other · mythology

The Mabinogion — Selected Tales

c. 1100–1200 CE (written); oral tradition much older) · Medieval Welsh · Wales

The First Branch — Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed

1Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed, was lord of the seven cantrevs of Dyfed.
2And one day he was at Arberth, his chief palace, when the thought came to him
3To go and hunt in Glyn Cuch.
4In the forest he heard the cry of another pack of hounds, different from his own.
5A stag fled before them, and a pack of hounds he had never seen before —
6White, with red ears — pulled it down.
7Pwyll drove these hounds off and set his own on the stag.
8Then a horseman came up on a great horse, grey and dappled.
9He wore a coat and mantle of grey, and a horn of ivory hung at his side.
10The horseman said: "I know who you are, and I will not greet you.
11I have never had worse discourtesy done to me than you have done just now."
12"What is your name?" asked Pwyll.
13"I am Arawn, King of Annwvn," said he. (Annwvn is the Otherworld.)
14"And how may I gain your friendship?" said Pwyll.
15"There is a man whose territory borders mine, and he wars constantly against me.
16Go in my shape to Annwvn for one year, and at the year's end meet him in combat.
17Do this and you will win my friendship."
18So Pwyll and Arawn exchanged shapes, and Pwyll went to rule in Annwvn.
19He lay beside Arawn's wife each night and turned away from her,
20Keeping the compact pure. And in the morning he ruled the court so well
21That all said there was no king in all the world equal to Arawn.

The Fourth Branch — Math Son of Mathonwy: Blodeuwedd

22Math Son of Mathonwy was lord over Gwynedd.
23And it was a characteristic of Math that he could not live
24Unless his feet were in the lap of a virgin —
25Except only when the turmoil of war prevented it.
26Gwydion said to his uncle Math: "Lord, I know a young man who would suit you.
27Let me seek a wife for him from the flowers of the earth."
28And Math and Gwydion took the flowers of the oak and the broom and the meadowsweet
29And from those flowers they conjured up the fairest and most beautiful maiden
30That man ever saw.
31They baptised her with the baptism they used at that time
32And named her Blodeuwedd — Face of Flowers.
33But Blodeuwedd was false. She fell in love with a hunter, Gronw Pebr,
34And together they plotted the death of her husband Lleu Llaw Gyffes.
35To kill Lleu required a spear made only on Sundays, during Mass, for a year.
36But Blodeuwedd drew from Lleu himself how he might be killed —
37And betrayed the secret.
38Gronw Pebr struck Lleu with the spear, and Lleu transformed into an eagle
39And flew shrieking into an oak tree.
40Gwydion sought him throughout Wales.
41At last he heard the singing of the eagle and found him.
42He sang an englyn, and Lleu descended, feather by feather,
43Back into human form.
44For her betrayal, Blodeuwedd was transformed into an owl —
45The bird that dares not show its face in daylight.
46And her name in Welsh means both flowers and the owl.

Culhwch and Olwen — The First Arthurian Tale

47Culhwch came to the court of Arthur and asked his boon:
48"I seek Olwen, daughter of Yspaddaden Chief-Giant."
49And Arthur said: "I have not heard of her. But I will seek her for you."
50The giant Yspaddaden set Culhwch thirty-nine impossible tasks.
51Among them: to obtain the comb and shears from between the ears of the great boar Twrch Trwyth,
52Who was once a king but had been transformed into a boar by God,
53For his sins.
54And Arthur and his men, the greatest heroes in the island of Britain,
55Hunted the boar Twrch Trwyth from Ireland across Wales into Cornwall.
56The sea was red with his blood. Heroes died in the hunt.
57But at last the comb and shears were taken.
58And all the tasks were accomplished, and Culhwch won Olwen.

notes

The Mabinogion is a collection of eleven medieval Welsh tales preserved in two manuscripts: the White Book of Rhydderch (c. 1350 CE) and the Red Book of Hergest (c. 1382–1410 CE), though the tales themselves are considerably older, drawing on mythological traditions that reach back into pre-Christian Celtic religion. The name "Mabinogion" derives from the Four Branches of the Mabinogi — the core mythological tales — though the collection also includes tales featuring King Arthur and translated French romances. The Four Branches feature a cast of mythological figures including Pwyll, Pryderi, Rhiannon, Math, and Gwydion, whose stories preserve traces of earlier Welsh deities and their attributes: the Otherworld (Annwvn), shape-changing, magical creation, and the transformation of humans into animals. The tale of Blodeuwedd — the woman made of flowers who becomes an owl — is one of the most haunting transformation myths in European literature. "Culhwch and Olwen" is the oldest Arthurian tale in Welsh, predating the French romances, and preserves a wild, pre-chivalric Arthur who leads a band of heroes on a mythological boar hunt. Translation after Lady Charlotte Guest (1838–1849). Public domain.

currently held: National Library of Wales (White Book of Rhydderch, Red Book of Hergest)

UnderworldHero EpicWelshTransformationCeltic

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