Ceridwen
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In Welsh medieval legend, Ceridwen was an enchantress, mother of Morfran and a beautiful daughter Creirwy. Her husband was Tegid Foel, and they lived near Bala Lake (Llyn Tegid) in north Wales. Medieval Welsh poetry refers to her as possessing the cauldron of Poetic Inspiration (Awen) and the Tale of Taliesin recounts her swallowing her servant Gwion Bach who is then reborn through her as the poet Taliesin.
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[edit] Etymology
There are several possible interpretations of the name 'Ceridwen'. The earliest recorded form, found in the Black Book of Carmarthen, is Cyrridven.[1] This was interpreted by Sir Ifor Williams as "crooked woman" (cyrrid < cwrr "crooked or bent"? + ben "woman, female"), although the precise meaning of cyrrid is uncertain.[2][3] Another possible meaning for the second element, based on the much more common form 'Ceridwen', is "fair, beloved" or "blessed, sacred" (gwen, mutated here to -wen, is a common element in female saints' names, e.g. Dwynwen).[4]
[edit] Legend
According to the late medieval Tale of Taliesin, included in some modern editions of the Mabinogion, Morfran (also called Afagddu) was hideously ugly, so Ceridwen sought to make him wise. She had a magical cauldron that could make a potion granting the gift of wisdom and poetic inspiration. The mixture had to be boiled for a year and a day. Morda, a blind man, tended the fire beneath the cauldron, while Gwion Bach, a young boy, stirred the concoction. The first three drops of liquid from this cauldron gave wisdom; the rest was a fatal poison. Three hot drops spilled onto Gwion's thumb as he stirred, burning him. He instinctively put his thumb in his mouth, and instantly gained great wisdom and knowledge.
Ceridwen chased Gwion. He turned himself into a hare. She became a greyhound. He became a fish and jumped into a river. She turned into an otter. He turned into a bird; she became a hawk. Finally, he turned into a single grain of corn. She then became a hen and ate him. When Ceridwen became pregnant, she knew it was Gwion and resolved to kill the child when he was born. However, when he was born, he was so beautiful that she couldn't do it. She threw him in the ocean instead, sewing him inside a leather-skin bag. The child did not die, but was rescued on a Welsh shore - near Aberdyfi according to most versions of the tale - by a prince named Elffin ap Gwyddno; the reborn infant grew to became the legendary bard Taliesin.
[edit] Later interpretations
Ronald Hutton suggests that Ceridwen was created solely for the Tale of Taliesin, the earliest surviving text of which dates to the mid-16th century.[2] However, references to Ceridwen and her cauldron, and indeed to Taliesin as the bard of Elffin, are found in the work of the Poets of the Princes, e.g. Cynddelw Brydydd Mawr, and thus can be dated to the 12th century.[5] References to Ceridwen's cauldron (pair Ceridwen) are also to be found in some of the mythological poems attributed to the legendary Taliesin in the Book of Taliesin,[6]
The Victorian poet Thomas Love Peacock also wrote a poem entitled the Cauldren of Ceridwen.[7] Later writers identified her as having originally been a pagan Goddess, speculating on her role in a supposed Celtic pantheon. John Rhys in 1878 referred to the Solar Myth theory of Max Muller according to which "Gwenhwyfar and Ceridwen are dawn goddesses."[8] Charles Isaac Elton in 1882 referred to her as a "white fairy".[9] Robert Graves later fitted her into his concept of the Threefold Goddess, in which she was interpreted as a form of the destructive side of the goddess.[10]
Graves' theory was appropriated by Wicca, in which Ceridwen plays a role as a goddess, her cauldron symbolizing the feminine principle.[11]
[edit] See also
- Finn MacCool and the legend of the Salmon of Knowledge
[edit] Notes
- ^ A. O. H. Jarman (ed.). Llyfr Du Caerfyrddin (University of Wales Press, 1982), 3.3.
- ^ a b Ronald Hutton, The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles: Their Nature and Legacy, Blackwell Publishing, 1993, p. 323
- ^ Rachel Bromwich (ed.), Trioedd Ynys Prydein (University of Wales Press, 1991), pp. 308-9.
- ^ Rachel Bromwich (ed.), Trioedd Ynys Prydein (University of Wales Press, 1991), p. 308.
- ^ Rachel Bromwich (ed.), Trioedd Ynys Prydein (University of Wales Press, 1991), p. 309.
- ^ J. Gwenogvryn Evans (ed.), The Book of Taliesin (Llanbedrog, 1910), 33.10; 27.13-14; 33.10.
- ^ Thomas Love Peacock, The Works of Thomas Love Peacock: Including His Novels, Poems, Fugitive Pieces, Criticisms, R. Bentley and Son, 1875, p. 113
- ^ John Rhys, Lectures on Welsh Philology, Trübner, 1879, p. 305
- ^ Charles Isaac Elton, Origins of English History, B. Quaritch, 1882, p.253
- ^ Ronald Hutton, The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft, Oxford University Press, 2001, p. 192
- ^ Cerridwen: Keeper of the Cauldron
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