The Stealing of the Swine (Illustrated)

The Stealing of the Swine (Illustrated)

Math the son of Mathonwy was lord over Gwynedd,

and Pryderi son of Pwyll was lord over twenty-one cantrefs in the south, namely the seven cantrefs of Dyfed, and the seven of Morgannwg, and the four of Ceredigion, and the three of Ystrad Tywi.

At that time Math son of Mathonwy could not live unless his feet were in the lap of a virgin, except when the turmoil of war prevented him. The maiden who was with him was Goewin daughter of Pebin from Dol Pebin in Arvon, and she was the fairest maiden of her generation known at the time. Math found peace at Caer Dathyl in Arfon. He was unable to circuit the land, but Gilfaethwy son of Don, and Gwydion son of Don, his nephews, sons of his sisters, together with the retinue would circuit the land on his behalf. The maiden was always with Math. But Gilfaethwy son of Don set his heart on the maiden, and loved her to the extent that he did not know what to do about it. and behold his colour and face and form were wasting away because of his love for her, so that it was not easy to recognise him. One day Gwydion, his brother looked at him closely.

'Lad, he said, 'what has happened to you?'

'Why,' said the other, “what is wrong with me?'

'I can see that you are losing your looks and colour, and what has happened to you?' said Gwydion.

'Lord brother,' said Gilfaethwy, 'there is no point my telling anyone what has happened.'

“Why is that, my friend?' he said.

'You know of Math son of Mathonwy's special attribute', said Gilfaethwy. 'Whatever whispering goes on between people- no matter how quiet-once the wind catches hold of it then Math will know about it.'

'That's true,' said Gwydion; 'say no more. I know your thoughts; you love Goewin.'

When Gilfaethwy realized that his brother knew what was on his mind, he heaved the heaviest sigh in the world.

“Friend , stop your sighing,' said Gwydion; ' you will not get anywhere like that. The only thing to do is for me to arrange that Gwynedd and Powys and Deheubarth, gather for war, so that you can get the maiden; and cheer up, because I will arrange it for you.'

'Lord,' said Gwydion, 'I hear that some kind of creatures that have never been in this island before have arrived in the South.'

'What are they called?' said Math.

'Hobeu, lord.'

'What sort of animals are they?'

'Small animals whose flesh is better than beef. They are small, their name varies. They are called moch now.

'Who owns them?'

'Pryderi son of Pwyll-they were sent him from Annwfn, by Arawn, king of Annwfn.' (And to this day that name survives in the term for a side of pork, half a hob.)

'Well,' said Math, 'how can we get them from him?'

'I will go with eleven men disguised as poets, lord, to ask for the swine.'

'He could refuse you,' said Math.

“My plan is not a bad one, lord,' he said. 'I will not return without the swine.' 'Very well,' said Math, 'Then go on your way'.

Gwydion and Gilvaethwy, together with ten men, travelled to Ceredigion, to the place now called Rhuddlan Teivi; Pryderi had a court there.

 They entered disguised as poets. They were made welcome. Gwydion was seated next to Pryderi that night.

'Well,' said Pryderi, 'we would like to have a story from some of the young men over there.'

'Our custom, Lord,' said Gwydion, 'is that on the first night we come to a great man, the chief poet performs. I would be happy to tell a story.'

Gwydion was the best story teller in the world. And that night he entertained the court with amusing anecdotes and stories, until he was admired by everyone in the court, and Pryderi enjoyed conversing with him.

When that was over, 'Lord,' said Gwydion, 'can anyone deliver my request to you better than I myself?'

'No indeed,' said Pryderi, 'yours is a very good tongue.'

'Then this is my request, lord: to ask you for the animals that were sent to you from Annwfn.'

'Well,' he replied, 'that would be the easiest thing in the world, were there not an agreement between me and my people concerning them; namely, that I should not part with them until they had bred twice their number in the land.'

'Lord,' said Gwydion, 'I can free you from those words. This is how: do not give me the pigs tonight, but do not refuse me either. Tomorrow I will show you something you can exchange for them.'

That night Gwydion and his companions went to their lodging to confer.

'My men,' said Gwydion, 'We will not get the swine by asking for them.'

'Well,' they said, 'What plan is there to get them?'

'I will make sure we get them .' said Gwydion. Then he drew on his skills, and began to demonstrate his magic, and he conjured up twelve stallions...

...and twelve hounds, each one black with a white breast, and twelve collars with twelve leashes on them, and anyone who saw them would think they were of gold; and twelve saddles on the horses , and where there should have been of iron there was gold, and the bridles were of the same workmanship.

Gwydion came to Pryderi with the steeds and the dogs.

'Good day to you, lord,' he said.

'May God prosper you,' said the Pryderi, 'and welcome.'

'Lord,' he said.

'Here is a way out from what you said last night concerning the swine, that you would not give them away or sell them. You can exchange them for something better. I will give you these twelve horses, fully equipped as they are with their saddles and bridles, and these twelve hounds that you see, with their collars and leashes, and the twelve golden shields you can see over there.' (He had conjured those up out of toadstools).

'Well,' he said, 'we will take advice.' They decided to give Gwydion the swine and take from him in return the horses and hounds and shields.

Then they took their leave, and set off with the swine.

'My brave men', said Gwydion, 'We must move quickly. The magic will only last until tomorrow'.

(First, they travelled through the district of Creuddyn.)

And that night they journeyed as far as the upper part of Ceredigiawn, to the place which, from that cause, is called Mochdrev still.

And the next day they took their course through Melenydd, and came that night to the town which is likewise for that reason called Mochdrev between Keri and Arwystli.

And thence they journeyed forward; and that night they came as far as that Commot in Powys, which also upon account thereof is called Mochnant, and there tarried they that night.

And they journeyed thence to the Cantrev of Rhos, and the place where they were that night is still called Mochdrev.

“My men,” said Gwydion, “we must push forward to the fastnesses of Gwynedd with these animals, for there is a gathering of hosts in pursuit of us.” So they journeyed on to the highest town of Arllechwedd, and there they made a sty for the swine, and therefore was the name of Creuwyryon given to that town.

And after they had made the sty for the swine, they proceeded to Math the son of Mathonwy, at Caer Dathyl. And when they came there, the country was rising. “What news is there here?” asked Gwydion. “Pryderi is assembling one-and-twenty Cantrevs to pursue after you,” answered they. “It is marvellous that you should have journeyed so slowly.” “Where are the animals whereof you went in quest?” said Math. “They have had a sty made for them in the other Cantrev below,” said Gwydion.

The Royal Family

The Royal Family

Don.........................Cassiepiea

Math...........................Cepheus

Aranrhod................Andromeda

Lleu Llaw Gyffes..........Perseus

In order to understand the birth of Llew Llaw Gyffes it is first necessary to demonstrate the astronomical mechanics pertaining to the story of Perseus' rescue of Andromeda. Ovid tells the story the best and while Manilius' somewhat racy treatment is also good on the astronomy, the episode is more neatly summarized by Apollodorus:

Arriving in Ethiopia, which was ruled by Cepheus, he (Perseus) found the king's daughter Andromeda exposed as prey to a sea monster; for Cassiepeia, the wife of Cepheus, had claimed to rival the Nereids in beauty, boasting that she surpassed them all. The Nereids were enraged by this, and Poseidon, who shared there anger, sent a sea-flood and a monster against the land. Now Ammon had prophesied deliverance from this calamity if Cepheus' daughter Andromeda were offered as prey to the monster, and compelled by the Ethiopians, Cepheus had done so and tied his daughter to a rock. As soon as Perseus saw her, he fell in love, and promised Cepheus that he would destroy the monster if he would give him the rescued girl as his wife. When oaths had been sworn to this effect, Perseus confronted the monster and killed it, and set Andromeda free.

This cast of characters, Cepheus the king, Cassiepeia the queen, Andromeda the princess and Perseus the hero comprise the constellation group known to astronomers as The Royal Family, a fifth member of this group is the southern constellation Cetus, The Sea Monster.ⁱ The episode is clearly astronomical in origin, that is, it was composed in order to describe the movements of these constellations.

The sea monster approaches.............Perseus cofronts it, slays it.............and saves Andromeda

Perseus rescues Andromeda from Cetus

Welsh tradition, (even if our knowledge of this tradition comes to us from a comparatively late date) insists that the constellation of Cassiepiea was known in Wales as Don, the shadowy mother figure in Math. We also know from comparative mythology that Perseus and Llew are cognate figures and that it is likely, for the reasons I have given above, that in celtic Gaul and Ireland the constellation of Perseus was known as Lugus and Lugh Lamfhada respectively. I have also shown that although Aranrhod ferch Don was associated in Wales with the constellation Corona Borealis, this only refers to the sea-girt fortress or Caer of Aranrhod, and a close inspection of her tradition in Wales reveals a remarkably detailed resemblance to that of Andromeda, daughter of Cassiepiea, our Don, mother of Aranrhod. I also demonstrated that Math vab Mathonwy shares all his key characteristics with the constellation Cepheus. His very name Bearborn son of Little Bear, his ownership of a wand, his kingship of the North, the fact that he has his feet in the 'lap' of a virgin, his inability to do a 'circuit' of his realm, his occupation of the dragon throne and finally his residence at Caer Dathyl which stems from a word meaning 'to turn, in the north'; all of these statements are true for both Math and the constellation of Cepheus. Each of these identifications was arrived independently, i.e. without reference to each other, and so it was surprising to find that the principal characters in the Lleu episodes from Math vab Mathonwy are all identifiable with the constellations which represent the principal characters in the Perseus/Andromeda episode from the Greek version of 'The King and his Prophesied Death'. I say a little surprising because although we might expect the characters in Math to correspond with the characters from the Perseus myth, simply because they belong to the same tale type, the author of Math seems more concerned with describing the associated astronomy. But this is not stargazing and telling stories round the campfire, rather it is a sophisticated response to the figures who represent star formations on the classical stereographic projections or planispheric constellational charts. It turns out then, that these are not isolated identifications, on the contrary, they form a coherent group of celestial figures known as 'The Royal Family' who are intimately linked to the international popular tale 'The King and is Prophesied Death', a tale which underlies 'Math vab Mathonwy'.

Cassiepeia or Don: 'The lady in the town with breasts'.

Andromeda or Aranrhod: The Fettered Lady.

Cepheus or Math vab Mathonwy: (Bear born son of the Little Bear), King of the North

Perseus the Hero or Llew Llaw Gyffes

iPegasus is also sometimes included in this group.

Aranrhod and Andromeda

Aranrhod and Andromeda.

All this begs a question. Is there any evidence to show that Aranrhod was ever associated with Andromeda in Welsh traditions? It can be shown that the respective traditions of Aranrhod and Andromeda are remarkably similar. Both are associated with constellations, both are princesses, both are beautiful 'virgins', both have 'snow white arms', both are associated with a rock or rocks at the edge of, or in, the Ocean. Both are central to legends of oceanic inundations. Both are associated with chains or fetters, Andromeda is famous as The Chained Lady and the Taliesin persona refers to the 'fetter of Arianrod':

My beloved is below,
In the fetter of Arianrod
It is certain you know not
How to understand the song I utter,

In the Etymologies. Isidore of Seville informs us that: “...There a rock is displayed which still retains traces of the fetters of Andromeda.”. Likewise, in reference to a variant of the Fourth Branch, Lewys Mon penned: "My plaint concerning a maid is greater than (that of) Math hen son of Mathonwy. The arm of a chaste white-armed wise maiden was every night his pillow, Arianrhod white as snow; that man might not live without her.". AchilIes Tatius, in the second century, writing of a painting by Evanthes of 'Perseus and Andromeda', described Andromeda thus : 'Her white arms were extended, and lashed to the rock; but their whiteness partook of a livid hue, and her fingers were like those of a corpse'. Andromeda is chained to a rock by her parents and Arianrhod too suffers the same indignity of imprisonment in very similar circumstances as those described of Andromeda:

"Over her, Luminary of the countryside, is a keeper as strong as the wall, an angry husband, a veritable churl of low degree, who is skilled in watching a woman; and again, there is her father with his eyes (upon her) and her mother, and this is all the worse for me. The lissom lady dare not jump onto the cliff, these people will not let her."

The Fettered Lady

These lines from Kadeir Kerrituen in the 'Book of Taliesin' supply further detail:

I saw desperate fighting in Nant Ffrancon
Early on Sunday morning between raptors and Gwydion.

On Thursday, for sure, they went to Anglesey
to look for a crafty one, and for enchanters.

Arianrhod, famed for her appearance surpassing the radiance of fair weather, her terrifying was the greatest shame (to come) from the region of the Britons;
a raging river rushes around her court,,
A river with its savage wrath beating against the land:
destructive its snare as it goes round the world
(Bede's books don't tell lies).

In [Manilius, Astronomica 1st century A.D., Book 5, p.344-351] the story of Andromeda is described thus:

"There follows the constellation of Andromeda, whose golden light appears in the rightward sky when the Fishes have risen to twelve degrees. Once on a time the sin of cruel parents [Cepheus and Cassiopeia] caused her to be given up for sacrifice, when a hostile sea in all its strength burst upon every shore, the land was shipwrecked in the flood, and what had been a king's domain was now an ocean. From those ills but one price of redemption was proposed, surrender of Andromeda to the raging main for a monster [Cetus, the sea-monster] to devour her tender limbs.

..."Then as soon as the procession reaches the shore of the tumultuous sea, her soft arms are stretched out on the hard rocks; they bound her feet to crags and cast chains upon her; and there to die on her virgin cross the maiden hung. Even in the hour of sacrifice she yet preserves a modest mien: her very sufferings become her, for, gently inclining her snow-white neck, she seemed in full possession of her liberty. The folds of her robe slipped from her shoulders and fell from her arms, and her streaming locks covered her body.

..."You, princess, halcyons in circling flight lamented and with plaintive song bewailed your fate, shading you by linking their spans of wing. To look at you the ocean checked its waves and ceased to break, as was its wont, upon the cliffs, whilst the Nereids raised their countenance above the surface of the sea and, weeping for your plight, moistened the very waves. Even the breeze, refreshing with gentle breath your pinioned limbs, resounded tearfully about the cliff-tops.

There is here a close correspondence with the traditions surrounding Aranrhod, in particular the phrase 'Andromeda, whose golden light appears in the rightward sky' where one is strongly reminded of "Arianrhod of famous beauty, surpassing the hue of sunshine." from (the poem mentioned above) Ceridwen's Chair in B.T., but also themes such as the weeping of the waves and the wind resounding tearfully 'about the cliff-tops', but now we are reminded of Dylan Eil Ton, Aranrhods aquatic son. Compare also the phrase, “and again, there is her father with his eyes (upon her) and her mother, and this is all the worse for me. The lissom lady dare not jump onto the cliff, these people will not let her." with “Once on a time the sin of cruel parents [Cepheus and Cassiopeia] caused her to be given up for sacrifice, when a hostile sea in all its strength burst upon every shore” and, “ a raging river rushes around her court, A river with its savage wrath beating against the land” with, “destructive its snare as it goes round the world the land was shipwrecked in the flood, and what had been a king's domain was now an ocean”. 

Caer Aranrhod is not the only tradition relating to land lost to the sea in these parts, Aranrhod's son Dylan 'as soon, as he was baptized he made for the sea. And there, as soon as he came to the sea, he took the nature of the sea' (Translation by Will Parker) surely relates to the huge glacial erratic on the shore, a mile and a half to the south of Caer Aranrhod, known as Maen Dylan, which appears to be eternally about to dive in to the the ocean, ( I suspect that Maen Dylan may have been brought from somewhere nearby and deliberately placed at this precise point). Then about a mile and a half to the north of Caer Aranrhod is the Iron-age hill fort known as Dinas Dinlle, The City of Lleu's Fort (Dylan's twin) which is actually still crumbling into the sea. The legends of the loss of Cantref Gwaelod and of Llys Helig to the sea are also part of a broader pattern of ancient memories of the permanent inundation of an earlier, extended Welsh coastline.

Aranrhod and her equidistant sons, Lleu and Dylan.

The pale beige line is the present beach.  But perhaps it is only the most recent coastline? Looking further east, ten or more, (highly pixelated darker blue) physical features can be discerned are these indications of even earlier coastlines  In fact, the visible evidence, from these Google maps alone suggests multiple episodes of catastrophic coastal erosion due to major storm events and to rising sea levels.

The coast overlain with an aerial photo showing the circular formation of Caer Aranrhod and her equidistant twins Lleu and Dylan.

Recent research has indicated that this area of the Welsh coast is particularly vulnerable to coastal erosion. This from a recent paper: Welsh Coastal Storms, December 2013 & January 2014 – an assessment of environmental change. Editors: Catherine Duigan, Nicola Rimington, Mike Howe

'We have significant evidence of the impact of historical storm events in Wales, with numerous examples cited by Davies & Jones (2014). These include reports of wrecks of the Great storm of 1859, which scattered wrecks along the whole of the Welsh coast, and a quote from Giraldus Cambrensis on the winter of 1171-2:

“The wind blew with such unprecedented violence that the shores of South Wales were completely denuded of sand….the seashore took on the appearance of a forest grove, cut down at the time of the flood….The tempest raged so fiercely that conger eels and many other fish were driven up on the high rocks…”

Looking back over the longer term, the last 2000 years or so, we know from work by Bristow (2009, 2011) at Morfa Dinlle in north Wales that there is evidence of storm events. Bristow identified the presence of around 20 low-angle erosion surfaces, tentatively interpreted to have been formed during storm events. From dating information and the number of erosion surfaces, the evidence suggests that the storm erosion events which formed these may have occurred on a 100 year time scale'.
https://naturalresources.wales/.../welsh-coastal-storms-december-2013-and-january-2

The graves of Dylan and Lleu are recorded in 'The Stanzas of the Graves'. Lleu's grave is 'under cover of the sea'.

Britain around 7000 BC.

Britain around 3000 BC. 
Note the shrinking coastline along the Llŷn and Anglesey.

These are clips from an animation which you can find on YouTube @ Sea Level Rise: 13,000 bp to 5,000 bp in the British Mesolithic - TemporalMapping.org. A short description reads: ''Sea level is calibrated to Global Sea Level estimates with data points at 1000 year intervals. This model does not yet account for isostacy, or glaciation'.

However, this amply illustrates how this part of North Wales was witness to radical changes to the coast throughout the mesolithic and the neolithic - changes which would, no doubt, have been of great interest to the local inhabitants. It is noteworthy that certainly two of the sites resulted from the retreating ice sheet some 13,000 to 10,000 years ago; Dinas Dinlle was built on 'an isolated mound of glacial drift 'known as a drumlin, Maen Dylan is a glacial erratic, I'm less sure of how Caer Arianrhod was formed, information is hard to find, but I wouldn't be surprised if this striking feature was also linked to rising sea levels and the retreating ice sheet. These three remarkable, stand-out features were all part of this otherwise low-lying post glacial landscape. Could they have been chosen as the repository of the tale of Aranrhod and her twin sons Dylan and Lleu in order to alert future generations to the relentless onslaught by the sea on the land?

A map illustrating predicted future land loss due to rising sea levels caused by global warming. Note the west coast of Anglesey and Morfa Dinlle on the north coast of Gwynedd.

Some recent Headlines:

Entire Welsh village to be evacuated before it’s lost to the sea

Residents of a ‘sinking’ town are hoping for £100million in compensation after authorities said they should be evacuated. A report said Fairbourne, a village in the north Welsh county of Gwynedd, would see sea levels rise by one metre over the next century, eventually becoming lost to the sea.

Ashitha NageshThursday 11 Feb 2016 11:04 am. Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MetroUK/

Erosion and rising seas threaten Wales's most beautiful beaches

Historic sites at risk from storms and tidal surges
National Trust report calls for action to tackle crisis

The Guardian. Steven Morris. 13.02.2007

The story continues....

There's a very good informative general introduction on the wider implications of changing sea levels - past, present and future - for Britain's coasts available on Youtube: Time Team Special 26 (2007) Britain's Drowned World.

Llys Don and Caer Aranrhod

Llys Don and Caer Aranrhod

According to Lady Charlotte Guest there are two central female characters in the Fourth Branch of the Mabinogi or Math vab Mathonwy whose identities are linked to the Ptolemaic or classical constellations. She associated Aranrhod with that beautiful circle of stars Corona Borealis or the Crown of the North Wind which the Welsh call Caer Aranrhod or 'Aranrhod's Fort', and secondly she equated the shadowy matriarch Don with Cassiopeia known in Wales as Llys Don or the 'Court of Don'.ⁱ 

How old is this material? Was the author of Math vab Mathonwy, (and his intended audience) aware of these celestial associations? Or are these later accretions, inventions of the likes of Owen Pughe and Iolo Morganwg? Present scholarship takes this second view, for example Patrick Simms Williams has said: 'On balance, however, Caer Sidi, sidydd, and the like as astronomical terms look like eighteenth century inventions based on the extant Taliesin poetry'. Caer Sidi does not concern us for the moment, but the reference here in '...and the like...' can only be to Llys Don and Caer Aranrhod in the 'Legendary' Taliesin poem Cadeir Ceridwen which mentions Gwydion, Llys Don and Arianrhod. The antiquity of Gwydion in association with the Milky Way (Caer Gwydion) is not in question. Can the same be said of Don and Cassiopeia and Aranrhod and Corona Borealis?

Llys Don and Casseiopeia

Cassiopeia or 'Llys Don'. The lady in the town with breasts?

The origins for the association of Don with the constellation Cassiopeia are not clear cut and one searches the prose, the poetry and the Triads in vain for an early unambiguous celestial reference. Conversely, notices in later authorities are plentiful but most appear to hark back to Lady Guest's note on Gwydion in her translation of Math, or to her sources, (probably Iolo Morgannwg and Owen Pughe, maybe Robert Roberts too).ⁱⁱ Lady Guest understood Don as a man, other writers who followed include Richard Hinckley Allen who noted in 'Star Myths': 'As the figure almost wholly lies in the Milky Way, the Celts fixed upon it as their Llys Don, the Home of Don, their king of the fairies and father of the mythical character Gwydyon, who gave his name to that great circle'.ⁱⁱⁱ And, in 'Celtic Mythology and Religion', Alexander Macbain also betrays his source: 'The family of Don is evidently connected with the sky and its changes. He has given his name in Welsh to the constellation of Cassiopeia, called Llys Don, the court of Don'. Iolo Morgannwg though, in his list of Welsh constellations in 'Y Barddas', offers no clues as to the gender of Dôn, simply stating: 'Llys Don - The Palace of Don, with the note 'Cassiopeia' attached. Likewise, Matthew Arnold in 'On the Study of Celtic Literature' enthused: 'Why, the heroes and heroines of the old Cymric world are all in the sky as well as in Welsh story … Cassiopeia's chair is Llys Don, Don's Court'. However, John Rhys in 'Celtic Folklore: Welsh And Manx' treats Don as the mother of the Plant Don, the Children of Dôn and says: '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 Llys Don or Don's Court'.

There is, at least, one mention looking beyond the influence horizon of Iolo Morganwg and Lady Guest, towards a traditional origin for Don = Cassiopeia. Robert Roberts (1777-1836) who “was well read in astronomy, and science more generally”, and who can be viewed “as a relatively reliable source". He recorded in the astronomical section, Arweiniad i Wybodaeth o Seryddiaeth ("A Guide to a Knowledge of Astronomy"), of his book Daearyddiaeth "Geography" (published in Chester in 1816). the following: Llys Don – The Court of Don – Cassiopeia. This is, however, still very late.

It is now generally accepted that in medieval Wales Don was regarded as the mother of Aranrhod and that, in accord with Triad 35, Beli Mawr was the father. Interestingly, this triad also mentions a son of Aranrhod (the redactor of Triad 35 understood Ar(y)anrot as 'Silver Wheel'.^iv) named Nwyfre, meaning 'Firmament', 'Sky', which seems to confirm this family's early celestial connections.

The earliest mention I can find of 'Llys Don' is in the poem known as Kadeir Kerrituen (Cadair Ceridwen) The Song or The (bardic) Chair of Ceridwen in The Book of Taliesin (In connection with this title it is interesting to note that Cassiopeia is always depicted as seated in a chair). The poem refers to other characters from Math vab Mathonwy - Gwydion, Aranrhod and Lleu, and to their adventures, including the Stealing of the Swine and the Creation of Blodeuedd. The mention of 'Llys Don' is in the voice of Taliesin who declares, 'Ry'm gelwir kyfrwys yn Llys Don', 'I'm called a knowledgeable one in Don's Court'. Marged Haycock has suggested 'Don's Court (llys) was imagined (like Kaer Sidi) as a place for poetry and entertainment' Later in the poem there are references to the (scientific) books of Bede and to Ocean currents, but there appears to be no overt astronomy here, unlike several other poems in the collection.

Cassiopeia belongs to that group of constellations called by astronomers, 'The Royal Family'. They are Cassiopiea The Queen, Cepheus The King, Andromeda The Princess and Perseus The Hero. The analogous roles in The Fourth Branch (a 'Perseus type tale') are thus Don The Queen, Math vab Mathonwy The King, Aranrhod The Princess and Llew Llaw Gyffes The Hero. The two families differ in their relationships with one another

Queen Cassiopiea Mother Wife (Queen)            Don Mother Sister Grandmother

King Cepheus Husband Father (in-law) (King)    Math Brother Uncle Father-in-law

Princess Andromeda Daughter Wife (Princess)   Aranrhod Daughter Niece

Hero Perseus Husband Son-in-Law (Hero)        Llew Grandson Nephew Son

The only kinship, that of mother and daughter, which does not differ in the two families is that between Cassiopeia and Andromeda, on the one hand and Don and Aranrhod, on the other. All four are associated with constellations:

Cassiopeia Cassiopeia = Don Llys Don (The Court of Don) = Cassiopeia.

Andromeda Andromeda = Aranrhod Caer Aranrhod (The Fort of Aranrhod) = Corona Borealis.

This is a very unlikely correspondence, it suggests that the two traditions are more than superficially related. Nonetheless, as far as Don is concerned it has to be admitted that firm evidence of an early connection with Cassiopeia is slight, however absence of evidence does not constitute evidence of absence. It is surely significant that her brother Gwydion and her son Nwyfre in connection with the Milky Way and the Firmament are both found early in the literature. My identification of Math vab Mathonwy with Cepheus (Cassiopeia's husband), should also be taken into consideration, as should Llew Llaw Gyffes' long historical association with the constellation Perseus.

There is one curious passage, however, in Math vab Mathonwy itself which just might be a reference to Don in her guise as Cassiopeia.

As Gwydion was on a day in his bed and waking, he heard a cry in the chest below his feet; though it was not loud, yet it was so loud that he heard it. This is what he did then, he arose quickly and opened the chest, and as he opened it, he could see a little boy waving his arms from the fold of a sheet, and parting it. And he took the boy between his hands and took him to the town, where he knew there was a woman with breasts, and he fixed a price with the woman to foster the child.^v

Present consensus does not recognise Don as the 'woman in the town with breasts', with whom Gwydion makes a deal to suckle the, (as yet unnamed) child Llew, but her role in the tale as the 'royal Mother' is undisputed; Don is the the Mother of Gwydion, Gilvaethwy, Aranrhod and Gofannon and the grandmother of Llew Llaw Gyffes and Dylan Eil Ton as well as Bleiddwn, Hyddwn and Hychdwn Hir. She is also the sister of Math vab Mathonwy whom I have identified with the constellation Cepheus (husband of Cassiopeia). Scholars have generally accepted that Don is to be equated with Danu 'the mother of the gods in the Irish pantheon', it may well be significant then that Cassiepeia is the only constellation figure who is consistently characterised as bare breasted, and in some late classical sources her bared beasts are part of her punishment so as to bring shame upon her for the crime of vanity. Or alternatively as Deborah Holding has suggested:

A distinguishing feature of Cassiopeia is the easily observed celestial 'W', formed by the shape of its five brightest stars. Schedar (or Schedir), the brightest of them all, is a 2nd magnitude star, rose pink in colour and situated in the breast of the figure, perhaps in order to highlight the theme of royal motherhood.

 'he could see a little boy waving his arms from the fold of a sheet, and parting it. And he took the boy between his hands and took him to the town, where he knew there was a woman with breasts'.

It might be coincidental that it is Gwydion (The Milky Way) who finds (Llew) the boy in the chest (Perseus) and carries him to 'the lady in the town with breasts' (Cassiopeia). But I don't think so.

Aranrhod and Coronae Borealis.

It has often been remarked that the name of the classical mythological princess most often associated with Corona Borealis, namely 'Ariadne' is very similar to that of 'Arianrhod', for example Allen noted 'this name (Arianrhod) bearing a singular resemblance to that of the classical owner of the Crown' (Ariadne), with the implication that this similarity of names is solely what lies behind the association of Arianrhod with the constellation Corona Borealis. But it is worth mentioning that both Ariadne and Arianrhod are characterised as princesses and as virginal island dwellers, presenting multiple connections:

Arianrhod   princess      virgin    Island dwelling     Caer Aranrhod (Corona Borealis)

Ariadne      princess      virgin    Island dwelling     Corona Borealis

It is also true that, whatever the actual etymology of 'Aranrhod,' as Rachel Bromwich noted '...Aryanrot is the spelling of the name in triad 35... In the mind of the triad's redactor there was clearly a connection between the name Ar(y)anrot and the title (of the triad) Tri Aryanllu, 'Three Silver Hosts'. The second part of the name Rot or Rhod means 'wheel'. The name, then, meant 'Silver Wheel' or 'Silver Circle' to the redactor and presumably to his 'audience'. This has led some to claim that Aranrhod was a goddess of the Moon or of the Milky Way, but it is surely simpler to assume an association with the constellation Caer Aranrhod or Corona Borealis which is depicted as a crown, in other words a 'Silver Circle'. Put this beside the fact that her mother Don is said to be Cassiopeia, her brother is represented as the Milky Way or Caer Gwydion and that her son is named 'Sky', 'Firmament' and the evidence starts to look convincing for an early association of Ar(y)anrhod with 'The Crown of the North Wind'.

There is a further surprising connection. The Welsh constellation Caer Arianrhod, has an earthly counterpart, it is a "submerged rock, visible at low water," about a mile off the coast of Gwynedd. It has been marked on maps of Wales ever since it first appeared on Humphrey Lhwyd's map Cambriae Typus as Caer Ierjenrod. A visual comparison of the constellation Caer Aranrhod with the sea girt 'town' of Caer Aranrhod reveals an uncanny topographical resemblance between Coronae Borealis and its relationship with the Milky Way (at the point where it branches), and the 'island' Caer Aranrhod and its relationship to the coast at the point where the river Llyfni enters the sea. One is reminded of the ancient dictum 'As above so below', This is of course an entirely natural coincidence, but it is curious that we are now confronted with several coincidences. 

There is even more to this, Caer Aranrhod, the natural rocky outcrop is known locally by several different names which recall not Ariadne but another classical princess, namely Andromeda. Edward Lhuyd noted Tre Ga'r Anthrag and two other versions as Caer Anrhad and Caer Anrhod, (these two both closer to Andromeda than Ariadne) whilst Rees recorded Tregan Anthrod (even closer). The first part of the name Andromeda is from the Greek Andro or anthro. These similarities are easily as noteworthy as that between Arianrhod and Ariadne.

Corona Borealis/Caer Arianrod

Caer Ierjenrhod on Cambriae Typus

Notes and References

iThe Mabinogion. Guest. 2^nd ed. Notes to Math son of Mathonwy pp 436 – 437 1877. London.

ii But this is not certain as some medieval sources speak of a 'fairy king' called Don. See for instance Marged Haycock's note to line 26 of the BT. Poem Kadeir Kerrituen in Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin. Aberystwyth. 2007.

iiiStar Names. Their Lore and Meanining. Hinckley Allen. Stechert. 1899. Republication Dover. 1963.

ivSee Trioedd Ynys Prydein.Ed. Trans. Rachel Bromwich. 3^rd edition. 2006. Cardiff. P284.

vMath vab Mathonwy. Gruffydd. P. 19. 1928. Cardiff.

Gilfaethwy son of Don & The Ploughman

Gilfaethwy son of Don & The Ploughman

It is a fact that Gwydion's brother Gilvaethwy can be found nowhere else in the entire corpus of Welsh vernacular literature other than in the Fourth Branch, but I propose that he is one and the same, (in the mind of the author of Math vab Mathonwy) with the Amaethon (also Gwydion's brother), of the Cad Goddeu or Kat Godeu (The Battle of the Trees) and of Culhwch ac Olwen. I don’t believe this is a new suggestion either, though I don't recall where I might have read it. Both names contain the Welsh word amaeth, in the case of Gilvaethwy it is the mutated form faeth, and means: farmer or agriculture. The endings in both names 'wy' and 'on' both signify divinity. Others have derived Amaethon from a proto-celtic word ambaxtonos, meaning: 'divine ploughman'.

Like Gilfaethwy in Math, Amaethon, in the poem Kat Godeu is responsible for a war between the Children of Don and the Lord of Annwfn after he steals a dog (Canis Major), a lapwing (Corvus) and a roebuck (Capricornus) from him. Gilfaethwy is the cause of the war in the mabinogi of Math because of his lust for Geowin (who, as explained in 'Lleu Llaw Gyffes and Perseus', is Ursa Minor, and when pregnant Ursa Major which contains The Plough). Gilvaethwy and Amaethon are, then, essentially the same character, playing esentially the same role, with essentially the same name.

The constellation Bootes is also called The Ploughman because he drives the oxen of The Plough, the great asterism of Ursa Major, and is credited by the Greeks with the invention of the plough. Whereas Amaethon appears in Culhwch and Olwen in the remarkable series of exchanges where it is stated that only he could till the field of Ysbaddaden Pencawr in one day, which is precisely what Bootes does - once a day, every day.

In another Greek tradition Bootes is known Arctophylax The Bear Watcher or Lover of the Bear(s) because he gazes upon those constellations, as Gilvaethwy gazes upon Goewin. Accepting all of this, it is easy to see why we can equate Bootes with Gilvaethwy/Amaethon. What is further beginning to emerge at this stage is that, it is not only the direct pictorial clues and the mythical allusions which urge these identifications but also the spatial and geometric relationships which the constellations share.

Gilvaethwy/Amaethon - The Divine Ploughman