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other tribal source, another group headed by Arthur, the god Artaius. He takes the place of Gwydion son of
Don, and the other deities of his circle fall more or less accurately into the places of others of the earlier
circle. The accompanying genealogical plans are intended to help the reader to a general view of the
relationships and attributes of these personages. It must be borne in mind, however, that these tabular
arrangements necessarily involve an appearance of precision and consistency which is not reflected in the
fluctuating character of the actual myths taken as a whole. Still, as a sketch-map of a very intricate and
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 Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race
obscure region, they may help the reader who enters it for the first time to find his bearings in it, and that is
the only purpose they propose to serve.
Gwyn ap Nudd
The deity named Gwyn ap Nudd is said, like Finn in Gaelic legend, [Finn and Gwyn are respectively the
Gaelic and Cymric forms of the same name, meaning fair or white] to have impressed himself more deeply
and lastingly on the Welsh popular imagination than any of the other divinities. A mighty warrior and
huntsman, he glories in the crash of breaking spears, and, like Odin, assembles the souls of dead heroes in his
shadowy kingdom, for although he belongs
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to the kindred of the Light-gods, Hades is his special domain. The combat between him and Gwythur ap
Greidawl (Victor, son of Scorcher) for Creudylad, daughter of Lludd, which is to be renewed every May-day
till time shall end, represents evidently the contest between winter and summer for the flowery and fertile
earth. " Later," writes Mr. Charles Squire, " he came to be considered as King of the Tylwyth Teg, the Welsh
fairies, and his name as such has hardly yet died out of his last haunt, the romantic vale of Neath. . . . He is
the Wild Huntsman of Wales and the West of England, and it is his pack which is sometimes heard at chase
in waste places by night." ["Mythology of the British Islands," p. 225] He figures as a god of war and death in
a wonderful poem from the "Black Book of Caermarthen," where he is represented as discoursing with a
prince named Gwyddneu Garanhir, who had come to ask his protection. I quote a few stanzas: the poem will
be found in full in Mr. Squire's excellent volume:
"I come from battle and conflict
With a shield in my hand;
Broken is my helmet by the thrusting of spears.
Round-hoofed is my horse, the torment of battle,
Fairy am I called, Gwyn the son of Nudd,
The lover of Crewrdilad, the daughter of Lludd
·..
" I have been in the place where Gwendolen was slain,
The son of Ceidaw, the pillar of song,
Where the ravens screamed over blood.
"I have been in the place where Bran was killed,
The son of Iweridd, of far-extending fame,
Where the ravens of the battlefield screamed.
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"I have been where Llacheu was slain,
The son of Arthur, extolled in songs,
When the ravens screamed over blood.
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 Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race
"I have been where Mewrig was killed,
The son of Carreian, of honourable fame,
When the ravens screamed over flesh.
"I have been where Gwallawg was killed,
The son of Goholeth, the accomplished,
The resister of Lloegyr, [Saxon Britain] the son of Lleynawg.
"I have been where the soldiers of Britain were slain,
From the east to the north:
I am the escort of the grave.
I have been where the soldiers of Britain were slain,
From the east to the south:
I am alive, they in death."
Myrddin, or Merlin
A deity named Myrddin holds in Arthur's mythological cycle the place of the Sky- and Sun-god, Nudd. One
of the Welsh Triads tells us that Britain, before it was inhabited, was called Clas Myrddin, Myrddin's
Enclosure. One is reminded of the Irish fashion of calling any favoured spot a "cattle-fold of the sun" - the
name is applied by Deirdre to her beloved Scottish home in Glen Etive. Professor Rhys suggests that
Myrddin was the deity specially worshipped at Stonehenge, which, according to British tradition as reported
by Geoffrey of Monmouth, was erected by "Merlin," the enchanter who represents the form into which
Myrddin had dwindled under Christian influences. We are told that the abode of Merlin was a house of glass,
or a bush of whitethorn laden with bloom, or a sort of smoke or mist in the air, or "a close neither of iron nor
steel nor timber nor of stone, but of the air
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without any other thing, by enchantment so strong that it may never be undone while the world endureth."
[Rhys, "Hibbert Lectures," quoting from the ancient saga of Merlin published by the English Text Society,
p.693] Finally he descended upon Bardsey Island, "off the extreme westernmost point of Carnarvonshire ·
into it he went with nine attendant bards, taking with him the 'Thirteen Treasures of Britain,' thenceforth lost
to men." Professor Rhys points out that a Greek traveller named Demetrius, who is described as having
visited Britain in the first Century A.D., mentions an island in the west where" Kronos" was supposed to be
imprisoned with his attendant deities, and Briareus keeping watch over him as he slept, "for sleep was the [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]