds. Every stranger
that goes to drink of the water of this well, is accustomed to leave on its
stone cover a piece of money, a needle, pin, or one of the prettiest varieated
stones they can find.' Last September I visited Gigha and saw a well there
which is supposed to be the one to which Martin refers. It is very
insignificant and known now by a name pronounced Tobar a viae, possibly
for an older Mo-Bheac : in Scotch Gaelic Beac^ written Beaihag, is equated
with the name Sophia. The only tradition now current about the well is
that emptying it used to prove the means of raising a wind or even of pro-
ducing great storms, and this appears to have been told Pennant : see his
Tour in Scotland and Voyage to the Hebrides, MDCCLXXII (Chester, 1774),
p. 226 :— ' Visit the few wonders of the isle : the first is a little well of a most
miraculous quality, for in old times, if ever the chieftain lay here wind-
bound, he had nothing more to do than cause the well to be cleared, and
instantly a favorable gale arose. But miracles are now ceased.'

P. 378. A similar rhyme is current in the neighbourhood of Dolgetiey, as
Miss Lucy Griffith informs me, as follows : —

Dolgeite dol a goiiir,

Daear a'i tfwnc, dvti'r '« V fie.

Dolgettey, a dale to be lost ;

Earth will swallow it, and water take its place.
P. 394. With regard to wells killing women visiting them, I may mention
a story, told me the other day by Professor Mahaffy after a friend whose
name he gave, concerning the inhabitants of one of the small islands on the
coast of Mayo— I understood him to say off" the Mullet. It was this : all
the men and boys, having gone fishing, were prevented by rough weather
from returning as soon as they intended, and the women left alone suff'ered
greatly from want of water, as not one of them would venture to go to the
well. By-and-by, however, one of them gave birth to a boy, whereupon
another of them carried the baby to the well, and ventured to draw water.

P. 418. As to Clychau Aberdyfi I am now convinced that the chwech and
saith are entirely due to the published versions, the editors of which seem to
have agreed that they will have as much as possible for their money, so to
say. I find that Mrs. Rhys learnt in her childhood to end the words with
pump, and that she cannot now be brought to sing the melody in any other
way : I have similar testimony from a musical lady from the neighbourhood
of Wrexham ; and, doubtless, more evidence of the same sort could be got.

P. 443. For ILywelyn ab Gruffyd read ILywelyn ab lorwerth.

ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS 693

Pp. 450-1. Some additional light on the doggerel dialogue will be found
thrown by the following story, which I find cited in Welsh by one of the
Liverpool Eisted"fod competitors : — There is in the parish of Yspytty Ifan,
in Carnarvonshire, a farm called Trwyn Swch, where eighty years ago
lived a man and his wife, who were both young, and had twins born to
them. Now the mother went one day to milk, leaving the twins alone in
the cradle — the husband was not at home — and who should enter the house
but one of the Tyhvyth Teg! He took the twins away and left two of his
own breed in the cradle in their stead. Thereupon the mother returned
home and saw what had come to pass ; she then in her excitement
snatched the Tylwyth Teg twins and took them to the bridge that crosses
the huge gorge of the river Conwy not very far from the house, and she
cast them into the whirlpool below. By this time the Tylwyth Teg had
come on the spot, some trying to save the children, and some making for the
woman. ' Seize the old hag ! ' {Crap aryr hen wrach !) said one of the chiefs
of the Tylwyth Teg. ' Too late ! ' cried the woman on the edge of the
bank ; and many of them ran after her to the house. As they ran three or
four of them lost their pipes in the field. They are pipes ingeniously made of
the blue stone {carreg las) of the gully. They measure three or four inches
long, and from time to time several of them have been found near the cave
of Trwyn Swch. — This is the first indication which I have discovered, that
the fairies are addicted to smoking.

P. 506. A Rhiw Gyferthwch (printed Rywgyverthwcli) occurs in the Record
of Carnarvon, p. 200 ; but it seems to have been in Merionethshire, and far
enough from Arfon.

P. 521. In the article already cited from the Romania, M. Paris finds
Twrch Trwyth in the boar Tortain of a French romance: see xxviii. 217,
where he mentions a legend concerning the strange pedigree of that beast.
The subject requires to be further studied.

P- 535- A- less probable explanation of Latio would be to suppose orti
understood. This has been suggested to me by Mr. Nicholson's treatment
of the ILanaelhaiarn inscription as Alt ortus Elmetiaco hie iacet, where
I should regard ^/i' as standing for an earlier nominative Alecs, and intended
as the Celtic equivalent for Cephas or Peter: .^// would be the word which
is in Med. Irish ail, genitive ailech, ' a rock or stone.'

P- 545- We have the Maethwy of Gilvaethwy possibly still further reduced
to Aethivy in Forth Aethwy, ' the Village of Menai Bridge,' in spite of its
occurring in the Record of Carnarvon, p. 77, as Porthaytho.

P. 548. To the reference to the Cymmrodor, ix. 170, as to Beli being
called son of Anna, add the Welsh Ehicidariuni, p.' 127, with its belim vab anna,
and The Camhro-Btitish Saints, p. 82, where we have Anna . . . genuit Beli,

P. 560. Two answers to the query as to the E^ech Las are now to be found
in the Scottish Antiquary, xv. 41-3.

P. 566. Caer Gai is called also Caer Gynyr, after Cai's father Cynyr, to
wit in a poem by William ILeyn, who died in 1587. This I owe to
Professor J. Morris Jones, who has copied it from a collection of that poet's
works in the possession of Myrd"in Fard, fo. 119.

694 CELTIC FOLKLORE

P. 569. Here it would, perhaps, not be irrelevant to mention Caer
■Dwrgynt, given s. v. Dwr in Morris' Celtic Remains, as a name of Caergybi, or
Holyhead. His authority is given in parenthesis thus : (Th. Williams,
Catal.). I should be disposed to think the name based on some such an
earlier form as Kair Ddbgint, ' the Fortress of the Danes,' who were called
in old Welsh Dub-giiit (^Annales Canibrice, a. d. 866, in the Cyinmrodor, ix.
165), that is to say ' Gentes Nigrce or Black Pagans,' and more simply Gint or
Gynt, ' Gentes or Heathens.'

Pp. 579-80. The word banna6c, whence the later bannog, seems to be
the origin of the name bonoec given to the famous horn in the Lai du Corn,
from which M. Paris in his Romania article, xxviii. 229, cites Cest cor qui
bonoec a nan, ' this horn which is called bonoec' The Welsh name would
have to be Corn (yr) ych bantiadc, ' the horn of (the) bannog ox,' with or
without the article.

P. 580, note I. One of the Liverpool Eisted"fod competitors cites W. O.
Pughe to the following effect in Welsh : — BLyn dau Ycliain, ' the Lake of Two
Oxen,' is on Hiraethog Mountain ; and near it is the footmark of one of
them in a stone or rock (carreg), where he rested when seeking his partner,
as the local legend has it. Another cites a still wilder story, to the effect
that there was once a wonderful cow called Y Fiavch Fraith, ' the Parti-
coloured Cow.' ' To that cow there came a witch to get milk, just after the
cow had supplied the whole neighbourhood. So the witch could not get
any milk, and to avenge her disappointment she made the cow mad. The
result was that the cow ran wild over the mountains, inflicting immense
harm on the country ; but at last she was killed by Hu near Hiraethog, in
the county of Denbigh.'

P. 592. With trivtan, Tnvtyn-Tratyn, and Trit-a-trot should doubtless be
compared the English use oi trot as applied contemptuously to a woman, as
when Grumio, in Shakespeare's Taming of the Slireiv, Act i, sc. 2, speaks
of ' an old trot with ne'er a tooth* in her head ' : the word was similarly
used by Thomas Heywood and others.

P. 649. With regard to note i, I find that Professor Zimmer is of opinion
— in fact he is quite positive — that tyngu and tynghed are in no way related :
see the Gottingische gelehrte Anzeigett for 1900 (No. 5"), pp. 371-2.

P. 673. I am tempted to rank with the man-eating fairies the Atecotti,

who are known to have been cannibals, and whose name seems to mean the

ancient race. Should this prove tenable, one would have to admit that the

little people, or at any rate peoples with an admixture of the blood of that

race, could be trained to fight. Further, one would probably have to class

with them also such non-cannibal tribes as those of the Fir Bolg and the

Galiuin of Irish story. Information about both will be found in my Hibbert

Lectures, in reading which, however, the mythological speculations should be

brushed aside. Lastly, I anticipate that most of the peoples figuring in the

oldest class of Irish story will prove to have belonged either (i) to the dwarf

race, or (2) to the Picts ; and that careful reading will multiply the means of

distinguishing between them. Looking comprehensively at the question

of the early races of the British Isles, the reader should weigh again the

concluding words of Professor Jladdon's theory, quoted on p. 684 above,
^■. - ^. vvv » ' -• ^^/ -, <;■•<.

p^NTgM ^RES^fgVg^

INDEX

a, i, u, 640.
Aachen, 579.
Ab Ithel, 203.
abacc, abhac, 142,431.
Abbey Dora, 192.

— Lands, 333, 334.
Aber Bargoed, 162.

— Cnch, 162.

— Glaslyn, 443.

— Gwy, 519.

— Hafren, 519.

— Henvelen, 548.

— Forth, 464.

■ — Rhiwlech, 137.

— Soch, 231, 233, 572,

— Torogi, 503, 505, 506,
508.

— Towy, 513, 530.
Aberavon, 402.
Aberconwy,443, 469, 565.
Aberdare, 514.
Aberdaron, 209, 228, 230.
Aberdovey bells, 416-8,

692.
Aberflfraw, 240, 241.
Abergwili, 274.
above wind, below wind,

&c., 170.
ach, 403, 421.
Adam and Eve, 621.
adchess, 264.
adchiu, 264.
Aelgyfarch, 219.
Aerfen, 441.
Aeron, the, 577.
aes side, 677.
Aethlem, 519.
afanc, the lake, 74, 81,

130.131,134.142,201,

429-31, 433,440, 689.

— and girl, 131.
Affaraon, 505 : see Ffa-

raoD.
Afon Cegin Arthur, 58.

— Mynach, 150.
~ Wen, 443.

Africa, N., 665.

Agrippa, H. Cornelius,
213.

Aiken-drum, 325.

ail, ailech, 693.

ail Meirchion, 439.

ailither, Ailithir, 271.

aiminn, aoibhinn, 629.

ainm, 625-7.

air, aer, aor, 632,

air impide anTiarna,335.

Airg<iill, 542.

Alaric, 410.

Alaw Leyn, 228,275, 277-

Albion, Albiona, 550.

Ali ortns Elmetiaco, 693.

All-hallows, 226, 327-9;
315, 346, 686: see Hal-
loween, Hollantide.

Attt Clwyd, 529.

am, 523.

Amaethon, Amathaon,

543.
Amairgen, 616, 617.
Aman, 528.
Amanw, 514, 522, 524,

541-
ambi, 523.

Ambrosius, 469, 470.
Ameridith, 233.
Amgoed, 512, 513.
Amhacsen, 233.
Amheirchion, 233, 234.
Amlwch, 203, 239, 568.
Amman, Aman, 513-5,

522, 528.
Amnod', 457.
amoenus, 629.

o-\^'P'h 523-
anadl, 626.
Anatemori, 363.
anauon, 500.
ancestor, -tress, 421, 454,

659, 672.
aneirif, 282.
dvejxos, 627.

avr/p, 264.
Anet, 519.
Angharad ILwyd, 490,

491.
anglad", 274.
Anglesey, 280, 439, 458,

508, 548, 567, 690.
Anglo-Hebrew names, 40.
anim, 626.
anima, 626, 627.
animus, 627.
Anna, 693.
Annvvn, 143, 144, 499,

500,503,525,678,679.
Annwvyn, Annwn, 499,

500.
Anoeth, 619.
Anses, the, 651.
anthrax, 230.
antiquities undisturbed,

343-
anu, enw, 625, 627.
anwan, 625.
Anwyl, Prof., 607.
Apocalypse, the, 345.
aquila fabulosa, 509.
ar-, 542.

ar yr aberth duw sul, 315.
— gym a ffibav, 573.
aram, 282.
Aran, the, 473.
Arawn, 216, 500, 525,

637-
Archan, 386.
"'A/3X"'''''oy, 631.
Ardagh, 680.
Ardee, 483.
Ardennes, 268,
Aidudwy, 147, 563.
ardelw, ardel, 514.
Ard\i, 32.
Ard'wyfan, 442.
Arennig, 149.
Arfon, 504, 505, 507, 567.
argat, 447.
argel Ardudwy, 563.

696

INDEX

Arianrhod, 207-9, ^45»
646.

Aries, 550.

Aritechwed; 52, 69, 504-
6, 508, 526, 566,569.

Armairc Letha, 535.

Armorica, 532, 535.

Arnold, Matthew, 551.

Arran More, 171.

Arthur, 22, 58, 142, 203,
233, 236, 429, 45S,
463, 464^ 466, 473-7,
484, 492-6, 499, 509-
12, 514, 5i9> 529-31,
536-9, 560, 562, 563,
570, 610, 611, 619,
672, 673, 679.

arwest, 68.

Arwyli, 530, 542, 544.

Arwystli, 525, 542.

asa-s, the ending, 546.

Ascoli, Professor, 641.

ash-tree by a well, 332.

Atecotti, 694.

Atherne, 635.

athgein, 655.

atras, 177.

Aubrey, Mr., 396.

August, first Sunday in,
15, 256, 257, 312.

— the twelfth of, 312.
Augustus' festival, 312.
Aurelius Ambrosius, 470.
Aust, 519.

Australia, 683.
Avallo, -onis, 496.
Avallon, Isle of, 440,

495, 496.
Awarnach, 565 : see

Eumach, Wrnach.
Awstin, 503, 506, 519.
Aymon, 488, 491.
Ayre, the, 285.

b for V, 538.

bailey, 377.

bala, 377, 378. •

Bala, y, 147, 150, 377,

378,415-

— Lake, 123, 207, 401,
408, 441, 443, 444 : see
E-yn Tegid.

Balaklava, 377.
Balder, 650, 651.
baledwyr, the, 484, 486,

487, 491.
balium, ballium, 377.
Balla K. Pherick, 285.
Ballachrink, 287, 289.
Ballarat, 377.

Ballymoyer, 612.
ban, bannau, 580.
banbh, 523, 528.
banc, 476.
Bann Arthur, 22.
Bannau Sir Gaer, 582.
bannog, bannawc, 131,

142, 561, 578-80, 694 :

see Ychen Bannog.
Bannon, Panon, 529.
bannoo, 523.
Bannwchdeni, 22, 580.
banshee, 188, 452, 454,

672, 677.
bantuathaigh, 375.
banw, 514, 523,524, 541.
baptism, 293, 631, 658.
Bardsey, 209, 363, 413,

440.
Bargoed, the, 175.
Barnwell, Mr., 533.
Barrivend-i, 568.
Barrule, South, 300, 312,

314, 343-
Basque numerals, 665.
bealtuinn, 308.
Beare, old woman of,

393, 454-
Bearhaven, 393.
Beathag, 692.
Beaune, 553.
beaver, the, 431.
— stones, 131.
Beddoe, Dr., 667,
Bedivere, 476: j^^Bedwyr.
Bedwyr, 499, 529.
Bed" yr Afanc, 689.
Bedgelert, 32, 75-80, 84,

86, 90, 104, 149, 470,

506, 567.
belli, 377.
Belene, 55, 598.
Beli (Belim), 548, 570,

693-

Belisama, 387.

Bella, 64-6, 91, 92, 223,

668.
Bellis, 106 : see Belsiaid.
Bellisians, the, 93, 668.
bells, submerged, 192,

416,417.
belltaine, 308-10 : see

May-day, Laa Boaldyn.
Belrath, 393.
Belsiaid, 105, 108, 220,

668.
Ben Nevis, 580.
ben side, 452, 677 : see

banshee.
Bendigeituran, 548.

Bendith y (eu) Mamau,
174, 176, 254, 256,
257, 262,263,265,266,

593,671.
Benlan Wen, 79.
Bentli, 413.
Bennar, the, 204.
benwic, 514, 524. ^

Beo-aed, 507.
Bera, 393 : see Beare.
Berber, 68 r.
Berbers, the, 665, 682.
Bergyon, 550.
Berners, Lord, 490.
Bernicia, 508.
Berre, B6rri, 393.
Bertalda, 27,
Berwyn, 138.
Bethel, 203.
Bethgelart, 567 : see Betf-

gelert.
Betws, 39.
Bettws (Amman Valley),

515-

— y Coed, 130, 134.

— Garmon, 38, 41.
beudy, 689.
Bevans, 192.
bewitch, 294.

bi Don, 208-10.
bi Donn, 209.
Bible, the, 557.

— the Manx, 297, 348,

349-
bins, 63, 64.
bird music, 155.

— warning, the, 409.
birth pedigree,656,682-4.
Biturix, 662.
Biulthan, 333, 334.
Black Eagle, the, 460.
black greyhound, 294.

— hen, 266.

— quarter, 691.
blade of grass, 148.
Blaen Einon, 517.

— Nos, 257.

— Pant ar Fi, 151.
Blaensawde, 3.
Blednoch, 325, 596.
Bledruis, 531.
Bledrws, 531.
Bleid; i, 528.

Blind, Karl, 341, 346.

blisters on the face, 633.

Blodeuwed, 439, 608-10,

Blodwell, 414.

blue eyes, 148.

boaldyn, 308.

Boand, 389,390, 392, 395.

INDEX

697

Boch y Rhaiadr, 457.
Bodach Glas, 8 1 , 520,689.
bodement, the, 205.
Bodermnd, 228, 691.
Bodfedan, 568.
Bodwydog Mountain, 2 28.
Bodysgattan, 68.
BoUan Bane, the, 293.
Boltane,Baltane,333,335.
boncyn, 476, 477.
bonfires at All-hallows,

224, 225.
bonoec, 694.
Borlase, Mr., 335.
Borth, 415, 417.
Boudicca, 677.
Bourke, Canon, 606.
Boya, 563.
Boyd Dawkins, Professor,

388, 579-
Boyne, the, 389,390,392,

481-3.
Bradda, 333.
braich, 19.
Braich y Bib, 202.

— y Corner, 202.

— y Dinas, 89, 95, 96.

— yr Oen, 475.
Bramston, Miss, 416.
Bian, 547, 648> 552, 553,

616, 628, 653.

— Castett Dinas, 148.
Branwen, 547, 552, 553.
bread, 650.

— and cheese offering, 1 7.
Breat, 504, 507 : see Bryn-

ach.
breath oflife, the, 626,627.
Brecheniauc, 72.
Brechfa, 515.
Brecknock Mere, 71, 73.
Brefi, the, 578.
brefu, 578.
bregliach, 277.
breni, 425.
Bri Ele, 391.

— Leith, 680.
Brialten glan Ceri, 169.
Briareus, 494.
brichta ban, 295.
Bridgend, 354-6.
Britannica Lingua, 270,

271.
Brittany, 535, 573.
Brittia, 440.
Bron y Fedw, 33, 34.
Bronach, 507.
Brons, Bron, 548.
brownie, the, 285, 286,

3^6. 596, 597.

Bmden Daderga, 424.
Brug, the, 436.
Brugmann, Dr., 641.
Bryn Bela, 65, 66.

— Berian, 689.

— Bwa, 152.

— Bygelyd", 689.

— y Pibion, 212, 214.

— y S. Marchog, 628.

— Twrw, 54, 55-
Brynach, 504-6, 508,

509, 566.
Bryneglwys, 241.
Brynm or- Jones, Mr., 355.
Brythoneg, 270.
Brythons, 279.
Bryttisc, 676.
Buattt, Buelt, 537, 538.
Buarth Arthur, 536.
buches Ian, 222.
Bugeildy, 22.
buidseach, -achd, 294.
Bulkeley, Lady, 47, 48.
— , Sir R., 105.
bull-holes, 323.
Burgocavis, 566.
burning an animal, 296.
burnt sacrifice, 305, 307.
buta 'nynna, &c., 224.
hutches, 294, 691.
butter, bewitched, 302.
Bwbach ILwyd, the, 81.
Bwca'r Trwyn, 193, 325,

594> 596, 597. 673.
Bwlch y Groes, 137.

— y Gwydel, 566.

— Mwrchan, 566.

— y Rhiw Felen, 673,
674.

— y Saethau, 473, 475,
560.

— Trwyn Swncwl, 278,
279.

Bwrd" Arthur, 536,

by, 630.

bychan a wyda' hi, &c.,

229.
bydye, 246.
Bye-gones, 169, 378.
'Byrhond"u = Aberhondu,

19.
bywyd, bowyd, 489.

Ca hainm tii, 629.
Cabal, 538, 539.
caballus, 539.
Cabbal yn Onral Losht,

306.
9ad, 282.
cadarn, pi. cedym, 282.

cader, ' a cradle,' 161.
Cader Idris, 203.
Cadgj'ffro, 545.
Cadi, 604, 605.
cadr, ceidyr, 282, 283.
Cadrawd, 376, 377, 405.
Cadwaladr, 484, 492.
Cadwatton,564, 569, 570.
Cae Quarry, 237.
Cae'r Ladi, 369-71.

— 'Loda', 207.
caer, 207.

Caer Arianrhod, 207, 208 ,
218, 401, 645.

— ©wrgynt, 694.

— FyrCfin cei oer fore,
378.

— Gai, 566, 693.

— Gwydion, 645.

— Gynyr, 693 : see Caer
Gai.

— Oeth, 619, 679.

— Sidi, 678, 679.
Caerau, 48.
Caergybi, 36, 694.
Caerleon, Caertteon, 462,

487. 595-
Cafalt, 538, 539.
Cai, 499,' 565, 621, 672,

693.
Caichear, 632.
Caier, 632, 635, 681.
Caill, 546.

Cailleach Bheara, 393.
Caillteamhuil, 546.
Cairatini, Maqui, 292.
caksh, 264.
Calan, y, 226, 342.
Calangaeaf, 226, 329.
Calanmai, 226, 329, 691.
Caldicot Pill, 506.
Calendae, 318, 342.
Calends, the, 211, 317,

321, 329-
calennig, c'lennig, 318,

338, 342.
calf sacrifice, the, 305.
Calvinists, good, 217.
Cambrians, the, 214, 468,

518, 533, 566.
Camlan, 560, 570.
Campbell, 433, 434-
candle trick, L-aw-ham's,

20.
cannibals, 673, 694.
canoe in IL. ILydaw, the,

533.
Canrig (Cantrig) Bwt,

673 : see Cynric Rwth.
Cantre'r Gwaelod, 169,

698

INDEX

375. 382, 394, 401,

415, 419-
Cantusus, 535.
canwytl; gorff, 275.
caorthann, 292.
caorunn, 292.
Capel y Fan, 183, 190,

191.

— Garmon, 130, 205.

— Sion, 36.

Caradog Freichras, 509,

689.
caraid, 434.
Caratauc, 551.
carchar, 674.
Carchar Cynric R., 673,

674.

— Oeth, &c., 619, 674.
Cardigan, 152, 159, 164,

169.
Cardy, 391.
cam, 539.
Cam Bentyrch, 222.

— Bodlian, 228, 674.

— Cabal, 538.

— Dolbenmaen,io8, 220.

— Fadrun, 674.

— March Arthur, 142.
Carnarvon, 87, 88.
Carned" Arthur, 473-5.

560.

— Drystan, 480.

• — Lywelyn, 480.
Carnguwch, 278, 361.
carreg afael, 107.
Carreg yr Eryr, 479.
carreg las, 693.
caru, 225.
Cas ILychwr, 514.
casag, 235.
Cassivellaunos, 570.
Castetl Carn Dochan,
148.

— Coch, 378.

— Gwattter, 506.

— Moedin, 245.

— y Nos, 257, 263.

— Penwed^ig, 506.
Castettmarch, 231-3, 572.
Caswatton, 569, 570, 637.
Cath Balug, 504, 505,

507, 566, 567.

— Balwg, 505.

cattle calls, 10, 24, 26,

29. M5. 149-
Catwatlawn, 564 : see

Cadwatton.
cauchemar, 286.
Cauldron of Sciences, 615.
caur, 282 : see cawr.

Cavall, 529 : see Cabal.

Caw, 529.

cawett, 68, 69.

cawr, cewri, 279J 280,

282, 283.
caws pob, 600, 601.
Cayo, 515.
cedyrn, kedym, 282.
Cefn y Ceirw, 167.

— Colston, 27.

— Creini, 215.
cefnderw, cefnder, 514.
Ceimarch, 136.

ceiri, 279, 280, 282, 283.
ceirw, 442.
Celtchar, 546.
Celynnog Fawr, 84, 156,

218, 363, 401.
, monk and the bird,

the, 156.
Cemmes, Hundred of,

152, 158.
Cenarth, 161, 162.
cenhedlaeth, 422.
Cephas, 693.
cerdin, cerding, cerdin,

292, 691.
Ceridwen, 117, 613, 615,

617.
Cernunnos, 552.
Cerrig y Dmdion, 673.

— y Gwyd-yl, 564, 569.
cert, 671.

Cerwyni, 175.

cess, 654.

ceuri, 280, 282 : see

ceiri.
ch, Welsh, 192.
Chair Caim, the, 393.
champion's portion, the,

501.
changelings, 194, 220,

667 : see fairy children.
Charencey, M. de, 664.
Charles V, 488, 489.
Chester, 484.
Chibbyr Lansh, 315.

— Undin, 332, 333.

— Unjin, 332.
Chibbyrt Voltane, 333.
Chinese leases, 428.
Chortonicum, 682, 683.
Christmas boxes, 342.
XpifTToj, Christus, 629.
Church, the, 345, 630.
church porch, the, 327,

328.
cibyn, 269.
Cid, the, 482, 655.
Cigfa, Kicua, 546.

Cil Cott, 380.

— Rath Fawr, 522.

— yr Ychen, 467.
Cilgwryd, 14.
Cilgwyn, 13.
Cimeliauc, 163.
Cinbelin, 551.
Cinust, 568.
Ciocbha, 546.
Cioccal, 547.
circle, a witch's, 295.
Civil War, the, 232.
Clackmannan, 550.
cladfedigaeth, 274.
Clagh Vane, 344.
Clamosus, 72, 74.
clar, 691.

Clare, Earl, 403.

Clark, Andrew, 156.

Claud Seri, 569.

clawd, 272.

clay for iron, 128.

clebran, 277.

Cledyv Divwlch, 529.

Clip y Gylfin-hir, 228.

cloch, 519.

Cloch y Pibwr, 519.

Clochan na bh-Fomhor-

ach, 433.
Clodd, Mr., 584, 585,

593, 598> 607, 628.
Clogwyn Dn, 476, 477.

— y Gwin, 50.
cluain, 513.

Clun Hir, 22, 513.

— Kein, 513.
Clutorig-i, 535.

Clvvch Dernog, 457, 568:

see Cnwch D.
clwy' byr, 230, 691.
Clychau Aberdyfi, 418,

692.
Clydach, 536.
Clyn, 513.

— Derwen, 513.

— Ystyn, 513: see Glynn.
C'lynnog, 363 : see Celyn-
nog.

cnocc, cnoc, 457.
cnu, cneifio, 225.
cnwc, 457.
cnwch, 457, 568.
Cnwch Coch, 457.

— Dernog, 457, 568.
cockfighting, 59.
coed, coat, 546.
Coed Arian, 402.

— y ©61, 31.

— y Gaer, 519.

— Howel, 58.

INDEX

699

Coelbren Station, 20,
Coetmor, 68.
cognomen (for nomen),

676.
coiced, 511,
Colby, 336.

€011,326,503-5,519,672.
Colifrevvi, 503, 504.
comalta, 539.
comb, Twrch's, 512.
comhdhail, 336.
Commission, the Welsh

Land, 690.
Common Prayer, Book

of, 373;
Communion, the Holy,

690.
Conaing, 435, 439.
Conaire Mor, 424.
Conall Cernach, 502.
Conchobar,624, 657,680.
conchylium, 269.
Condla Ruad, 661, 691.
conduail, 264.
confarreatio, 649.
Conghus, 568.
Connaught, 501 , 502, 617.
Connla Cainbhrethach,

617.

— Ruad, 291, 661, 691.
Connla's Well, 390.
Conus, Connws, 568.
Conway, 199.

Conwy, the, 30, 134, 199,

693-
coquille, 269.
cor, 69.

cor, corr, korr, 671, 681.
coracle, the Marchlyn,2 36.
Coraniaid, 674, 675.
Corannians, the, 196,674,

675-
Cordeilla, Cordelia, 547.
Coritani, Coritavi, 675,

677.
Cord Prydain, 560.
corlan, 150.
Cormac, 309, 310.
corn, 539.

Com Gafattt, 538, 539.
— , Lai du, 694.

— Prydain, 560: see Cord".
Comavii, 388.

Comet, 489.
Cornewe, 567.
Cornwall, 503, 506, 519,

573,611,612.
Corn wen. Corn wan, 235.
Cornwy, 567, 568.
coron ynys y ceuri, 280.

corrach, 671.

corrguinigh, 619, 681.

corryn, 217, 671.

Cors Fochno, 417.

Corsicans, the, 654.

Corwen, 671.

Corwrion, 47, 51, 52, 55,
57-9> 60, 61, 64, 70,
229,241,401,526,584,
598, 674.

Cotton, Mr., 600.

counting by fives, 8, 664.

couvade, the, 654.

Cowlyd Farm, 198.

Cowperiaid, 67, 69, 668.

Coychurch, 354, 355.

Craig y Derwydbn, 468.

— y Dinas : see C. y
©inas.

— y ©inas, 439, 459,
461, 496.

— Gwrtheym, 487.

— ILwyd, 524.

— y Nos, 254, 257, 674.
Craigfryn Hughes, Mr.,

i73-9i> 257, 269, 462,

486, 593, 691.
crannog, a, 73 : see Sy-

fadon.
— , a natural, 533,
crap ar y wrach, 450, 693.
eras dy fara, 4, 17, 28, 30.
crau, 69.
credu, 225.

Cregeen, Archibald, 349.
cretem, 225.
creu, 526 : see crau.-
Creurd'ilad,Creid'ylat,547.
Creu-Wyrion, 526 : see

Corwrion.
Creuwyryon, Creweryon,

70 : see Corwrion.
criafol, 292, 691.
Criccieth, 201, 219, 276,

443-
Crickhowel, 516.
crimbil, 263,267, 431,591.
cristin, 387.
cristynogaeth, 387.
crithod, 253.
cro, 69.

Croagh Patrick, 335.
crochan aur, 470.
crocodile, the, 431.
croes, 28.

Croes-Willin, 410-12.
Cromwell, 174-
Cronk ny Harrey, 311.

— yn Irree Laa, 286, 311.
Cronus, 440, 494.

Cross Ivar, 334.

cross roads, 295.

Croyland, 676, 677.

Cruc Howel, 516 : see
Crickhowel.

Crug y Balog, 152.

Crugcaith, 201 : see Cric-
cieth.

craim, 530.

cruimther, 629,

Cruithne, pi. Cmithni,
281, 282, 689.

Cramlin Pool, 404 : see
Crymlyn. ^

cruth, 530, 53T. V,,

crwth, 281,

Crymlyn, 191, 192, 376,
401, 404-6, 605.

Cuch, 499, 500.

Cuchulainn, 320, 385,
388, 483, 528, 603,
613, 624, 653, 656,
657, 663, 683.

cuim, 292.

culbard, 440.

Cumberland, 466.

Cunedagius, 503.

Cuneda, 378, 408, 503,

570-
cunning man, the, iii,

264, 331.
Cunogussi, 56S.
Cupitianus, 566.
Cuman, 384.
curtus, 671.
cutty one, the, 294.
cwcwtt wy iar, 269.
Cwettyn, 32, 44, 48, 50,

83, 107.
Cwm Berwyn, 577.

— Brwynog, 31, 33, 4*^ •

— Ceulan, 577.

— Corryn, 217, 671.

— Drywenyd, 34, 35.

— Du, 516-9.

— Dyli, 80, 134, 473,

474> 477-

— Hafod Ruffyd, 86, 98.

— Kerwyn, 512, 529.

— ILwch, 22.

— Marchnad, 91, 92.

— Pennant, 13S, 140.

— Strattyn, 96, 443, 668

— Tawe, 251, 257.

— Tir M)Tiach, 150.
Cwmbran, 14.
Cwmglas, 35, 36, 673.
Cwmttan, 98, 115, 116,

473. 476.
Cwmydw, 15.

700

INDEX

Cwn Annwn, 143, 144,

215-7, 203.
Cwrvagyl, 512.
Cwrwgl, Bryn, 237 : see

coracle,
cwta, cota, 225.
cwys yr Ychen B., 579.
cyfaitt, cyfaittt, 539.
cyfarwyd", kyvarwyd, 264.
Cyfelach, 163.
cyferthwch, 508.
cyfoeth, -og, 619.
cyhir, cyhirau, 453.
cyhiraeth, cyhoereth,453.
cylfeird, 440.
cymod, 442.

Cymiy, Cymru, 226, 281.
Cynan (Cinnan), 404,

406, 480.
Cyntfelw, 58, 202, 456.
Cynffig, 402 : see Keufig.
cynhebrwng, 274.
Cynlas ab Cynan, 530.
cynnil, 264.

Cynric Rwth, 673, 674.
Cynyr, 693.
cyrfaglach, cryf-, cyfr-,

450, 591-

dadwitsio, 363.

daear, 259.

daeth yr awr, &c., 243,

244.
dafad, -en, =a wart, 31.
DafydBu Eryri, 218.

— ab Gerattd, 270.

— ab Gwilym, 12, 439.

— Meirig, 464-6.

— Offeiriad, 280.
Dalan, 424, 680.
Dalby, 289, 352, 353.
Dalmeny, 550.
Daly ell, 273.
Dattwaran, Datt weir, 504.
Dattweir Dattben, 503,

604-
Daitwyr, 505 : see Datt-

weir.
dan, gen. dana, 646.
dana, 441.
dandy-dogs, 217.
Danu, Donu, 544, 554,

645, 646.
Danube, 441.
dar, 259, 691,
Daronwy, Darronwy,504,

507, 565-9-
dates, 15, 107, 197, 307,

323, 350-2.

Davies, 163.

— , David, 402.

— , J. H., 354, 355, 491.

— , Wm., 147, 376, 450:

see Hywel.
dd, (t, 2.

De Saussure, M., 64I.
Debatable Ground, the,

585, 593.
Dechtere, 613, 657.
decimal system, the, 663.
Dee and Andee, 618.
Dee, the Aberdeen, 244.
— , the Welsh, 387, 441-

3.445-
defaid gwytttion, 31.
Deganwy, 68.
Deira, 508.
Demetian, 12.
Demetrius, 173, 493-5.
Denholm, 585.
Der-Chairthinn, 292.
Dera, son of Scera, 427.
Dermot, 437, 691.
Dernog, Dernok, Dor-

nok, 567, 568.
Derwenyd", 34.
DeugleiTyf, 512.
Deunant, 230, 330.
deva, Deva, 442.
devil and his dandy-dogs,

the, 217.

— the Manx, 347.

— shape-shifting, the, 20.
Devil's Bridge, the, 577.
Devon, 503, 519.

dew, May morn, 308.
Dewi Glan Ffrydlas, 99,

268, 450.
Dewid", Dewi, 476.
Zia^oKos, 348.

diafol, diafl, diawl, 20,
348.

dial, 408.

dialect words, Welsh : see
12, 19, 24, 28, 29, 51,
63, 64, 76, 81, 133,
177, 200,204, 209, 214,
323, 225, 229, 235,
246,252, 253,259,263,

269, 273, 282, 377,

404, 450, 451, 592,
603, 691.
diaspad mererid, 383,

.384-
diawl, the, 20.
Die y Pibyd", 202.
Dick, Mary, 351.
difenwi, 510.
Digdi, 393-

dihaed", diheit, 621.
Din Emreis, 469, 565 :
see Dinas Emrys.

— Tywi, 515.
Dinas Affaraon, 505.

— Dintte, 207, 219, 401,
543, 645.

— Emrys, 148, 458, 469,
473, 495, 507, 564,
565-

— Fiaraon, 507.

— Mawdwy, 137.
dind, 498.
dindsenchas, 498, 519,

539-
Dinttaen, 226-8.
Dintte : see Dinas Dintte.
Dintteu, 543 : see Dinas.
Dinorwig, 234, 237.
diroch, 692.
discreet cauldron, the,

442-
Disynni, the, 144, 416.
di-wyneb, 634.
Dochon, Abbas, 163.
Docunni, Abbas, 163.
Docunnus, 163.
Docwinnus, 163.
Dogfael, 163.
D61 Bydye, 246.

— Howel, II.
dolath, 273 : see toleth.
Dolau Bach, 501.

— Cothi, 535.
Dolbenmaen, 93, 107,

668.
Doler, Dolor, 565 : see

Solor.
Dolgette dol a gottir,

692.
Dolgettey, 244, 692.
dollar, 156, 157.
Dollgarreg, 15.
dolmens and monoliths,

358-
dolur byr, 230, 691.
Dolwydelan, 77, 78, 80,

84, 132, 134,204,670,

689.
Dolyd-Elan, 132 : see

Dolwydelan.
Don, the Aberdeen, 244.
Don, 208-10, 454, 544,

548-50. 554, 644-6,

685, 686.
Donn = John, 209.
Donn, 581.
Donnos, 581.
Donnotaurus, 581.
Donu, 645, 646 : see Danu.

INDEX

701

Donwy, 441,

Dore Valley, the, 416.

Dormaith, 216.

Dorronwy, 567 : see Dar-
onwy.

Dorstone, 329, 416.

dos i ben y bryn, &c., 219.

Dovaston, J. F. M., 410,
412, 413.

Dovey, the, 144,416,614.

Dowth, 482.

dragons, the, 469.

Drogheda, 481.

Drostan, 480.

Drudwyn, 529.

drui, 616.

druids, 436, 622, 623,
631, 658, 680.

druith, 619.

Drum, the, 255.

Drustagn-i, 480.

drwi, 29 : see trwi.

Drws y Coed, 38, 84, 86,
90-3, 668.

Drystan, 480, 499.

dryw, pi. drywon, 445,
616.

du, 32, 225.

Dubgint, 694.

dubh, 225.

Dubr duiu, 441.

Dulan, 210: 5^^ Dylan.

Dumnonians, the, 286.

Dumnonias, the two, 503.

Dun Cearmna, 632.

Duncraigaig, 345.

dust charm, the, 303.

dwarfs, 431, 432, 671,
672, 684, 694.

Dwrgynt, 694.

dwy, dwyf, duiu, 442.

Dwyfach, 108, 440-5.

Dwyfan, 440-5.

Dwyfor, Dwyfawr, 443.

dwyn, dwg, 649.

Dwynaur, 443 : see Dwy-
for.

Dwynech, 443 : see Dwy-
fach.

Dwynwen, St., 367.

Dyaus, 642, 644.

Dyfed, Dyved, 152, 499,

5oo> 505- 525> 548.
Dyfi, 614 : see Dovey.
Dyffrydan, 243.
Dyffryn Gwyn, 143.
— Mymbyr, loo, 161.
Dyfnwal Moelmud, 503.
Dyfodwg, 23.
Dyfrdonwy, 441.

Dyfrdwyf, Dyfrdwy, 441,

445-
Dylan, 117, 207, 210.
Dytlgoed, 380.
dyn, 264.

— cynnil, 264, 595.

— hysbys, 264, 350.

— tiaw-harn, 19, 20,

— ysprydol, 19.
dynes, 264.
Dyssyrnant, 144.
dywawt, 616.

eagle, the, 609-11,
Ebliu, Eblinde, 436.
Ecell, 537, 542.
Echel, 536, 637, 541,
542.

— Vordwyt-twit, 530.
edafwr, 404.

Edem, 276, 278.

— ab Nud", 672, 681.
edifeirwch, 408.
Edmond, 488 : seeKymon.
Edward the Black Prince,

487, 489.
Edward III, 487, 488,

489, 491.
Edwards, Ellen, 138, 140,

141.
— , O. M., 146, 148, 215.
— , Robert, 237.
Edwin, 504, 507.
Efail Newyd; yr, 77.
Egel,Ecel,536,537, 541,

542, 544-
Egeria, 130.
egg-shell test, the, 62,

220, 223, 263-5, 268,

269.
Eglwys Each, 607.
Eglwyseg, 238.
Egyptian, 681,
Eibhear, 393.
Eidilig, 505, 672.
Eifion, Eifionyd, 84, 508,

588.
Eifl, the, 84, 214, 218,

278, 279.
eight days' christening,

the, 102.
Eildon, 466.
Eilian, 212-4, 673.
Eilio, Eilian, Moel, 206.
eiliw, 282.
Einion ab Gwalchmai,

217.

— Las, 114, 150.
Einon, the, 517.
Eiriawn Penttoran, 530.

eirif, 282.

Eistedfod, the, 82, 361,

691, 693, 694.
Elan, 208, 209.
Elbodug-o, 271.
Elen Egryn, 242.
Elenyd, 525.
Elfod, 117, 271.
Elfod'w, 271.
eli, 657.

Eli, 529. 530. 5.^7-

— Atver, 529, 657.
^li Loga, 657.
Elidyr, 271.

— Mountain, 234.
Eliodorus, 117, 269, 270,

660.
'HA-toSoipos, 270.
Elis bach, 223, 224, 227.

— o'r Nant, 134, 476-9,
689.

Elised, Elized, 476.

Eliwlod, 610.

Ellis, Archdeacon, 371.

— of Ysgoldy, Robert,

237-
Elmetiaco, 693.
Elphin, 614.
Elvet Lewis, Mr., 484.
Ely, Isle of, 677.
Emlyn, 161, 499.
Emwnt, 67.
Emyr ILydaw, 531.
enaid, 603, 607, 608,

625-7.
Enchanted Island, 171.
Endor, witch of, 349.
enech, 634.
enech-gris, -log, -lann,

634-
ened, 603 : see enaid.
Enemy of Souls, the, 347.
Enez-Sun, 386 : see Sein.
England, Little, 192.
englynion of the graves,

383, 384-
Eocha Eachcheann, 433.
Eochaid Airem, 424, 680.

— mac Maireda, 381,

435-7-
Eochraidhe, 531, 613.
Eoghan Taidhleach, 393.
Eporedorix, 531.
Eri, 529.

Erigena, 617, 620.
Erris, 286.
eruptions of water, 426,

427.
Eryri, 475, 497, 503,

509.

702

INDEX

Esgair ILaethdy, lo, 13.
Esgeir Oervel, 510, 511.
esgynnyd", 422, 423.
Essyitt, 480, 499.
Esylht, 480.
Etain, 531, 613, 621, 680,

683.
Etar, 613.
Ethylda, 480.
Etthil, 480 : see Essyitt.
Eumach, 507, 564, 565.
Evain de Gales, 489 : see

Yvain.
Evan, Yuan, 490 : see

Yvain.
Evans, Abel, 13S, 140.
— , Francis, 518.
— , Hugh, 207.
— , John, 396.
— , Capt. John, 171.

— Jones, Mr., 107-9.
— , Mrs., 192.

— , Thomas, 167-9.
Everliving, realm of the,

661.
Ewein, 489.
Ewybrnant, 478.
Excalibur, 476.
i^iuvevcxe, 626.
Ezekiel xvi. 6, 297.

f=v, 2.

face, the, 632-5.

Faery as Annwn, 502,

503-
— , entrance to, 20, 112,

205, 227, 238.
— , glimpses of, 158, 161,

170-2, 230, 330.
— , lighted by stones, 112.
— , sojourners in, 50, 153-

5, 191, 200, 250, 255,

291, 496.
fagaint, 335.
fairies : see lake lady,

mermaid, brownie.

— ancestral, 170, 597.

— cleanly, 83, 193, 194.

— dishonest, 82, 99, 194,
220, 251.

— female only, 245, 661.

— fond of circumlocu-
tion, 107.

— fond of blond persons,
212, 214, 221.

— fond of fish, 292.

— fond of the green
sward, 1S4.

— fond of milk, 36, 193,
224, 502, 597.

fairies honest, 83, 159.

— immortal, 83, 678.

— inexorable, 186, 250.

— opulent, 83.

— ugly, 188, 262, 667.
fairies' agents, 159, 161,

255j 256.

— favourites, 161, 173,

227, 289.

— habitat, 84, 103, 200,
221, 228, 277.

— midwife, 63, 98, 99,
147, 212, 220, 223, 227,

228, 291.

— origins, 445, 449, 659.

— proxy for handling
iron, 63, 241.

fairies abducted, 39, 45.

— armed with the sword,
185.

— captured, 86, 90.

— detected, 62, 103, 162,

220, 223, 231, 263-5,
268, 269.

— exorcized, 221, 228.

— incommoded, 141, 230.

— insulted, 193, 594.

— watched, 60, 85.
fairies blinding, 99, iii,

147, 198, 213, 228.

— bringing sweethearts,
151.

— burning the corn, 185.

— causing idiocy, 21,193.

— dupingpeople,85,ioo,
116, 200,223, 239, 262.

— flying, 54, 55.

— haymaking, 53.

— hunting, 83.

— kidnapping, 82, 100,
110,199, 220,227,228,
255, 256, 262, 276, 289.

— marketing, 63, 82, 147,
159-61.

— mining, 53.

— mowing, 53, 63.

— riding, 194, 215, 239,
240.

— serving, 45, 87, 97,
I09> 597> ^672, 673,
691.

— shelter-seeking, 56, 83,
no, 151, 192, 194,
198, 240.

— smoking, 693.

— soliciting favours, 63,

221, 224, 227-9, 231,
241.

— spinning, 64, 198, 212,
213, 229.

fairies thatching, 238.

— troubling, 185, 188,

— working on Sunday,

63-
fairies and baptism, 8, 9,
82, 100, 1 10, 292, 293.

— and bread, 4-6, 28, 30,
64, 194, 227, 228, 241,
251, 660.

— and clay, 129.

— and dolur byr, 230.

— on the floating isle, 93.

— as ghosts, 290, 691.

— and gipsies, 106.

— and grass, 170.

— and the hour, 85, 227,
265.

— and iron, 32, 35, 39-
41, 46, 51, 54, 55, 61,
87, 88, 97, 106, 108,
129,147, 200, 231, 241,
250, 598, 660.

— and the June moon,

150, 151-

— and the lakes, 33, 52,
54. 67, 72, 125.

— and luck, 97, 137, 251,
669.

— as magicians, 196,669,
681.

— in mist, 33, 212, 220,
223, 228.

— in the moon's light,

85, 96, ^50, 151. 198-
200, 203, 265.

— like mortals, 670.

— and their names, 45,
54, 55, 61, 87, 88, 97,

229, 457, 588, 590-3.
595, 597, 598, 663.

— near old sites, 1 36, 2 1 2,
227, 245, 674.

— and their plough, 63,
184.

— and prices, 147, 159,
160.

— and the rowan tree, 85,

137-

— and salt, 292.

— of several kinds, 82,
83,96, 103, 220, 250.

— underground, 82, 83,
161, 173, 206, 213,

230, 254.

— and water, 52, 54, 56,
67, 84, 136, 170, 187,

243, 445, 449-

— and witches, 195, 243.
fairy anhnals, 53, 83, 215,

238-40, 292, 502.

INDEX

703

fairy attachment, 250,
672.

— boats, 137, 170.

— characteristics, 278,
660, 669, 670.

— children, 62, 103, 162,
194, 220-4, 227, 231,
263-5, 268, 269, 276,
450, 451, 667.

— counting, 8, 418, 660,
664.

— delay, 73,74,186,420,

423-5-

— displeasure, 54, 74,
185,189,192,193,235,
250,255,425, 594.

— dress,44, 133, 139,185,
200, 245, 246, 250.

— ethics, 419,420, 425.

— fare, 270.

— felicity replaced by a
bird's warbling, 155.

— food, 290.

Fairy Glen, the, 205.
fairy glow-worm, 60.

— gratitude, 36, 56, 116,

137, I4i>i5i> 193,194.
198,221,224, 227,228,
230, 240, 241.

— hosts, 152.

— jollity, 33, 35, 39, 44,
85, 96, 99, 100, III,
115, 176,199, 200,203,
212,215,243,245,246,
251.

— language, 270, 272,
273, 277, 279, 660.

— liberality, 37, 38, 56,
110,111,193,194,199,
203, 204, 227, 228.

— mamma, 72, 89, 90,

93> "3, 139-

— money, 36-8, 56, 82,
99, 108, 110, 111, 137,
141, 194, 198, 203, 221,
224, 240, 241, 254,
255.

— music, 153, 176, 201,
202, 262, 292, 293.

— ointment, 63, 99, 147,
198, 213, 291.

— palace, 98, 203.

— papa, 93, 98, 99, 112,
127, 128, 276, 531.

— password, 254.

— rings, 85, 153, 194,
204,222,239,240,245,
671.

— secretiveness, 38, 83,
141, 203, 241.

tairy shooting, 291-3.

— soap, 213.

— song, a Welsh, 176.

— time, 154, 170, 191,
424.

— walking-stick, 116.

— wells, 150, 425, 436.

— wife taking her hus-
band to her country, 49.

fairy's descendants resent-
ing her name, 89, 93,
96, 105, 108.

— dowry, 92, 419.

— husband to shun iron,
108.

faith, 616.

Fan Chapel, the, 183,
190, 191.

— Fach, the, 312, 664.
Farches, y, 218.
farreum libum, 649.
fascination by water,

405-7-
fasg, 434-
fatum, 649.
fe allai, 644.
feeackle y jargan, 337.
feis, 527.
Felix, 676.
fenodyree,the,i09, 286-9,

324, 348.

— and his clothes, 287,

324-

— and the hare, 287, 324.

— the threshing, 286.
Fenton, Ferrar, 171.
fer side, 677.
Ferdeadh, 483.
Ferdre, y, 4.

F^re, M., 633.
Ferghoir, 511.
Fergus, 568.

— mac Roig, 603.
Ferguson, Joseph, 612.
ferrishyn, 289.
Fiacc's Hymn, 678.
Fick, Dr., 641.

finaun wenestir, 383, 395,
Finn, 437-9> 484. 5ii-
finn brsekr, 288.
Fionn, 511 : see Finn.
Fir Bolg, 694.

— Dea, 645.
Fir Ulaid, 656.

fire and brimstone, 195.
— , its efficacy, 296, 304,

Fire, the Great, 486,

fires on May-day, 309.
first person, the, 452, 672.

first things, the two, 107.
first-foot, the, 337-41 :

see qualtagh.
Fisher, John, 379-8 1 , 46S ,

469, 485-7, 490, 494.
fisherman and the fire,

the, 305.
Fishguard, 165.
Fittletetot, 590.
Fitzgerald, Mr., 60,
— , David, Bishop, 270.
fjun, 288.

Flesc, Lam, Luam, 390.
Flinc Houvel, 488, 489.
floating island, the, 172.
foawr, foawragh, 286,

432.
Fochard, Faughard, 414.
Foelattt, y, 578.
folda, 533.

fomhair, famhair, 432.
fomor, fomhor, 286, 432.
Fomoraig, Fomhoraigh,

432, 433-
Fomori, 286, 432, 433,

435, 439-
forelock plucked, the, 353.
Fortunata, 647.
Four Crosses, the village

of, 222.
Francises, 68, 238.
Frazer, Dr., 638, 662.
Frazers, 68, 238, 239.
Freeman, Mr., 687.
freht, 66.

French landing, the, 165.
Freni, the, 245, 424, 425.
fritten, frittenin, 66.
Froissart, 488, 490, 491.
front door in the back,

230.
furrow across Mydfai

Mountain, the, 10.
Fuwch P"raith, y, 694.
fy ngwr, fy ngwr! &c.,

453-

fynney, 288.

ff, 2.

Ffaraon, 507: see Af-

faraon.
Ffarwel Die yPibyd, 202.

— Dwm Bach, 202.

— Ned Puw, 202.
fferytt, fferyttt, 539.
fflagen, 380.

Ffos 'Nod'yn, 205.
Ffrid", 104, 105.
ffrityn, -en, 64.
Ffynnon Beris, 366.

704

INDEX

Ffynnon Cae Garw, 361.

— Cae Moch, 354.

— Cefn ILeithfan, 362.

— Eilian, 357, 395.

— Faglan, 362, 363.

— Fair, 364.

— Fair ]Land\vyn, 367.
ffynnon fenestr, 383 : see

finaun.
Ffynnon Feuno, 363.

— Grassi, 367, 384.

— Gwyned, 365.

— Gwynwy, 361.

— Gybi, 365.

— Gywer, 376, 401,419,
691.

— Marcros, 356.

— Pen Rhys, 356.
ffynnon reibio, 357.
Ffynnon Saethon, 364.

— y Saint, 364.

— yr Ychen, 399.
— : see Well.

gaaue mwaagh, the, 294,

295-
Gader, the, 105.
gaem, 691.
Gaer, the, 518.
Gaidoz, M., 500.
Galiuin, 618, 694.
Gattcoyt, 514.
Gallizense, 331.
gambo, 16, 17.
Garman Glas, 427.
Garmon, 39.
Garn, the, 220: see Cam

Dolbenmaen.

— Fawr, 172.

— Goch, 255.

Garry Geerlaug,483,492.
Garselid Wydel, 529.
garth, 210.

Garth Dorwen, 210, 212,
213.

— Eii, 537.

— Grugyn, 515, 522,

524, 528, 530. 537-
Garwy, 441.
Gaster, Dr., 519.
Gath Dorwen, 210: see

Garth D.
Gattie, G. B., 125, 130.
Gaul, 623, 624.
Gavaelvawr, 530.
Gavian, 169, 170.
Geirionyd", 30.
geisel, gisal, 542.
Gelert, 567 : see Kelert.

Geffi, the, 221.
generation, the third,

408.
— , the fifth, 423.
— , the sixth, 413.
— , the seventh, 420, 423,

425-
— , the eighth, 420, 425.
— , the ninth, 73, 403,

404, 421.
Gentes Nigrse, 694.
Geoffrey, 280, 406.
Gerald, 271 : 5^^Giraldus.
Germanus, St., 412, 413.
Gerwyn Du, the, 187.
Geryon, 550.
Gesail Gyfarch, 219,
gessa, 647.
Gethin, John, 19, 20.
— Jones, Mr., 204-6,
Gethings, one of the,

255 : see Gethin.
ghost laid, a, 73.
ghostly rehearsals, 275.
giall, 542.
Giant's Causeway, the,

433-
giants, Manx, 285.
Gibby, Benjamin, 399,

400.
Gick, William, 312.
Gigha, Gigay, 692.
Gilberd, Gilbert, 545.
Gildas, 546.
gilla, .'^45-

Gilla Decair, the, 437-9.
Gilla-min, 545.
Gitta, 546.
Gillitrut, 593.
Gilmin Troedd'u, 444,

545-
Gilvaethwy, 545, 693.
Ginst Point, 513.
Giraldus, 21, 90, 117,

269-71, 441.
girl and the afanc, the,

433, 434, 689.
Gist, the, 478.
glaisrig, glaistig, 2 89.
glam dicenn, 681.
Glamorgan, 691.
— , peat and wood fires in,

267.
glan, 31Q.
Glan y Gors, 276.
Glanfryd, 121.
Glannawc, Glannog, 414.
Glanusk, Lord, 518.
Glasbury, 74.
Glascodine, Mr., 405.

Glasfryn, 164, 278, 366-

75.389, 401-
glashtyn, the, 285, 289,

324. 4.34-
Glaslyn, 474, 475.

— Lake, 134.

Glass House, the, 440.
Glasynys, 40,41, 66, 93,
95, 109, 116, 117, 130,

135, 137, 150, 155,

156, 164, 271.
Glen Rushen, 287.
Glendevon, 156, 157.
Glew ab Yscawt, 529.
Glewlwyd, 530.

giyn, 513-

Glyn Iwrch, 218.

— ILifon, 208, 213, 215,

444, 545-

— Ned", 18.

— Tawy (Tawe), 18.

— y Tylwyth Teg, 205;
Glynn Ystu, 513.
Glythmyr Ledewig, 529.
Goborchinn, 432.
Godfrey, 483.
Godhroedh, Godred, Gor-

ry, 483-

Gofannon,532, 543, 550,

551,645.
Goffarius, 281.
Gofynion,Gofynyon,532,

543, 551: see Gofaunon.
Gogarth, 414.
Gogigwr, 530.
Goibniu, Goibnenn, 543,

544-
Goidelic dying out, 509,
528,570.

— traces, 39, 8r, 235,

514,519, 523, 544-
Goidels in Wales, 148,

279, 280, 472, 566-70,

636, 637, 645.
Golden Valley, the, 192,

328, 416, 460, 461.
golligaut, helligaut, 394.
gotlwng, 378.
Gomme, Mr., 103, 310,

346, 358, 360.
Gonorilla, 547.
goresgynnyd', 404, 421-3.
Gorffwysfa Beris, 566.
Gormant, 478.
gormot, 395.
Gors Fawr, 149.

— Goch, no.

— Las, 380, 381,
gossamer, 103, 104, 671.
gota, y, 294.

INDEX

705

Govynnyat, 514.
gradett, 221, 231 : see

padett.
Grail, the Holy, 439, 548,

553-
Grasholm, 171, 548.
grass spell, the, 170, 690.
Grassi, 367-72, 384.
Greek, 641.
Green Grounds, the, 402.

— Islands, 170, 173.
green sward, the, 419,427.
Greenan-Ely, 481.
Greenwell, Canon, 345.
Gregor, Mr., 103.
Greid, 529.

Grianan of Aileach, 481 :

see Greenan-Ely.
Griffin, Gerald, 205, 418.
Griffith, Dr., 533.
— , Miss Lucy, 244, 692.
Grim Ogo', the, 411,412.
grippiach greppiach, &c.,

451-
Grongar, 515.
Gronw Pebr, 609, 620,

622.
Grove Island, the, 402.
Grucand, gen. Grucind,

528.
Gruffydab Einon, 159.

— or Gruffud", 203.

— Prisiart, 80.

— ab Rhys, 72.

— Says, 487, 491.
Grugyn, 511, 522, 530,

537; ^
Grumio, 694,
Grwyne, 516.
grym, 620.
guee, gwee, 349.
Guernsey, 301, 302, 331,

489.
Guest, Lady Ch., 536.
Guid gen, 551.
Guitnev, 383 : see Gwyd-

no.
gulat, 629.
Gumanyn, 550.
Gurbodu, Guruodu, 532 :

see Gwrbothu.
Guthlac, St., 676, 677.
gwaeldyn, 365.
Gwaen ILifon, 206, 444.

— y Rhos, 177.
Gwair, Gweir, 678, 679.
gwaith gwr, 377.
Gwales, 548.
gwalstawt ieithoed, 511.
gvvan, 619,

gwartheg y tiyn, 144.
Gwarthegytf, 529.
Gwarwyn-a-Throt, 595,

596.
gwas twt, 592.
Gwastad Annas, 77, 78,

80, 566.
— Meirionyd", 242.
gwawd, 616.
Gwawl, 637.
gwawn, 103, 671.
gwedel, wedel, wed'al, 12,

24 : see hwedel.
Gweirglod y Telynorion,

206.
Gweiryd', 189.
gvvette, 147.
Gwelsantfrait, 568.
gwely g'l'absant, 76.
Gwendraeth Fawr, the,

379.
Gwenfrewi, 188, 503.
Gwennan, 207-10.
Gwenogvryn Evans, J.,

280,330,425,453,487,

603, 604.
Gwent, 192, 503,505,506.
Gwentian, i 2.
gwe'r cor, corryn, 671.
Gwerdon, 204 : see Wer-

d"on.
Gwerdbnau ILion, 120,

121, 204.
Gwestin of Gwestiniog, 7 1 •
gwetid, 616.
Gwgon, 689.
gwiber, 690.
Gwilenhin, 530.
GwionBach,6i3,6i5,6i7.
gvifiz, gwez, 527.
gwlithlaw, 223.
Gvvflydyn Saer, 530.
gwr, 264.

Gwr Blew, y, 481, 493.
gwr cyfarwyd", loi.
— hyspys, 150.
Gwrach y Rhibyn, 81,

453-
Gwraged Annwn, 191.
Gwrbothu Hen, 531, 532,

551-

gwrdueichyat, 500.

gwreic kynmwyt, 649.

Gwrfodw, 531 : see Gwr-
bothu.

Gwrgwst, 568.

Gwrhyr, 511, 512.

Gwriad, 218.

Gwrych Ereint, 51 1.

Gwryd, 217.

Z Z

Gwryd Cai, 565.
Gwy, 392, 516.
Gwybr fynyd, 478.
Gwybrnant, Gwybrant,

478.
gwyd, 218.
Gwydion, 69, 117, 326,

50i> 503. 525. 526,

551, 608-10, 620, 637,

644-6.
Gwydir, 203, 490.
Gwydre, 529.
Gwydawg Gwyr, 530.
Gwydel, pi. Gwydyl,

Gwydelod, 148, 458,

472, 473: see Goidels.
Gwydfa Rita, 478, 479.
Gwydno, 383, 387, 415,

417,614.
Gwyd'on Ganhebon, 429.
Gwyd'yl to get hidden

treasure, 148, 473, 554.
Gwyl Awst, 312.
gwyl fabsant, 76, 93.
Gwyl Galan, 244.
Gwyn ab Nud", 117, 143,

216.

— ab Tringad, 530.
gwynebwerth, -warth,634.
Gwynedh, 412: see Gwyn-

ed.
Gwyned, 412, 500, 525,

526,559.560,570,573,

610.
Gwynionyd", 151, 161-3,

166-9, 466, 484.
Gwyrfai, 44, 569.
gwys, Gwys, 522, 524,

526, 527.
gwystl, 542.

gylfin-hir (gylfinir), 219.
Gynt, 694.
gyrru kulhwch arna6,

628.

h in Glamorgan, 28, 29.
Habetrot, 593.
Habren, 448 : see Hafren.
Haddon, Prof., 683, 684,

694.
Hades, 500.
haearn, 259, 691.
Hafod y Borth, 473.

— Grugyn, 515.

— ILanberis, 35.

— Ruffyd", 105.

— Rugog, 107.
Hafodyd' Brithion, 98.
Hafoty'r Famaeth, 56.
Hafren, 392, 448, 449.

7o6

INDEX

Hagman-heigh, 317: see

Hob dy naa.
hair-cutting ceremony,

the, 647.
Halloween, 202,203,316,

686 : see All-hallows,

Calangaeaf, HoUan-

tide, Samhain.
Hanes Taliessin, 123.
harden hemp, 324.
hare and the fenodyree,

the, 2S6, 287, 324.

— smith, the, 294.

— witch, the, 294.
Harlech, 548.
ham, 259, 691.

harper surviving, the,
409, 410, 413-5.

Harper, Miss C. A., 690.

Harri'r Nawfed, 464.

Hartland, Mr., 18, 268,
359> 360, 406, 605.

Harvest, first Sunday in,
312.

haul i gaera, 200.

— ILanfabon, 265.
Haverfield, Mr., 535.
Hawstin, 504, 506 : see

Awstin.
hazels ofwisdom, the, 392.
Heidelberg, 76.
Helfa Fawr, 31, 33.
Helig ab Glannog, 387,

402, 414,415, 422-
hen, hen, 550, 551, 685.
Hen Wr o'r Coed, the,

156.
Hendre' Ard'wyfan, 442.
Hengwrt MSS., 490, 491 :

see Peniarth.
Henry II, 484.

— VIII, 490, 491, 516.

— IX, 491.
Henvinus, 503.
Henwen, 503, 504.
Herbert James, J., 403,

404.
Hercules, 550.
Hereward, 677.
Herodotus, 323.
Heywood, Thomas, 694.
hi, 643.

Highmead, 501.
hindmost, the devil take

the, 235.
Hiraethog, 694.
hiring fairs, 2 1 1, 2 1 3, 31 7.
Hirpeissawc, 531.
Hirwaen Wrgan, 404.
hob, the Yorkshire, 324.

hob dy naa, ju naa, 316:

see Hagman-heigh.
hobeu, 500, 525.
hobi wen, 57.
Hogmanay, 317 : see

Hagman-heigh.
Hog-unnaa, 316 : see

Hagman-heigh.
hott, hotit, 539.
Hollantide,3i5,3i8,320,

321.: see Halloween.
Holy Grail, the, 146.
Holyhead, 693.
hoof of Arthur's horse,

142.
Hopiar y Getti, 58, 60.
horse a tabu at sea, 345.
horse's ears, 231,232, 435,

672.
hosier, 287.

hot shovel, the, 103, 162.
houndsman. Own An-

nwn's, 216.
House, David, 488.
Howe, the, 311.
Howel the Physician, 14.
Howell, J. T., 354, 355.
Howells, W., 173, 268,

273, 381.

Hu Gadarn, 135, 142,
382, 429, 689, 694.

hual, 51.

Huandaw, 530.

Hiibner, Dr., 446.

hud a tledrith, 115.

Hugh Bifan, 135.

Hughes, Mr. Craigfryn :
see Craigfryn.

— , Mr. Derfel, 472.

— , Mr. Harwood, 380.

— , Mr. Hennessy, 201.

— , Morris, 198.

— , Morris, Cwm Corr3'n,
217.

— , Rachel, 174.

— , Robert, 214, 215,
217-9.

Hunganay, 316 : jec Hag-
man-heigh.

Huw Tegai, 52,

Huw'r Glyn, 304.

Huws, Daniel, 165.

hwch du gwta, yr, 225,
226, 498.

hwed'el, 12, 24.

Hy-Breasail, 171.

Hyde, Dr. Douglas, 433 .

hynaf dyn pan aiiher,269.

hyspys, hysbys, 150, 264.

Hywel, Howel, 489.

Hywel = Wm. Davies,
147, 148, 376, 450-

laco ab Dewi, 561.

iar, 259.

Iberian, Iberians,654,684.

Ibleid, 528 : see Y Blaiif.

Iceni, 675, 676.

Ickleford, 676.

Ickleton, 676.

Icklingham, 676.

Icknield Way, 676.

Icles, 676.

Iclingas, 676, 677.

id quod est, 629.

idiot prophet, the, 385.

idle incidents, 61, 124.

Idloes, 203.

Idnerth, 203.

Idris, 203, 408.

Idwal of Nantclwyd, 155,

203.
Idawc, 560.
Idon, 70.
ie, 644.
Ifan Morgan, 1 18-21.

— Owen, 78, 80.
il, 644.

Iliad, the, 640.

ime", 625.

instep, the question of,

339-41-
inundation stories, 419.
Inverary, 344.
lolo ap Huw, 202, 216.

— Morganwg, 403, 458,
461, 462.

"IjrrrapxoJ, 63 1.

i'r de, 365.

irhinn issid crist, 629,

iron, 87, 92, 93, 97.

— and the fairies : see
fairies.

— forcharming, 296, 297.

— shunned by a girl
coming from the fairies,
249.

Irrus Domnann, 286.
Is, Ville d', 386, 401.
Isabella, 65, 69.
Iscawyn, 529.
Iscovan Hael, 529.
Iselt, Iseut, 480.
Islands of the Dead, the,

439, 44°-
Isle of Prydain, 499, 505.
issit padiu itau gulat,629.
Ithel, 203.
iud", ud, 203.
Iverion, 550.

INDEX

707

Iwan Lakes, the, 577.
Iwerdbn, 204: i-^^Werdon.

Jack of France, 328.
Jane, 31.

jawl, 348 : see diafol.
Jephthah's daughter, 313.
Jessen, 658, 663.
Jesus College, 33.

MS. XX, 689.

Jesus, the name of, 353.
John, 31.

— ab Cadwaladr, 371.
Johnes of Hafod, Mr., 490.
Jones, 68, 163.

— , David, 376.

— D. J., 355.

— , Edmund, 174, 195,

350-
— , Grace, 203.

— Griffith, Grace, 371 :
see Grassi.

— , Hugh D., 33.

— , John, 361 : see Myr-

d"in Fard".
— , John, Tyn ILan, 78.
— , Professor J. Morris,

225, 681, 693.
— , Lewis, 222.
— , Owen, 414.
— , Robert Isaac, 98, 105,

106.
— , Theophilus, 518.
— , William, 84, 86, 94,

98, 99.
— , Sir William, 641.
Joughin, Mr., 351.
jour de I'an, 342.
Joyce's Celtic Romances,

437, 662.
Jubainville, M. d'Arbois

de, 617.
Jurby, 311.

Kabyles, 682.

kadir, 383.

kaer, caer, 282.

Kaer Gofannon, 550.

Kaer-a-Is, 386.

Kaer Kenedir, 384.

Kattureuy, 504 : see Cott-

frewi.
Kamschtschen, 268.
kedaul, 383.
keeill, 332.
Kei, 565 : see Cai.
Keiri, the, 214, 279, 386.
KiKaSi-Lai, KeKa5jj.evos, 282.
Kelcoet, 546.
Kelert, Kellarth, 567.

Kelly, Dan, 351, 352.
— Dr. J., 316.

kelpie, the, 243, 244, 285,

434-
Kenfig, 401-4, 452, 672.
Keredigion,5o6,5i5,525,

530.
Kermode, Philip, 311,

314. 333-
Kernyw, 503, 504, 506,

519-
Kerry, 665, 666.
— , Mont., 525.
Kervyn de Lettenhove,

489.
kerwyni of the Taff, the,

187.
Kewley, Mr., 352.
Keys, the House of, 343.
keys and pins on Easter

Sunday, 364.
kiark Catrina marroo,

336.
Kilcoed, 546.
Kilken, 513.
Killorglin, 433.
Kinran, 384.
kirchmesse, 76.
Kittlerumpit, 585-90.
klvstiav march, 572, 573.
knitting nights, 76.
knocking-stone, the, 586.
Knowth, 482.
knwgh, 567 : see cnwch.
Knwghdemok, 568.
Kohler, Dr., 593.
Kollman, Dr. Jul., 684.
korr, korrez, 671.
Koa/Mos, 282,
Krukyth, 201 : see Cric-

cieth.
Kiihlebom, 661.
Kulhwch, 509, 510, 628,

646.
Kymry, 569.

— in straits, 463.
kymu, 442.
Kynnwas, 512.
kywiw, 441.

1 for tt, 538, 539.
La ghian blieny, 320.

— nolick y biggy, 320.
Laa Boaldyn, 308 : see

May-day.

— Lhunys, 312.

— '11 mooar ny Saintsh,

346-
Labraid Lore, 435.

— Luath lam, &c., 547.

Z Z 2

Laighlainne, 427.
laith lemnacht, 502.
lake angler in a canoe,
the, 133.

— bells heard, 74, 192.

— calf, a, 10, 149.

— castles, 191.

— cattle, 144, 145.

— city seen, a, 73, 74-
lake lady : i-(?^ fairy, fairies.

counting, 8, 664.

fancying an apple,

127.

paralysing the arm

of the butcher, 145.

prophesying, 71,72.

struck, 129.

teaching medicine,

&C., II.

lake lady and bread, 3-6,

30.

inaboat, 17,18, 444.

like a mermaid,

124, 256.
lake lady's behaviour, the,

8-10.

dress, the, 145.

father, 7, 32, 430,

431-

gifted progeny, 128.

mother, the, 32.

sister, the, 7.

lake paradise, the, 21.

— piper, a, 149.

— spires, 74.

— spirit's victim, 244.

— thatcher, a, 238.

— woman washing, 133.
lakes, eruption of, 426.
— , uncanny, 22, 133,

143-
lam, 447.
Lam, 390.
Lamb the assassin, 489,

490.
Lammas, 312.
Lampeter, 152.
Lanarkshire, 346.
Land of Promise, 390.

— of the Women, 662.
langfiter, 51.
Lanion, 506.
Lanjaghan, 287.
lanketer, 51 : j-(?(,' langfiter.
Lapland witches, 331.
Lapps, the, 657, 658, 663,

683, 684.
Latin, 641.
Latium, Latio, 532, 535,

536, 693.

7o8

INDEX

Latter-day Saints, 492,

493-
Laugharne, 513.
Lawegogh, Lawgogh,

488 : see Owen.
Lear, lear, 549, 550.
Lee, the, 449.
leeches, 57.
Leem, Knud, 658.
Lefrith, y Fuwch Laeth-

wen, 146.
Legra, 547.
Legraceaster, 547.
Leicester, 547, 675.
Leire, 547.

Leisa Bela, 64, 65, 69.
Lenem, 72 : see ILyfni.
Ler, gen. Lir, 547-50:

see Lir.
Leskien, Professor, 641.
Lessb Forest, 268.
Letha, 532, 535. 536-
Leucarum, 514.
I^ewenny, 74 : see ILyfui.
Lewis, David, 18.

— Glyn Cothi, 74, 134,
135, 201.

Leyden, the poet, 466.
Lhunclys, 412 : see ILync-

lys.
Lhuyd, Lhwyd, 233, 412 :

see ILwyd.
Liath, 546.
Liban,373,375,376,382,

611.
Libyans, the, 682, 684.
licat, 391 : see itygad.
Licat Amir, 391.
lice, a plague of, 302.
Liger, 547.
Lincoln, 675.
Lincolnshire, 596, 597.

— folklore, 323-8.
Lindsay, Professor, 535,

629.
Lindum, 675.
Linn Mna F^ile, 390.
liobhagach an locha,

.434-
Lir, the Children of, 93,

.376, 547, 612, 6S4.
Litavia, 533: see ILyn

E-ydaw.
Lloyd Jones, Evan, 234.

— of Tratlwyn, H., 371.
Lob lie by the fire, 288.
Loch Dairbhreach, 376.

— Carman, 427.

— Melghe, 427.

— Owel, 124, 125. I

Loegaire Lore, 435.
Loire, the, 547.
London Bridge, 458,

464-6.
longfetter, 51, 52.
Lore, 231, 435.
Loth, M., 374, 375.
Lough Crew, 393.

— Erne, 612.

— Melvin, 427.

— Neagh, 373, 376, 381,
382, 394,426, 611.

— Ramor, 394.

— Reagh, 381.

— Ree, 381, 382, 426,
436.

— Sheelin, 394.
Loughor, 14, 514: see

ILychwr.
Louhen, 551 : see ILeu.
Louis XIV, 486.
Louth, 385.

Lovat family, the, 239.
Lovemii, Fill, 363.
Lowri Robart, 80.
Loxdale, Mr., 515.
Luam, 390.
lubber fiend, Milton's,

287.
lubhghort, 225.
Luchorpain, 432.
Lucht Cumachtai, 619,

637-
Lucifer, 618.
luck sacrifice, 305, 306,

307-
lucky fire, the, 310.
Lucretius, 354.
Lud, 448.

Ludesgata, Ludgate, 448.
Lug,gen.Loga, 312,542,

613, 618, 656, 657,

659-

Lug-aed, 507.
Lugnassad, 312.
Lugoves, 659.
Luguqurit-, 531. _
Luicridh, Luccraide, 531.
Lundy, 280, 679.
Lydney, 446, 448.

Had", 609, 610.
ILaen, 226.
ttafyrieu, 691.
itain, 226.
ttaith dy fara, 5.
ttamhigyn, 79.
ILan y Bydair, 603.

— y Gors, 536.

— Ystumdwy, 443.

ILanaelhaeam, 214, 217,

278.
ILanafan, 244.
ILanbedr Ystrad Yw, 516.
ILanberis, 31, 34, 35, 41,

46, 83, 84, 133, 366,

566, 604.
ILanbumsant, 274.
ILanciau Eryri, 473, 474,

497-.
ILandeiniolen, 36.
ILandew, 21.
ILandewi Brefi, 534, 537,

578-80.
ILandogwel, 163.
ILand'wyn, 219, 367.
ILandefatte, 13.
ILandegai, 41, 48, 52,

84.
ILandegla, 673.
ILandeilo Cressenny, 192.

— Fawr, 515.

— ILwydarth, 397-9.
ILandough, 163.
ILandiiilo'r Berwyn, 138.

— yn Rhos, 200, 357.
ILandrygarn, 268.
ILandybie, 380.
ILandydoch, 163.
ILandyfrydog, 239,
ILandysilio, Denb., 138.

— inDyfed, 513, 534.
ILandyssul, 152.
ILanegryn, 242.
ILanelian, Anglesey, 396.
— , Denbighshire, 396.
ILanengan, 231.
ILanfabon, 257, 265, 667.
ILanfachreth, 135.
ILanfair, 504, 507.
ILanfihangel Genau'r

Glyn, 506.

— y Pennant, 89.
ILanfor, 377, 378.
ILanfrothen, 81.
ILanfyrnach, 59.
ILangeitho, 578.
ILangoiten, 673, 674.
ILangorse, 534, 536.
ILangower, 376.
ILangybi, 164, 366, 367,

471.
ILangyfelach, 163.
ILangyntto, 648.
ILangynog, 456.
ILanilar, ILan Hilar, 515.
ILanttechid, 41.
ILannerch y Med", 239.
ILanover, 193-5, 602.
ILanrhaiadr, 526.

INDEX

709

ILanrwst, 30, 198, 204,

429, 568.
ILansanffraid, 199.
ILansantffread, the rector

of, 518.
ILantiissant, 461.
ILaniiwchityn, 146, 147,

566.
ILanuwttyn, 566.
I,anwenog, 152,648.
ILanwnda, Cam., 569.
— , Pern., 165.
ILanwonno, 265.
ILanwrthwl, 535.
tias, 515.
ILaw-harn, 19.
ILawttech, 148.
ttawn, 508.
ttawr glan, 84.
ILech y Deri, 152.

— y Derwytf, 152-5, 168.

— Gelydon, 560.

— Las, 560, 693.
ttechwaew, 689.
ttef, 72.

ILefn, the, 51.

ILefni, 72 : see ILyfni.

itefrith, 502.

ILeidr Dyfrydog, Cae,

239-
ILen y Werin, 234.
ILeu, 542, 543, 551 : see

ILew.
ttena, 434.

ILevelys, 196, 507, 674.
ILew ILawgyffes, 315,

542, 543, 551, 609,

Cio, 620-2, 645.
ILewelyn, Edward, 219-

21.
ILeyn, 84, 221, 226, 505,

508, 572, 584.
ILi, 386.
ILia Gvitel, 563.
ILidiad y Medygon, 11.
ILifon, 204, 206, 444 : see

IL'ion.
ILion, 204, 206, 207, 382,

429, 440, 443, 444.
ILithfaen, 215.
E^iwed", the, 474, 477.
ILonion, ILonyon, 504-6,

508.
ILonnio, 505: see ILonion.
lLonwen,503: j^e ILonion.
ttowethir, 51.
ttuarth, 225.
ILud-, 196, 435, 447, 448,

507, .'^47> 674, 675.
ttwch = loch, 23.

ILwch is Awel, 515.

— Ewin, 515, 530, 537.

— Tawe.Tawi, 515,536,

537-
ILwyd, ILwyt, 524, 546,

637 : see ILwydeu.
— , Edward, 81,130, 201,

206, 233, 234, 572.
ILwydawc, 514, 516, 523,

524> 531-
ILwydeu, 524, 546.
ILwyn y Forwyn, 92, 93.

— I fan Fedyg, 13.

— y Mafon, 219.

— y Moch, 536.

— y Nef, 156.

— On, 50.
ILwytmor, 220, 668.
ILychwr, 513-5.
ILydaw, 531-6; see ILyn

BLydaw.
ityfethair, 51.
ILyfni, the Arfon, 444.
— , the ILangorse, 72, 74.
%g, 53°-
rfygad, 391-
ILygad ILychwr, 391.

— Yw, 517, 518.
itygaid arian, 148.
ILygatrud Emys, 531.
ILyn Aerfen, 444.

— yr Afanc, 130, 689.

— 'r Arennig, 149.

— Barfog, 141-6, 245,
428, 429.

— y Bwch, 203.

— Coch, 125.

— Cwm Ffynnon Las,
I32» 133 : -f^^ Glaslyn.

— Cwm ILwch, 21-3,

430.

— Cwm Silin, iii.

— Cwm Strattyn, 96.

— Cynnwch, 135, 136,

243-

— Dau Ychain, 694.

— y Dinas, 564.

— Du, 378.

— Du'r Ard"u, 31, 431,

440, 445-

— Dwythwch, 33, 372.

— y Dywarchen, 86, 90,

92, 93.

— Eidwen, 577, 578.

— Elfarch, 23-9, 650.

— y Fan Each, 19, 256,
428, 429, 440, 444,
445, 582, 650.

— Fanod, 577, 578.

— Farch, 577, 578.

ILyn Ferwyn, 577.

— y Ffynhonnau, 1 1 1 .

— Ffynnon y Gwas, 31.

— Ffynnon Las, 1 34 : see
Glaslyn,

— y Forwyn, 23-6, 582.

— y Gader, 90-2.

— Glas, 79, 80 : see Glas-
lyn.

— Gwemen, 243.

— Gwynain (Gwynan),
79, .^64.

— Ird'yn, 148, 170, 674.

— ILech Owen, 379, 380.
394, 401.

— ILifon, 206.

— ILion, 142, 206, 207,
382, 429.

— ILiwan, 407, 519, 605.

— ILydaw, 134,473,475.
476. 532.

— ILygad y Rheidol, 39 1 .

577-

— Pair, 143.

— Pencraig, 206, 444.

— Syfadon : see^yisiion.

— Tardenni, 32 : see
Cweiiyn.

— Tegid ( = Bala Lake),
123, 408, 415, 419,

444, 445-

— yr Wyth Eidion, 429.

ILynclyn, y, 218.
ILynclys, 379, 402, 410-

3, 415, 452-
ILynfi, ILynvi : see^yim.
ILyr, ttyr, 547, 548, 684.
ILywarch Br. y Moch,

441.
ILywelyn ab Gruffyd',

443, 491, 692: see IL.

ab lorwerth.

— ab Gwilym, 134.

— ab lorwerth, 442, 443,
565, 692.

— of Trattwng, 378.

Mab, Queen, 670.
mabcom yr Ych Bannog.

579-
Mabinogion, the, 636,

637-
Mabon, 619.
Mac-Cairthinn, 292.
MacConglinne, 501.

— Datho, 501.

— y Lear, 549.

— Lir, 549.

— Oc, the, 436.
machteith, 383.

7IO

INDEX

Mackellar, Mrs., 520.
Mackinlay, J. M., 244.
Maclagan, Dr. R. C,

273-
Maclaren, J. D., 199-201.
Macsen, Maxen, 233, 564.
Madawc, 530.
madfati, 603, 604, 607.
Madganoe, Madgone,544.
Madog ab Meredyd", 479.
Madrnn, 277.
Maelan, 208, 209.
Mael-Brigte, 568.
Maelgwn, 570, 573.

— Vychan, 515.
Mael-mochta, 545.
Maen Du, Maendu, 504,

505. 507. 508-

— Dylan Point, 210.

— y Gwediau, 20.
Maes Gwenith, 503-6.

— y ILyn, 577.

— Madog, 51.
Maethwy, 693.
Magbile, 611.

magic, 302-4, 359, 360,
406, 525, 59S. 631,
636-8, 672.

Mahaffy, Professor, 692,

Mahony, 544.

mahr, 286.

Maiden Castle, 156.

Maired, 435.

Mattdraeth, 564, 568.

Malory, 476.

Mame, 3S4.

man, mannog, 580.

Manaman, 284, 314: see
Manannan.

Manannan, 314, 547, 549,

637-
Manannan's rent, 314.
Manau Guotodin. 550.
manavvyd, mynawyd, 543.
Manawyd, Manawyt, 543,

678.
Manawyfl-an, 543, 547,

619, 620,637,678,679.
Manx Bible, the, 287.

— fairy tune, the, 292.

— man fairy-shot, the,
292.

— mermaid, the, 166.
Mapes, Walter, 70-4, 496.
mara, 535, 536.

Marc, Margg, More, 435.
March Arthur, Cam, 142.

— ab Meirchion,23i, 233,

435. 439. 499, 572-
Marchett, 499.

Marchlyn Mawr, 234,
236, 237, 456, 476.

Marereda, 384 : 5^12 Mar-
garita.

Margam, Margan, 374,
402.

Marganus, 374.

Margarita, Margaret, 384.

Marget Totts, 590, 591.

Margetiud", 203: see Mere-
dyd'.

Marm-i, 535.

Martin, 691.

Mary-Morgant, 375.

masgal, 269.

Mason, 68, 163.

mass, thehourof, 315,609.

Massilia, 623.

Math, 196, 326, 501, 526,
532,548.550,608,636,
646.

Mathgamnai, 544.

Mathonwy, 544.

Mauchta, Mochta, 545.

Maucteus, Maughteus,

545-
Maughold Head, 314.
Mausna, 416, 417.
May-day, 20, 295, 307-

II, 317 : see belltaine,

Laa Boaldyn.
May flowers, 308.
— morning dew, 308,

309-
Mayo, 692.
Meal-bag Pavilion, the,

552, 616.
medicine, 11.
Medrod, Medrawd, 560,

570-
Meirchion, 231,435,439.
Melchior family, the, 399.
melfoch, meluoch, 502.
melg, 502.

Melghe Molbthach, 427.
men, 135.
menb, 507, 510.
menestr, 383.
menestre, 383.
Menevia, 512.
Menw, 510, 672.
Menwaed, Mengwaed,

504-9, 566, 569.
M6ra, 393 : see B^ra.
Meredyd", 203, 233.
Meredydh,M.Morgan,22.
Mererid, 383.
Merfyn, Mermin, 480.
Mergaed, 504, 507 : see

Menwaed.

Merin, Meri, the, 577.
Merlin, 470, 485, 486,

493, 507.
mermaid : see lake lady,
fairies.

— advising, 166.

— dressing, 163.

— tune-hunting, 118,119.

— warning, 164, 201.

— whispering to the sea,
119.

mermaid of Cardigan,
the, 164.

— in the Conwy, 30, 199.

— in a doggerel, 199.

— off ILanwnda, 165.

— and the nets, 118,
200.

— as one of Plant Rhys,
165.

— near Portmadoc, 81.
mermaid's cap, 118, 119,

124.

— cry trebled, 164.

— farewell, 165, 166.

— form, 165.
mermen and mermaids,

285.
Merry Nights, 76.
Mersey, the, 387.
mesen cyn derwen, 259,

268.
Messiah, 493.
metre and magic, 636.
MiarthjMyarth, 518, 519.
Mider, 424, 680, 681,
Midsummer Eve, 17, 314.
midwife, the : see fairies'.
Mighty, Islands of the,

280.
milk, a woman's, 690.
milking, a whole, 184.
Milky Way, the, 645.
Milton, 288.
Mirabilia, the, 406.
mirage, 121, 168, 169,

171-3-
mo, 581.
moch, 500.

Moch Sir Benfro, 501.
Mochdref, 525, 526.
Mochdrum, 590.
Mochnant, 526.
Mochno, 417.
Mochta, 545.
Mochteyrn Predein, 374.
Mocu-Min, 545.
Modonnos, 581.
Modred,56o: .f^^ Medrod.
Modron, 619.

INDEX

711

Modryb Man, 599, 601,

602.
Moedin, Moydin, 245,

271, 279, 674.
Moel Arthur, 22.

— Bentyrch, 365.

— Eilio, Eilian, 40, 83,
206.

— Famau, 413.

— Fentti, 413.

— y Gest, 81.

— Gynghorion, 478,

— Hebog, 96.

— y ILyn, 577.

— Siabod, 84.

— Tryfan, 84.
Moelfre, 147.
Moher, 418.

Moin Conaing, 439.
Molwynog, 480.
Mo-mera, 393.
Mon, Mona, 439, 567 :

see Anglesey,
monk and the bird, the,

^55-

monoliths, circle of, 285.
moon, the new, 342.
Moore, A. W., 2S4, 311,

322.
— , Dr. N., 124, 125.
mor, 432.
Mor Maurhidic, 384.

— Neifion, 444.
Morcant, Morgant, 374,

375 : see Morgan.
Morcunt, Morcunn, 374 :

see Morgan.
Mordwyt Tytiion, 616.
morfeser, 664.
MorfiU, Professor, 496.
morforwyn, 30.
Morgain, -e. Morgue, 171,

373-5-
Morgan, 372-5.
— , Bishop, 478.
— , Counsellor, 175, 176.

— Tut, 374.
Morganiaid, 374.
Morgannwg, 374.
Morgans, 192.
Morgen, Morien, 373-5.
Morris, Lewis, 148, 450.
— , Thomas, 238.
Mortagne sur Mer, 489.
moruin, morvin, 383, 394.
Mothers, the, 174.
mothlach, 451.
Mothvey, 13 : see Mydfai.
Mourne Mountains, 309.
mouse a tabu at sea, 345.

Moytura, 618.
muir, gen. mara, 432.
Muirgen, 373.
Muirthemhne, 385.
Mullet, the, 692.
Mumbles, 402.
Mummers, Manx, 316,

317-
Mur y Cryfaglach, 450.

— Mawr, 33.

Murray, Dr., 316, 566,

585.
music, 666.
Mwlchan, Mwyalchen,

565, 566.
mwnglws, 133.
Mwrchan, 565.
mwthlach, 451.
mwy na'r cythraul at y

groes, 216.
Mytffai, Mydfe, 4, 13,

440, 582.
Myliteyrn, 226.
myn Dewi, 439.
Mynach, the, 577.
Mynogan, 233.
Mynyd" Anelog, 228.

— y Ban wen, 18.

— y Cnwc, 457, 458.

— yr Eglwys, 27.

— y Fedw, 35.

— Mawr, 380, 381.

— y Rhiw, 228.
Mynyw, 512.

Myrdin, 148, 470, 493,
507 : see Merlin.

— Fard", 361, 362, 364,
365, 367, 368, 693.

nag-e, 644.
naman, 625.

name and iron, 54, 61 ;
see fairies.

— and cognate words,
625, 627.

— in cursing, 635, 636.
name-giving, 628, 630,

631,658.
name-hiding, 45, 54, 61,

88, 97, 229, 624.
Nanhwynain (Nanhwy-

nan),98, 470, 473, 560.
Nani Fach, 194.
Nanmor, 32, 80, 81.
Nannau, 135.
Nant yr Aran, 98.

— y Bettws, 42, 46, 50,
83, 85.

— Conwy, 134.

— Ffrancon, 130.

Nant Gwrtheyrn, 215,
218, 223, 224.

— Uffern, 205.
Nantclwyd, 155.
Nanttte,84, 111,444,543.
Napier, Professor, 293.
Narberth, 522.
Narbyl, 353.

Nash Point, 356,

Natal, 391.

Neath, 270.

nee came vescebantur,

270.
Nechtan, 383, 389, 390.
necromancy, 284.
Ned Puw, 282.
Nede mac Adnai, 392,

632.
Nefyd" Naf Neifion, 117,

429, 440, 444.
Nefyn, 164, 223, 275,

278, 667.

— the mermaid, n8-2i.

— mermaid story, the,
164.

Neifion, 429, 444, 445.
neithior, neithiorau, 76,

100.
Nemed,gen. Nemid, 444.
Nemesis, 347.
Nennius, 406, 413, 570.
Neptune, 444, 447, 550.
Ness Cliff, 202.
nett, gen. nitt, 531.
Neued, 530.
Nevem, the, 512, 529.
New Grange, 482.
New Year's Day, 316,

338, 341.342.

Eve, 18, 244, 318,

320,

newyn ceiniog, 484.
Nicholas IV, Pope, 516,

536.
Nicholson, E. \\.B.,3i7,

682.
— , William, 335.
Nick, old, 434.
nldha, gen. 531.
nightmare, 2S6.
Niss, the Danish, 324.
noght oie houney, 316.
Noicride, 531.
Noicrothach, 531.
Noid ny Hanmey, 347.
nomen, 625-7.
Norse Calendar, the, 321.

— Yule, 321.
NosGalangaeaf, 224, 226,

686.

712

INDEX

Nos Glamau, 691 : see

Calanmai.
nos in place-names, 257.
noswyliau ttawen, 76.
Novantae, 387.
November, the twelfth of,

315-
nthr = nrh, 20S.
Nuada, gen. Nuadat, 447,

547, 618.
Nudons, Nodens, 445-7,

449.
Nudos, Nudi, 447, 448.
nuptial feasts, 76.
Nyfer, 512.
Nykr, 434.
Nynio, Nyniaw, 560,

561, 576, 577, 580.
nyth, 530.

O'Donoghue, the, 482.

0 a-e, 365.

oaks, eagle-haunted, 609,

610.
oashyr, 287.
oeth, 619.
Oeth and Anoeth, 619,

679.
offering, an Irish, 359.
Ogam, 292, 424, 527,

— Deio, 117, 119.

— ILanciau Eryri, 473,

474, 476-

— y Marchlyn, 236, 237.

— Myrdin, 493.

— Gwr Blew, 481.
ogress, the, 411.
Ogtene, 387.

Ogwen,the, 130,471, 472.
oian, 527.

Old Head of Kinsale,

632.
Oldcastle, 393.
*! Olfyn, 218.

Ollick ghennal, 337.

01 wen, 113, 114, 646,
647.

omnia mutantur, 353.

on, 630.

Onttwyn, 255.

ovo/xa, 625.

Oper Linn Liguan, 407.

oracular wells, 364.

ore, 521.

Ore Treith, 521.

Oriel, 542.

Orkney, Man, and Wight,

281.
Orkneys, the, 679.
Orphic notions, 623.
ortus, 693.
OS bydanwyd, &c., 220.

— coccygis, 608.
Osismi, 331.
Osthoff, 641.

Otto of Bamberg, 553.
Ouessant, 375.
Owain, 489 : see Owen.
Owen, Edward, 479, 491.
— , Elias, 274.
— , Ellis, 95, 96, 98, 105.

— Findu, 564 : see O.
yMhaxen.

— Glyndwr, Glendower.
126, 380, 381, 469,
487, 490.

— , Goronwy, 84,
-J. P., 468.

— Lawgoch, 80, 381,
439, 464-9, 481, 484,

487-93, 496-

— yMhaxen, Ymhacsen,

233, 564-

— ab Thomas ab Rhod-
ri, 491.

— ab Urien, 490.

— , William, 474 : see

Glaslyn.
Owen's red hand, 465.
owl, the, 439.
Oxford, 507.

padetl a gradett, 221,

227-9, 231.
palchey phuddase, 337.
Paluc, 504, 505.
panis farreus, 650.
Pannog, 131, 576, 577:

see bannog.
Pant y Gwaith, 174.

— y ILyn, 467-9.

— y Medygon, ii.
Pantannas, 155, 175, 184,

186, 187, 189-91, 419,

423, 452, 454, 597,

672.
Panylau, 564.
Parch, 233 : see March,
parchettan, 527.
Paric Bog, 312.
Paris, Gaston, 689, 693.
Partholan, 546, 611.
Parys Mountain, 203.

Pass of ILanberis, 673.
paternity, 661-3, 684.
Patrick's Hymn, 205.
patronymics, Bedgelert,

77-
Paulmus, 513, 534-6.
Pawl Hen, 535.
Peacock, Miss, 323, 326-

9-
Peada, 676,
peat fires in Glamorgan,

267.
peccagh, 349.
Pechts, 679, 680 : see

Picti.
pedigrees, Nennian, 408,

551-
pedoli gwidon ag aur,i 1 1 .
Peel, 68.

— third boat, 343.
pegor, 431, 432.
Peibio, Peibiaw, 560, 561 ,

576, 577-
Pelagians, the, 373.
Pelagius, 373, 412.
Pelisha, 106, 668.
Pellings, the, 46-8, 69.
Pelumyawc, Pelunyawc,

512 : see Peuliniog.
Pembroke, Earl of, 489.
Pen y Bone, 60, 61.

— y Bont, 78.

— y Casteii, 515.

— Craig Daf, 175, 176,
187-9, '9'-

— y Gaer, 518.

— y Gwryd, 133, 565.

— pingon, 530.

— Poch, 192.

— Pwtt Coch, 80.
penance, public, 351, 352.
Penardim, 225.
Penarwen, 225.
Pencader, 155.

Penda, 676.
Pendaran, 499, 500.
Penderyn, 255.
Pendinas, 52, 58.
Penelope (Penelop), 45-8,

69, 87, 668.
Penfro, 503, 504, 506.
Pengwaed, 506.
Peniarth Collection, the,

330.
Pentloran, 530.
Pentlyn, 408.
Penmachno, 84, 93, 204.
Penmaen Mawr, 686.
Penmorfa, 89, 93, 105,

220, 223.

INDEX

713

Pennant, Thomas, 125,

532, 692.
Pennant Valley, the, 84,

96, 105, 106, 108, 220,

223, 597, 668, 669,

673, 691.
Pennarft, Pennarth, 218.

— Gron, 54, 59,
Ilivvo-ovivbos, 631.
Penrhock, 15.
Penrhyn (Penryn) Aws-

tin, 506, 519.
Penrice Castle, 402.
Pentir, 519.
Pentregethen, the cunning

man of, 331.
Pentyrch, 471.
Penwall, 676.
Penwedic, 506.
Penwedig, 504, 506.
Penwith, 506.
Penwyn, 631.
Peredur, 142, 287, 384,

502, 672.

— and the hinds, 2S7.
Pergrin, 163, 164, 168,

200, 271.
Peris, 566.
Perkins, E., 172.
Peter, 693.
Peuliniog, Peuliniauc,

512, 513, 530, 534-
phantom city, the, 165,

171, 205.

— coffin, 274, 275.

— funeral, 271, 273-5,
278.

— wedding, 277.
Philip VI of France, 488.
Phillimore, Egerton, 506,

513-
phynnodderee, 288 : see

fenodyree.
pibau, 573.
Pibion, Bryn y, 674.
Pictavienses, 281.
Picti, Picts, 156, 279,

281, 282, 638, 679,

680, 682, 684-6, 694.
Pictish succession, the,

638.
Pictones, 281, 682.
Pictus, Goffarius, 281.
Pierce, Ellis (Elis o'r

Nant), 134, 476.
pigs, 50i-3> 679.
Pihtes, L^a, 676.
pil, 241.

pilnos, the, 214, 215.
pilosus clamabit, 287.

pin wells, 314, 360, 361.

Pin y Wig, 276.

pin and wool for warts,

361.
pinnau, 365.
pins in wells, 361-3.
pipe in N. Wales, the,

2 34-
pisky, the, 325, 612 :

see fenodyree, brownie,

fairies.
Pistytt, 278, 361.
Pitt-Rivers Museum, the,

.333-
pitter patter, holy water,

587-

Plague, the, 486.

Plas y Nant, 478.

— Pennant, 36.
Plato, 606.
Plaws Hen, 388.
Plinlimmon, 391, 392,

577-
plisgyn, 269.
Plutarch, 173, 440, 456,

493, 494-
pnawn, 233.
Pointe du Raz, 386.
Poitiers, battle of, 488.
Poitou, 682.
Pollock, Sir F., 307.
Pont ar Dawe, 515, 536.

— y ILan, 68.

— Rhyd Fendigaid, 580.

— y Wem, 60.
Ponterwyd, 274, 372,

601.
Pontypool, 174.
Pool, 378.
porcus, 521.
porfeyd', 226.
Port Talbot, 535.
Porth Aethwy, 693.

— Clais, 512.

— Dinttaen, 226.

— W^ydho, 417.
Porthlud, 448.
Poseidon, 435, 550.
Pott, 682.

Powel, Anthony, 439.
Powell, Mrs., 328, 416.
Powys, 525.

— Castle, 378.
Prasutagus, 677.
Predein,374: 5^e Prydain,
prencriafol,85: i-<?^rowan.
pres, 471.

presbyter, 629.
Presseleu, Preselly, 512.
Pretanic, 281.
Tipijavticri, N^croy, 281.
Pretender, the, 176.
Price, Thomas, 490.
Prices, 192.

Prichard, Thomas, 691.
Procopius, 440.
prognosticating for the
year by means of —

ashes, the, 318.

blind man's buff, 319.

eavesdropping, 319,

327-9-

salt-heaps, 318.

salt herring, 320.

suppers, 327, 328.
promiscuity, 684.
Prossers, 192.
prthivi, 533.
pryd, 281, 530.
Prydain, Prydein, 281,

282, 374, 560, 561.
Pryden : see Prydain.
Pryderi, 69, 499-501,

525, 678, 679.
prydnawn, 233.
Prydwen, 512, 678, 679.
Prydyn, 226, 281, 560,

561 : see Prydain.
pryf, 530.

prynhawn, pyrnhawn, 233.
Psalms, the, 349.
Psyche, 612.
Ptolemy, 445.
Pughe, John, 141-6, 216,

428, 429.
— , Dr., 527, 693.
Pumlumon, 392.
Pumsant, 274.
pustules, 634.
PwH Cynan, 404.
— ILygad Ych, 132.-
Pwttgwemog, 80.
Pwllheli, 277.
Pwyll, 2 1 6, 499, 500, 503 ,

548, 637, 679, 684.
Pwynt Maen Tylen, 210 :

see Dylan,
py'agh, p'agh, 349.
Pybba, 676.
pygmies, 684,
Pytchley, 676.
Pythagoras, 623.

quaail, 336.

quaaltagh, qualtagh, the,

336-8, 341.
Quakers' graveyard, 175.

714

INDEX

quart, the big, of Bed'ge-

lert, 78.
Quegte, Maqui, 387.
Queich bum,the, 156, 157.
Quine, Mr., 333, 334.
Quire, Mr., 353.

r for s, 531.

rabbit, Welsh, 600, 614.

rags put on a thorn, 605.

— at wells, 355, 357.
Ratee, 675.

rath, 522.

Rath, the, 522.

Ravens' Rift, the, 181,

1S9.
razor, Twrch's, 512.
rebirth, 655-8.
Record Office, the, 491.
Red Book, the, 515, 516,

525, 531.

— Sea, the, 596.
Reformation, the Calvin-

istic, 76.
Regaby, 316.
Regan, 547.
Reidwn, 529, 657.
Renan, M., 401.
Rennes Dindsenchas, 427.
rent paid in rushes, 314.
Reynolds, IL., 269, 428,

429.
rhaffau'r Tylwyth Teg,

103 : see gossamer.
Rhayader, 539.
Rheidol, the, 391.
Rheid'wn, 529, 657.
rhent ar y pentan, 84.
Rhiangott, 517, 519.
Rhiannon, 226, 637,684.
rhibyn, 453.
Rhisiart, W. ab, 78.
Rhita, 477-80, 561-4.
Rhiw Goch, 381, 469.

— Gyferthwch, 503-6,
508, 693.

— 'r Ychen, 132.
Rhiwabon, Rhuabon, 225.
Rhiwatton the physician,

II, 12.
Rhiwallon, Rhuati:on,2 25.
Rhivvarth, 456.
Rhivven, Rhiwan, 235,

236.
Rhodri, brother to ILew-

elyn, 491.

— Molvvynog, 480.
Rhonabwy, 560.
Rhonda Fechan, 23, 27.
rhos, 530,

Rhos, 526.

— Hirwaen, 228.
Rhudlan, Rothelan, 563.

— Teifi, 501, 525.
Rhudhvm the Dwarf,

326, 505, 671.
Rhwng y ©wy Afon, 144.
Rhwydrys, 531.
Rhyblid, 14.
Rhyd y Gloch, 265.
Rhyd-©u, 107.
Rhyderch, 188-91.
Rhygyfarch, 219.
Rhys, 530.

— Goch Eryri, 474.

— Gryg, 12.

— , J.'d., 22, 515.
— , Mrs., 275, 370, 477,
692.

— ab Sion, 201.

— ab Tewdwr, 404.
Rhysians, the, 160.
rhyswr, rhyswyr,529, 530.
ri, gen. rig, 661, 662.
Rib, 435, 436.

Ribble, the, 3S7.
Ricca, 477 : see Rhita.
Richard Crookback, 595.
Rig- Veda, the, 640,641.
Rions, Rion, 563.
Ritho, Rithonem, 562,

563 : see Rhita.
Ritta, 477-80, 564 : see

Rhita, Ritho.
ritualistic movement, the,

666.
Rivals, the, 214 : see Eifl.
river eruptions, 426.
Roberts, Askew, 490.
— , E. S., 138, 240, 241.
— , John, 239.
— , J. H., 148, 215, 216,

456.
— , Mrs., 96.
— , Robert, 239.
Robin Round-Cap, 324.
Rochelle, La, 489.
Roeder, C, 284, 288,

289, 334-

Roelend, Roelent, Rothe-
lan, 563.

Roger, 199.

Rome, 653.

Ronnag, the, 343.

ross, 530.

rowan, the, 85, 137, 292,
308, 325, 691.

Rowlands, Thomas, 48.
Rudie, 345.
Rudvyw Rys, 530.

Riigen, 553-
ruins spared, 343.
Rumpelstiltzchen, 66,

229, 584, 593, 596.
rushes as rent, 314.
Russ, gen. Rossa, 530.
rye, 505, 508.
Rymer, 490.
Ryons, Ryence, 562, 563.

Sabrann, 449.
Sabrina, 448. .«

sacred fish, 366, 367.
sacrifice, 305, 306, 308,

326, 609.
Saethon (? = Sanctaaus),

364-
Safadan, Safad'on, 19, 74 :

see Syfadbn.
Safrwch, Dyffryn, 23, 26,

29.
Saidi, 387,388.
St. Ann's, 334.
St. Asaph, the Bishop of,

15, 16.
St. Beuno, 219.
St. Catherine, 335, 336,

364-
St. Columbkill, 359.
St. Cybi, 365.
St. David, 275, 534.
St. David's, the Bishop

of, 231.
St. Dogmael's, 163.
St. Dogwell's, 163.
St. Pagan's, 174.
St. Finnen, 611, 620.
St. Galle, 579.
St. John's Eve, 314,

329-
St. ILeian's, 380.
St. Mabon, 257.
St. Mark's Eve, 327, 329.
St. Paul's, 448.
St. Peter, 599, 600.
St. Sanctan, 334.
St. Stephen's, 606.
St. Teilo, 398, 399.
Saint-Leger, 490.
saints' fetes, 76.
Saith Marchog, 628, 629.
saldra gwneyd, 413.
salmon of knowledge, the,

392-
salmon-skin cap, the, 124.
salt, 292, 293.
Salvianus, 566.

INDEX

715

Samhain, gen. Samhna,

226, 315.
Samhanach, 226.
Samthann, 74.
Sanctanus, 334, 714.
Sanskrit, 641.
Santander, 489.
Santon, 334, 335.
Sam yr Afanc, 130, 689.
— Fyttteyrn, 226, 233.
Satan officiating, 328.
satire, 632, 635, 636.
Saturn, 494.
Sauin, gen. Souney, 315,

316: see Samhain.
Savadhan, 74 : see Sy-

fatfon.
Savage, Mr., 332-4.
Sawde, 3, 19.
Sayce, Professor, 602,

606, 665, 682.
Sayces, 192.
scapegoats, the, 310.
Schmidt, Professor Joh.,

625, 641.
scores, counting by, 663.
Scott, Sir Walter, 643.
Scottish rivers' victims,

244.
se, 643.

sea-serpent, the, 122.
Sebastian, Dom, 482.
Sebillot, 273.
sechem, 225.
second sight, 158, 275,

330-
sedes, 677.
Seely Court, the, 592 :

see silly.
Segais, 392.

Segantii, 385 : see Setantii.
Seidhun, 331, 386 : see

Sein.
Seidi, 388 : see Saidi.
seiet, the, 350.
seig, 611.

seily, seely, 591 : see silly.
Sein, Sun, 331, 386.
Seirith, 569.
Seithennin, Seithenhin,

383-8, 395, 419-

Seithyn, 386-8.

Sena, 331.

Senaudon,562 : see Snow-
don.

senchasa, 498.

Senghenyd", 26.

Seren Gomer, 167.

Seri, 569.

Serrigi, Serigi, 565, 569.

Senv, the, 206.
Sescenn Uairbeoil, 510.
sessam, -om, 225.
Setanta, 385, 387, 388,

656, 657.
Setantii, 385, 387.
Seteia, Segeia, 387.
Sethor.ethor.othor, &c.,

635-
Setinte, Setinti, 387.
Severn, 391, 407, 449.
Sgubor Gerrig, 198, 199.
shag-foal, the, 324.
shaman, 631.
Shannon, the, 390.
shears, Twrch's, 512.
sheep sacrifice, 308.
Shenn Laa Boaldyn, 307,

308.
sheriff, 569.

Shetland fishermen, 346.
Shetlands, the, 679.
Shone, 31.
Sian William, 237.
sibh, 643.
Sibi, 97, 668.
siblais, siblad, silis, 436,

437-
Sichfraith,Sichraidh, 569.
sid, sith, 383, 657, 658,

680.
Sid Nechtain, 383.
side, 678, 683.
Sidi, Caer, 678: i-^^ under

Caer.
Siegfried, 569.
signourie et princet6,

491.
Sigrced-r, 569 : see Sieg-
fried.
Sigtrygg-r, 569.
Sikes, Wirt, 99, 169, 173,

191, 195, 405.
silence in visiting a well,

362.
silly frit, Sili Ffrit, 64-6,

229,584,585,591,592,

697-
Silly go Dwt, Sili g. D.,

229, 584, 590-2, 597-
Silvan Evans, Chancellor
D., 40, 156, 271, 273,

357- . ^

silver to shoot witches

with, 294.
simach, 67.

Simond, Simonds, 67, 68.
Simwch, 67.

Simwnt, 67 : see Simond.
Simychiaid, 67, 668.

Sinann, Sinand, Sinend,

390-2, 305.
Singhalese, the, 627.
Sinodun, Sinadoun, 562 :

see Snowdon.
Sion, 31.
Sion Ifan, 201.
Sitriuce, Sitriug, 569.
Sizun, 331, 386: see Sein.
OKiai, 627.
skilled man, the, 102,111 :

see cunning,
si, 1, 542.
Slamannan, 550.
Slaney, the, 581.
sleih beggey, 289.
Sliabh na Caillighe, 393.
Slieau Maggyl, 315.

— Whallian, 296.
Sloe, Slack, 510.
Smith, Dr. A., 344.
smiths, 294, 295.
Smychiaid, 67-9 : see

Simychiaid.
Snaefell, 286, 287, 312,

314-

snakes, 689, 690.

Snowdon, 509, 533, 554,
559, 560, 562.

soap as fairy ointment,
213, 669.

Soar, 547.

Sodom, 73.

sods, properties of cer-
tain, 158, 170, 171,

303-
sojourner in Faery, the,

291 : see Faery.
Solomon, Wm. Thos.,

208-10.
Solor, 565.
son oural, 307, 308.
Sophia, 692.
soul, the, 601-4, 607, 608,

611, 612, 626, 627.
sour apple-tree portent,

the, 60.
spaagagh, 337, 339.
Spain, 489.
spear ground during mass,

— stone-tipped, 689.
Spencer, Edward, 489.

— and Gillen, 662, 663.
spinning after supper in

winter, 212,
stand ing on another's foot ,

stealing the fames flowers,

7i6

INDEX

steel, 128 : see iron.
Stepney - Gul ston , Mr.,

468.
Stevenson, Mr., 547, 563.
Stifyn Ifan, 400.
Stindwy, 443 : see ILan

Ystumdvvy.
stockaded isle, 73 • ^^^

Syfatfon.
Stokes, Dr. Whitley, 519,

527, 575,618.
stone age, the, 606.
stones thrown into the

bonfire, 225.
Strattyn, 443 : see ILyn

Cwm Strattyn.
strand, 39.

Strangford Lough, 426.
Strata Florida, 12, 579.
strath, 39.
straw to curse with, 345.

— spun into gold, 214.
Sualdaim, 657.
submerged bells, 405 ,

,415, 417-
sui, gen. suad, 616.
suithe, 616, 617.
Sunday of harvest, the

first, 3 1 2-5: j-(?^ August.
superstitions modified,

216, 313, 612.
surnames, 163: j'^^Davies,

Jones, Mason.
Svatovit, 553.
Swaffham, 466, 467.
Swan Maidens, the, 583.
swans, the Children of

Lir as, 94.
Swansea Bay, 402.
Swyd" Ffynnon, 246, 250.
Syfadon, 19, 73, 74, 134,

379> 401, 415. 429.452,

496, 534-
sympathetic magic, 638 :

see magic,
synhuir vann, 385.
syrcyn, 106.
Syrigi, 565,569: -s-^Ser-

rigi.
syw, sywyd, sywedyd",

616, 617.

Tabhida, Dyphryn, 22.
Tacitus, 271, 408, 559.
Taf, the, 449, 534.
Taff, the, 175, 449,
Tafwys,449: j^,?Tamesis.
taghairm, the, 320.
Tai Bach, 31.

— Teulwriaid, 55.

Tain Bo Cuailnge, 657.
Tal y Clegyr, 202.

— y ILychau, 12.

— y Treudin, 533.
Talhaiarn, 617.
Taliesin ab lolo, 439.
Taliessin, 614-7.
Tattwch, 499.
Tamesis, 449.
Tamise, la, 449,
tappag, the, 353.
Tarawg, 529.
Tarr-cain, 391.

Tarren y Cigfrain, 181,
189.

— y Crynwyr, 175.
taiToo ushtey, 284, 285.
Tarvos Trigaranus, 581.
tarw penwyn Corwrion,

52, 55, 61.
tatter-colt, tatter-foal, 324.
tattooing, 682.
tau, tawaf, 280.
taut, 592.
Tavve, 522.
Taxatio of Nicholas IV,

516.
Tegai, 52.

Tegau Eurfron, 689.
Tegid, 408 : see Tacitus.

— Foel, 408.

— Lake, 376 : see ILyn
Tegid.

— Morgan, 120-3.
Tegid's monster, 122,123.
Teifi, the, 577.

Teilo's skull, 399.

— well, 398, 399.
Teirgwaed", 510.
Teithion, 530.
telyn aur, 148.
Teme, the, 22.
Ternoc, 568.

Testament, the New, 493.
Tethra, 291.

Teulu Oeth, &c., 619.
teuz, 375.
Teyrnon, 226.
th, 2.

th, d", omitted, 563.
Thames, the, 449.
Thargelia, the, 310.
third Peel boat, the, 343.
Jjokk, 651.
Thomas, David, 60.
— , D. ILeufer, 469.
— , Evan, 198, 199.
— , Howell, 125.
— , Hugh, 73.
—John, 217.

Thomas, Rees, 380.

— ab Rhodri, 491.
thorns for pins, 365.
three advices, the mer-
maid's, 166.

— battle-knights, 509.

— blows, the, 6, 9, 10,
28 : see three disagree-
ments.

— boundaries, junction
of, 295.

— chief enchanters, 505.

— disagreements, the, 28:
see three blows.

— Islands of the Mighty,
280.

— Islands of Prydain,
280, 281.

— Marchlyn ladies, 236.

— outpost Isles, 280.

— Sons of the Gapless
Sword, 529.

Thurneysen, Dr., 533.
Till, the, 244.
Tir Cluchi Midir ecus
Maic Oic, 436.

— Dimuner, 528.

— nan Og, 678.

— Tairngire, 390.

— fo Thuinn, 437.
Tobar a veac, 692.
tocad, 647.

toeli, the, 273, 274, 279.
toleth, tolaeth, 273, 274:

see tylwyth.
Tom na Hurich, 483.

— Tit Tot, 584, 590,
692-

ton, 176.
tore, 521.
torgochiaid, 33.
Torogi, Tarogi, 503,

505, 506 : see Troggy.
torrog, torogi, 508 : see

Troggy.
Tortain, 693.
tote, 592.
Touaregs, 682.
Toubir-more, 692 : see

Tobar a veac.
toulu, 273 : see toeli.
tout, 592.
Towy, 146,
Towyn Trewern, 37.
Trachmyr, 529,530, 537-
Traeth Lafan, 402.
traha, 395.
Trattwng, Trattwn, Trali-

wm, 378.
tramynyat, 514.

INDEX

717

Trawsfynyd" parson, the,

102.
Tre' Gaerfyrdin, 207.

— Geiri, 280 : see Tre'r
Ceiri.

— Wylan, 410.
treasure-finders, 148.
tref, tre', 207.

Tref Rita, 478.
Treflys, 60.
Trefriw, 30, 198, 199.
Tregalan, 473, 476.
Tregan Anthrod, &c.,

208, 218, 219: seeCz.tr

Arianrhod.
Tregaranthreg, 207, 208.
Tregaron, 577.
Tremadoc, 443.
Tremains, 354.
Tre'r Ceiri, 214, 279, 280,

283, 686.

— Gwydelod, 566.
Tretower, 516, 518.
Trevine, Trefin, 165, 171.
Triads, the Welsh, 429,

440-5,498-501,503-6,

509, 560, 570.
— , Irish, 498.
triath, gen. tr^ith, 521,

522.
Triban Morgannwg, 19.
Tricephal, the, 653.
Triglaus, 553.
Tringad, 530.
Trinio, 71, 72, 496.
Trinity invoked in

charms, the, 297.
Triple Alliance, the, 486.
Tristan, Trystan, 499 :

see Drystan.
Trit-a-Trot, 593, 597,

694.
Treed yr Aur, 166,464-6.
troeil bach, 64, 229, 584.
Troggy, 506, 508.
Troia, 444.

Troit, Porcus, 538, 541.
Trojans, the, 271, 280,

281,
trot, 694.
trwi, 29.

trwtan, trwdlan, 592.
Trwtyn-Tratyn, 229, 592,

597> 694-
Trwyd, 541 : see Trwyth.
Trwyn Swch, 693.
— Swncwl, 278: see

Ewlch T. S.
Trwyth, 541, 544.
Tryfan, 580.

Tuan mac Cairill, 611,
615, 618, 620, 621.

Tuatha De ocus Andd,
637.

— De Danann, 454, 544,
548-50, 554. 685.

Tudwal Roads, 232.
Tunccetace, 647.
tut, tud, 374, 375.
tuthe, 374.
Tweed, the, 244.
twin changelings, 692.
Twm Bach, 202. .

— Bryn Sytlty, 199.

— Ifan Siams, 80.
two first things, 107.
Twrch, the river, 524.

— ILawin, 514, 522.

— Trwyth, 509-15, 519-
30, 534, 536-9, 552,
565, 693.

twt, 592.

Twyn y moch, 536.

Twyne, Thomas, 412.

Ty Gwyn, 534.

Tydoch, 163.

tydyn, tyn, 33.

Tydyn y Barcud, 62.

Ty-fry, 26, 27.

Tylen, 210: see Dylan.

tyloethod, 274.

Tylor, Professor, 290,329,

641, 657.
tylwyth, 273.
Tylwyth Teg, 115, 671.
tylwythes, -en, 48.
tyn = tyilyn, 33, 367.
Tyn y Ffynnon, 366, 367.

— Gadlas, 33.

— ILan, 78.

— yr Onnen, 33.

— Siarlas, 33.
tynghed, 644, 646-51,

694.
tyngu, 225, 647-9, 694.
Tyno Helig, 387, 4i5.

422.
Tyr, 642.

Uairbhel, 510.

Uath mac Imomain, 618.

\\i, 203.

ugliness of fairies, 262 :

see fairies.
Ulfilas, 626,
Ulster, 502.

— women, the, 498.
umbnr, 627.

un, dau, tri, pedwar,
pump, 418, 419.

Undine, i, 124, 389.437,

661.
unlucky things, 342-5.
Uoret, 217.
Urdawl Ben, 552.
Urnach, 507, 564, 565.
Urogenonertus, 580.
urus, the, 579-81.
Usk, the, 518.
uwchwynt, yr, 596.
uzon, 626.

v = Welsh f, 2.

vates, 616.

Vaughan the antiquary,

491.
vel p'agh sthie, 349.
Velfrey, 512, 513.
Vendubar-i, 568.
vengeance, the cry of,

403,404,408,409,413,

414,452.
— , delay of, 423.
Vergilius, 539.
Verwig, 166, 167.
Vigfusson, Dr., 321.
vir, 264.

Virginia Water, 394.
Viriatus, 218.
Visurix, 662.
voices concerning the

murdered, 73.
Volospa, 322.
Voltaire, 640.
Vortigern, 218, 469, 470,

487, 507-
Vulgate, the, 287.

Waen Fawr, 41, 275.
Warinsey, sibyl of, 331 :

see Guernsey.
Warrefield, 314.
warts, 297, 360-2.
Wastinus,7i: j-^^Gwestin.
watch and ward, 311.
water efficacious during

mass, 315.
water-bull, the, 284, 2S5,

289, 323-
water-horse, the, 324,

433, 434-
Waungyrlais, 20.
wealhstod, 511.
wedding, a Welsh, 277.
wele dacw, 109.
well priesthood, 389, 396,

400.

— ritual, 332, 333, 395,

396, 399-

— water bottled, 315.

7i8

INDEX

well, ILancarvan, 356,
— , St. Maughold's, 333.
— , St. Teilo's, 398, 399.
Wellington, Duke of,494.
wells, covered, 389, 394,

692.
— , Manx mountain, 314.
wells for dadwitsio, 363.

— with pins and rags,

327, 332-5, 355-7-

— : see Ffynnon.
Welsh rabbit, 614.

— spelling, 671.
Welshpool, 378.
wenestir, finaun, 395.
WerClon, 204, 205.

— gwel'd y, 204, 205.
Wesleyan Methodists,

348, 353- , ^
Wessobrunn Codex, 682.
Weun Gonnws, 56S.
Wexford Harbour, 427.
white dog and his owner,

the, 148.

— stones, 344, 345.
Whitland, 534.
Whuppity Stoorie, 588,

690-
Wi, Wi Wei, 277.
wicken, 325 : see rowan,
widow's son, the, 3, 29,

660, 661.
wife caned, the, 54.
Wight, Isle of, 281.
William Dafyd", 78, 80.

— ILeyn, 693.

— Wmffra, 80.
Williams, Canon, 130.
— , Evan, 230.

— , Jane, 221.
— , Owen, 207.
— , Sir Robert, 478.
— , S. Rhys, 89.

— ofTrefriw,Thos.,28o,
— , William, 193.
Williams.Ellis,J.C.,368,

371.
, Mrs., 278, 366, 368,

37I.47I-
WiUin, Clerk, 410-2.
wind, traffic in, 330, 331.
Windele's MSS., 335.
window opened for a

changeling, 103.

window opened for a

death, 601.
Winter Nights, Feast of

the, 321.
wisps, traffic in, 299.
witch pronounced butch,

the word, 294, 691.

— at crossroads, the, 295.

— of Endor, the, 349.

— as a hare, the, 309.

— and the heart, the, 305.
witchcraft, how inherited,

326.
witches bled, 326.

— caught by a black
greyhound, 294.

— fetched by boiling
herbs, 300.

— fetched by burning
a carcase, 305.

— tortured to death, 296.
witch's besom, the, 295,

296.

— face, 305.
with, 630.
Woden, 676.

wood fires in Glamorgan,

267.
wool, virtue of, 357, 361.
wormwood, &c., the

charmer using, 299.
Wright, Professor, 66.
Wmach, Gwmach, 565.
Wryd, Wryd! 217.
wy, 516.

Wye, the, 391, 516.
wyneb, 634.
Wynne, Sir John, 490,670.

— of Peniarth, Mr., 242.
Wynns, the, 444.
wyrion, 70.

Y Bala aeth, 378.

— Blaid", 528.

— Dinas, 469, 470.

— ©inas, 467.

— Gromlech, 673.
y law, 198.

— raw, 198.

Y Wydfa, 479.
Yarrow Kirk, 448.
ych, 530.

Ychain Mannog, 131,
132 : j-^^Ychen Bannog.

Ychain Mannog melody,

the, 132.
Ychen Bannog, Bannawc,

131, 142,561,579,580,
year, the Celtic, 317.
— , the Norse, 321.
yellow hair and blue eyes,

148.
Yeuwains, 488 : see Yvain.

ym, 523-

Ymhacsen, 564.
Ynys y Ceuri, Ceiri, 280,
283.

— Entti, 413, 440.

— Geinon, 254, 255, 674.

— y Kedyrn, 280, 282,
283, 386.

— Prydein, 281, 282.

— Wair, 679.

Yr Ystrad, 39-46.
ysbryd y lantar, 59.
Yscawt, 529.
Yskithyrwynn Pennbeid,

520.
Yspadaden, 520, 646,

647.
Yspytty Ifan, 206, 693.
Ystalyfera, 251, 522.
Ystiad, 39.

— Dyfodwg, 23, 461,
582.

— Einon, 517.

— Fflur, 578.

— Gynlais, 522.

— Meurig, 216, 244-8,
601, 661, 669.

— Rhonda, 27.

— Yw, 516, 517, 524,

531, 536.
Ystradfellte, 255.
Ystum Cegid, 220.
ystyr, 511.
Yvain, Yeuwains, Ye-

wains, 488-91.
yw, Yw, ywen, 516-8,

524> 531, 534, 536.
Ywains le fils Urien, 490.
Ywein, Ewein, 489 : see

Owen Lawgoch.

ZeiJs, 642, 644, 652.
Zimmer, Professor, 375,

4S0, 544, 694.
Zipporah, 583.

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Full text of "Celtic folklore, Welsh and Manx"

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