Tag: The Dead

Annwn and the Dead – Those Who Live On

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Introduction – Who Lives On?

In ‘The Conversation of Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’, Gwyn, a ruler of Annwn and gatherer of souls, speaks the following lines:

‘I was there when the warriors of Britain were slain
From the east to the south;
I live on; they are dead.’ (1)

Here Gwyn draws a distinction between Himself living on and the mortal warriors who have died. He and His people, the spirits of Annwn or fairies, are immortal or at least very long-lived. Annuvian figures are often capable of returning from death (for example the Green Knight) and although there have been sightings of fairy funerals they are rare occasions of exceptional sadness.

In my last two articles I argued that Annwn is primarily a world of the living to which Gwyn and His people guide the souls of the dead to be reborn from His magical vessel of rebirth – the Cauldron of the Head of Annwn.

I then cited evidence for certain souls, such as the souls of inspired bards and brave warriors, living on for longer and perhaps attaining immortality. In this article I will be examining other examples and exploring the reasons why some souls pass into new lives and others choose, or are chosen, to live on.

1. Inspired Bards

      Previously I showed how Taliesin stole the awen from the cauldron and became ‘unfettered’ from the cycle of reincarnation as an inspired bard.

      Taliesin claims his ‘native abode / is the land of the Cherubim’ and boasts of visiting the Court of Don and the fortresses of Gwydion and Arianrhod. (2) The abodes of the Children of Don are located in the landscape of Wales and in the stars. According to Charles Squire, the Court of Don is Cassiopea, Caer Arianrhod the Northern Crown, and Caer Gwydion the Milky Way. (3) Taliesin thus might be seen to join the immortal Gods feasting in the Heavens.

      This might explain where he gained his ‘two keen spears: / from Heaven did they come’ (4) which he used to pierce the monsters of Annwn in ‘The Battle of the Trees’.

      Taliesin brags about singing a ‘harmonious’ song in Caer Siddi ‘The Fairy Fort’. Considering he raided this Annuvian fortress one wonders whether this was a victory song he is claiming is superior to the songs of the fair folk.

      The long-lived, or immortal, spirit of Taliesin has been invoked and channelled by bards for many centuries and modern bards, such as Kevan Manwaring and Gwilym Morus-Baird continue this practice in the present day.

      Yet Taliesin is not the only bard whose spirit continues to live on. Another well-known example is Myrddin (Merlin). After dying a three-fold death (5) at the hands of shepherds at the confluence of Pausalyl Burn and the river Tweed in Drumelzier he continues to prophecy from his grave at Aber Caraf.

      ‘He who speaks from the grave
      Knows that before seven years
      |March of Eurdein will die.

      I have drunk from a bright cup
      With fierce and warlike lords;
      My name is Myrddin, son of Morvyn’. (6)

      Myrddin spoke through me resulting in a poem called ‘Myrddin’s Scribe’. This happened at a time when I was researching his lesser-known story as the northern British wildman Myrddin Wyllt and he continues to speak to others. His northern origins have been investigated by a series of scholars from William Skene to Nikolai Tolstoy, Tim Clarkson and William A. Young. Only recently have they grown in public recognition enough to warrant the initial plans for the building of a ‘Merlin Centre’ at Moffat in Annandale. (7)

      Other bards included with Taliesin amongst the Cynfeirdd ‘early poets’ who might live on include Talhaearn Tad Awen, Aneirin, Bluchbardd and Cian.

      2. The Brave not the Cowardly

      The Cauldron of the Head of Annwn ‘does not boil a coward’s food’ (8). This statement might be read on a number of levels. It could refer to the tradition of the champion’s portion, or the ‘food’ or ‘meat’ might be a metaphor for awen. Awen carries connotation of inspiration and destiny which are breathed into a person by the Gods (9) at auspicious moments including rebirth.

      An ambiguous image on the Gundestrup Cauldron might represent rebirth in either world. Are the warriors plunged headfirst into the cauldron by a deity with a hound, likely Gwyn, riding away to a mortal life in Thisworld or to join Him and His people, living on, perhaps forever, as magical huntsmen? 

      In the Norse myths the spirits of courageous warriors join Odin feasting in Valhalla. Might brave souls be similarly rewarded by joining Gwyn’s feast?

      This is suggested in the writing of Pomponius Mela who records a druidic doctrine ‘commonly known to the populace so that warriors might fight more bravely, that the spirit is eternal and another life awaits the spirits of the dead’. (10)

      Our evidence comes from warrior cultures but there is no reason to restrict the concept of bravery to warriors. In my personal experience any person might be rewarded for their courage by joining Gwyn on His hunt and at His feast.

      3. Speaking Heads

      In the Second Branch of The Mabinogion after Bendigeidfran is slain in battle he asks seven survivors, including Pryderi and Taliesin, to cut off his head and to feast with it for seven years in Harlech and for eighty years in Gwales. He tells them, ‘And you will find the head to be as good company as it ever was when it was on me’. (11) True to his word, ‘Having the head there was no more unpleasant than when Bendigeidfran had been alive with them’. (12) 

      This is suggestive of Brythonic beliefs about the soul residing in the head and being able to live on there after death. It suggests Bendigeidfran’s spirit was so strong it played a role in delaying the process of decomposition (although there are other factors at play in the pausing of time such as the singing of the birds of Rhiannon and the door that should not be opened). His spirit lived on in his head after death for at least eighty-seven years, continuing to speak with and counsel the seven companions.

      We find evidence of this belief amongst the neighbouring Gauls from Roman writers. Diodorus Siculus says in war: ‘They capitate their slain enemies and and attach the heads to their horses’ necks… The choicest spoils they nail to the walls of their houses just like the hunting trophies from wild beasts. They preserve the heads of their most distinguished enemies in cedar oil and store them carefully in chests. These they display proudly to visitors, saying that for this head one of his ancestors, or his father, or he himself refused a large offer of money. It is said some proud owners have not accepted for a head an equal weight in gold, a barbarous sort of magnimity. For selling the proof of one’s valour is ignoble, but to continue hostility against the dead is bestial’. (13)

      This passage, evidencing the tradition of head-hunting, is also suggestive of the belief the soul lives on in the head. More darkly it shows the dangers of one’s head being taken and one’s spirit living on in servitude to one’s enemies through the practice of embalming. This may be why Bendigeidfran was so keen for his people to take his head away before his enemies stole it.

      Bran finally asked for his head to be buried under the Brynfryn ‘White Hill’ in London facing towards France. From thereon it served an atropaic function: ‘for no oppression would ever come from across the sea to this island while the head was in that hiding place’. (14)

      4. Bog Heads and Bog People

      The tradition of the living head is evidenced by the bog heads recovered from the mosslands of present-day Lancashire and Cheshire, which were inhabited by the Setantii, ‘the Reaping People’, at the time of their burial.

      On Pilling Moss district was found ‘the head of a female… wrapped in coarse yellow cloth, with strings of beads. She is described as having a great abundance of hair, of a most beautiful auburn, which was plaited and of great length’ with a necklace of jet beads with ‘one large round amber bead’. (15)

      Other bog heads include another female with plaited hair from Red Moss and male heads from Lindow Moss, Ashton Moss, Worsley, Briarfield and Birkdale. (16)

      Peat bogs, known as mosslands in the north, are formed from Sphagnum mosses, which hold large amounts of water and break down to form peat. They provide anaerobic environments which prevent decay and are heavy in tannins, which preserve organic materials, including skin and organs.

      The Setantii were likely well aware of these magical properties and placed the heads of their ancestors in the bogs so they continued to live on, like the head of Bendigeidfran, offering counsel and / or defending their territories.

      We sometimes also find whole bog bodies such as Lindow Man and Seascale Man. Lindow Man died a ritualised three-fold death (like Myrddin). (17). This ritual killing has been read as a sacrifice to the Gods for aid in battle and as punishment for a criminal but might alternatively be read as a rite which bound his spirit in his body so he would live on. 

      His treatment prior to his death, such as the trimming of his moustache, the manicuring of his fingernails and his consumption of a griddle cake baked from wheat, barley and weed seeds and food, drink or medicine containing mistletoe pollen (18) are suggestive of preparation for a special fate, perhaps living on as a guide, for which he was chosen by his tribe and / or by the Gods.

      5. The Venerable Dead

      Prehistoric burial mounds look very much like houses for the dead. Indubitably they were created to appear this way for this reason. Thus it might be suggested that the spirits of the dead were believed to abide there or to return there at specific times in order to counsel the living. 

      Burials with grave goods, which include all the accoutrements needed in life, such as clothing, armour, weapons, games, jewellery, make-up sets, eating equipment and food, show the soul is believed to live on after death.

      A number of suggestions about what it did in the afterlife might be made. Perhaps the soul was seen to reside in the burial mound or to move on to the Otherworld or perhaps it was able to move between the worlds at will. 

      That the soul remained in the mound or sometimes returned is suggested by the evidence of ritual feasts that might have taken place at liminal times such as Nos Galan Gaeaf when the veils between the worlds were thin. This way venerable ancestors might have lived on as counsellors and guides.

      6. The Angry and Vengeful Dead

      Whereas there were some persons who were chosen to live on there were others who certainly were not – enemies, criminals, the angry and vengeful.

      Whilst some severed heads were placed in a bog to preserve the facial features of an ancestor some heads were mutilated perhaps with the intent of preventing the spirit from residing in the skull. Examples include the head from Briarfield which was ‘deposited in a defleshed state without the mandible’ and four defleshed skulls from the Thames. (19) The disarticulation of corpses and their binding (20) might have served a similar function. These practices suggest some spirits who lived on might have been powerful enough to raise their bodies and return physically from the dead.

      Will Parker associates such dismemberments with the ‘devils’ of Annwn who are contained by Gwyn ap Nudd to prevent the destruction of the world. (21)

      7. Witches of Annwn

      Another group of individuals who were relentlessly persecuted and the likes of Arthur and his warriors seriously did not want to live on were the witches of Annwn. 

      This term appears in the poetry of Dafydd ap Gwilym: 

      ‘Unsightly fog wherein the dogs are barking,
      Ointment of the witches of Annwfn.’ (22)

      It refers to a Gallo-Brythonic tradition of magic-workers whose powers and inspiration came from Annwn. Their practices are recorded on ritual tablets from ancient Gaul. On the Tablet of Chamalieres (50 AD) a group of male magic-workers invoke the Andedion ‘Underworld God(s) / Spirits’, Maponos and Lugus for aid in battle and the Tablet of Larzac (90 AD) records the ‘prophetic curse’ of a group of female ‘practitioners of underworld magic’.  (23) 

      Others existed in ancient Britain for example the black-robed women who defended Anglesey from the invasion of the Romans with the Druids in the account of Tacitus. ‘Women in black clothing like that of the Furies ran between the ranks. Wild-haired they brandished torches. Around them, the Druids, lifting their hands to the sky to make frightening curses frightened (the Roman) soldiers with this extraordinary sight. And so (the Romans) stood motionless and vulnerable as if their limbs were paralysed’. (24)

      The Christian persecution of these uncanny figures is recorded in our myths. At the end of Peredur son of Efrog the eponymous ‘hero’ slays the nine witches of Caer Loyw. A witch is killed in a specific way. ‘Peredur drew his sword and struck the witch on the top of the helmet, so that the helmet and all the armour and the head were split in two’. (25) The splitting of the head may be a ritual maneuver to prevent a witch’s soul from living on.

      Arthur kills Orddu, ‘Very Black’, a hag who lives in a cave ‘in Pennant Gofid in the uplands of Hell’ in a similar manner. ‘Arthur… aimed at the hag with Carwennan, his knife, and struck her in the middle so she was like two vats.’ (26) Her severing in twain was likely intended to serve the same function.

      From personal experience I know Arthur’s ploy was unsuccessful. On her death Orddu joined the spirits of Annwn and lives on with her mother, Orddu, and other witches of Annwn as guides to the magical tradition of the Old North.

      Conclusion – To Live On or Not to Live On?

      In this essay I have shown that certain persons choose, or are chosen by their people and / or the Gods to live on after death. It is likely they were chosen for personal qualities such as inspiration, bravery and wisdom to become ancestral guides with whom their people could commune. 

      On the other hand people went to great lengths to prevent the vengeful dead from returning. One example, from the not so distant past, is the burial of the ‘witch’ Meg Shelton face down with a boulder on top in St Anne’s graveyard in Woodplumpton, not far outside Preston, near my home, in 1705.

      In ancient Britain, in a polytheistic society, in which the people lived in constant communion with the Gods and spirits there would have been a much deeper awareness of the processes surrounding whether a spirit lived on along with a knowledge of the rites for maintaining and dismissing their presence.

      As the old ways return the question arises who amongst us might choose or be chosen to live on and, if given the choice, what answer we might give.

      1. Hill, G. (transl), ‘The Conversation between Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’, Awen ac Awenydd 
      2. Parker, W. (transl), The Mabinogion, (University of California Press, 2008), p173
      3. Squire, C. Celtic Myth and Legend, (1905), p252-3 https://sacred-texts.com/neu/celt/cml/index.htm
      4. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p183, l187-188
      5. He is beaten with stones, tumbles into the water and drowns, and is impaled on a stake. E. Lawrence, ‘Threefold Death and the World Tree’, Western Folklore, Vol. 69, No.1, p92
      6. Jones, M. ‘A Fugitive Poem of Myrddin in his Grave’, Mary Jones Celtic Literature Collective, l1-6, https://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/h02.html
      7. Breen, Christie, ‘September date for Merlin study release’, DnG, https://www.dng24.co.uk/september-date-for-merlin-study-release/
      8. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), l17
      9. Awen shares a similar root to awel ‘breath’ and the cauldron is kindled by the breath of nine maidens – likely Morgana and Her sisters.
      10. Koch, J. The Celtic Heroic Age, (Celtic Studies Publications, 2003), p32
      11. Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p32
      12. Ibid. p34
      13. Koch, J. The Celtic Heroic Age, (Celtic Studies Publications, 2003), p13
      14. It remained there until it was dug up by Arthur – one of ‘Three Unfortunate Disclosures’. Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p34, p237
      15. Lamb, J. ‘Lancashire’s Prehistoric Past’ inSever, L. (ed.), Lancashire’s Sacred Landscape, (The History Press, 2010), p27
      16. Barrowclough, D. Prehistoric Lancashire, (The History Press, 2011), p206
      17. He was hit on the head, garroted, then he drowned in the bog.Joy, J. Lindow Man, (The British Museum Press, 2009), p38 – 44.
      18. Ibid. p29
      19. Barrowclough, D. Prehistoric Lancashire, (The History Press, 2011), p209
      20. Ibid. p205
      21. Parker, W., The Four Branches of the Mabinogi, (Bardic Press, 2005), p645
      22. Gwilym ap, D. Poems, (Gomer Press, 1982), p134
      23. Koch, J. The Celtic Heroic Age, (Celtic Studies Publications, 2003), p1-3
      24. Ibid. p34
      25. Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p102
      26. Ibid. p213

      BIBLIOGRAPHY

      Aldhouse Green, M., Dying for the Gods: Human Sacrifice in Iron Age and Roman Europe (The History Press, 2002)
      Barrowclough, D. Prehistoric Lancashire, (The History Press, 2011)
      Breen, Christie, ‘September date for Merlin study release’, DnG, https://www.dng24.co.uk/september-date-for-merlin-study-release/
      Cooper, A., Garrow, D., Gibson, C., Giles, M., Wilkin, N. Grave Goods: Objects and Death in Later Prehistoric Britain, (Oxbow Books, 2022)
      Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007
      E. Lawrence, ‘Threefold Death and the World Tree’, Western Folklore, Vol. 69, No.1, p92
      Fahey, R. ‘Mystery of 80 bound skeletons found in mass grave explained by items found with their remains’, The Mirror, (2021)
      Guest, C. (transl), The Mabinogion, (1838)
      Gwilym ap, D. Poems, (Gomer Press, 1982)
      Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007)
      Hill, G. (transl), ‘The Conversation between Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’, Awen ac Awenydd
      Hughes, K. 13th Mt Haemus Lecture: Magical Transformation in the Book of Talieisn and The Spoils of Annwn, (OBOD, 2019)
      Jones, M. ‘A Fugitive Poem of Myrddin in his Grave’, Mary Jones Celtic Literature Collective
      Joy, J. Lindow Man, (The British Museum Press, 2009)
      Koch, J. The Celtic Heroic Age, (Celtic Studies Publications, 2003)
      Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023)
      Sever, L. (ed.), Lancashire’s Sacred Landscape, (The History Press, 2010)
      Squire, C. Celtic Myth and Legend, (1905), p252-3 https://sacred-texts.com/neu/celt/cml/index.htm

      Annwn and the Dead – The Mysteries of Rebirth

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      Introduction – How is a soul reborn?

      In my last article I put forward an argument that Annwn is primarily a land of the living through which the souls of the dead pass to be reborn.

      The notion that the soul does not stay in the spirit world for good but takes a new form bears similarities to the Dharmic religions (Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism). Scholars and modern druid orders have noted the similarities between the doctrine of reincarnation and ancient British beliefs about the soul being immortal and passing into a new body after death along with other parallels such as the likeness between the Brahmins and Druids. (1)

      References to reincarnation are found in the Rig Veda and Upanishads and the Bardo Thodol (The Tibetan Book of the Dead) lays out a detailed picture of the processes the soul undergoes upon death and by which it is reborn. 

      In the Brythonic tradition we find hints about the mysteries of rebirth in medieval Welsh literature and in this article to these I will turn.

      1. The Transformations of Taliesin

      The most famous and most cited source for evidence of ancient British and druidic beliefs about reincarnation is the poetry of Taliesin. This historical and legendary bard is central to the bardic tradition and to modern druidry.

      Taliesin speaks of his transformations in several poems. In the opening lines of ‘The Battle of the Trees’ he tells us ‘I was in a multitude of forms / before I was unfettered’. This might be a reference to being trapped in the cycle of reincarnation before his liberation as an inspired bard.

      Taliesin lists his forms which include elemental qualities, a bird, a tree, and a number of man-made artefacts:

      ‘I was a slender mottled sword
      made from the hand.
      I was a droplet in the air,
      I was the stellar radiance of the stars.
      I was a word in writing,
      I was a book in my prime.
      I was the light of a lantern
      for a year and a half.
      I was a bridge standing
      over sixty estuaries.
      I was a path, I was an eagle,
      I was a coracle on the seas.
      I was effervescence in drink,
      I was a raindrop in a shower,
      I was a sword in the hand,
      I was a shield in battle.
      I was a string in a harp
      under enchantment for nine years,
      (and) foam in water.
      I was a tinder-spark in a fire,
      I was a tree in a conflagration.’ (2)

      In ‘The Hostile Confederacy’ Taliesin lists animal transformations:

      ‘I was a blue salmon, 
      I was a dog, I was a stag,
      I was a roebuck on the mountain’. (3)

      Followed by tools:

      ‘I was a block, I was a spade,
      I was an axe in the hand,
      I was an auger (held) in tongs,
      for a year and a half.’ (4)

      Then lusty male animals:

      ‘I was a speckled white cockerel
      covering the hens in Eidyn;
      I was a stallion at stud,
      I was a fiery bull.’ (5)

      He then tells his story as a grain:

      ‘I was a stook in the mills,
      the ground meal of farmers;
      I was a grain…
      it grew on a hill;
      I’m reaped, I’m planted,
      I’m dispatched to the kiln,
      I’m loosed from the hand
      in order to be roasted.
      A hen got hold of me – 
      a red clawed one, a crested enemy;
      I spent nine nights residing in her womb.
      I was matured, 
      I was drink set before a ruler,
      I was dead, I was alive,
      a stick went into me;
      I was on the lees,
      separated from it I was whole…
      I’m Taliesin.’ (6)

      One might read this simply as an account of the bard’s protoplasmic ability to shift through multiple forms in Thisworld if we didn’t find the lines, ‘I was dead, I was alive’. Implicit is the idea each form is a separate incarnation.

      Taliesin’s account of his rebirth from the womb of a crested red-clawed hen into his bardic incarnation provides a link to The Story of Taliesin.

      2. The Cauldron of Ceridwen

      In The Story of Taliesin we meet Ceridwen, who is ‘learned in the three crafts, which are known as magic, witchcraft and divination’. Ceridwen has a son called Afagddu who is ‘terribly ugly’ and because of his ‘wretchedness’ she sets out to brew a potion in her cauldron ‘to make him in possession of the Prophetic Spirit and a great storyteller of the world to come’. (7)

      To stir her cauldron for a year and a day she recruits a young man called Gwion Bach. When the time arrives for Afagddu to receive the three magical drops Gwion pushes him out of the way, receives them, and is ‘filled with knowledge’. Ceridwen is furious. Thereon follows a shapeshifting chase. Gwion takes the form of a hare and Ceridwen a black greyhound bitch, Gwion a salmon and Ceridwen an otter, Gwion a bird and Ceridwen a hawk. Finally, he takes the form of a grain of wheat and she a crested black hen and she swallows him. He gestates in her womb for nine months. When he’s born she casts him out to sea in ‘a coracle, or skin belly’. (8) He is found in the salmon weir of Gwyddno Garanhir by Gwyddno’s son, Elffin, who, on opening the skin, declares, “Behold the radiant brow!” Thus he is named Taliesin. (9)

      The parallels between the poem and story are clear. Each portrays the soul shifting through a series of forms before it is reborn from the womb of Ceridwen, as a crested black hen, ‘whole’ in its bardic incarnation.

      In medieval Welsh literature Ceridwen is associated with the pair awen ‘cauldron of inspiration’ and invoked by the bards as a muse (10). Her presence at the Court of Don as a ‘knowledgeable one’ (11) suggests, like Don and Her children, She is an important Brythonic Goddess.

      Kristoffer Hughes notes ‘in the Welsh language the word “crochen” meaning cauldron shares the same prefix “cro” as the word “croth” meaning womb’ (12) suggesting Ceridwen’s cauldron and womb are one. Her magical vessel is the source of initiation, inspiration, transformation and rebirth. (13) 

      Gwilym Morus-Baird hypothesises this story might be rooted in interactions between the bardic tradition and the visionary tradition of the witches. (14) Taliesin steals his awen from a ‘witch’ who knows its secrets and can be seen continuing his thieving ways in his raid with Arthur on Annwn.

      3. The Cauldron of the Head of Annwn

      In the midst of Annwn, in the midst of Caer Vedwit ‘The Mead Feast Fort’, lies ‘the Cauldron of the Head of Annwn’. The most likely candidate for this title is Gwyn ap Nudd as He speaks of witnessing a battle at one of the forts raided, Caer Vandwy ‘The Fort of God’s Peak’, in His conversation with Gwyddno. 

      This cauldron is kindled by ‘the breath of nine maidens’ (15) who might be named as Morgana and Her sisters. (16) It has ‘a dark trim and pearls’ and its ‘disposition’ is such that ‘it does not boil a coward’s food’. (17) 

      It appears again in association with the Head of Annwn’s cauldron keeper, Dyrnwch the Giant, in ‘The Thirteen Treasures of the Island of Britain’. ‘The Cauldron of Dyrnwch the Giant: if meat for a coward were put in it to boil, it would never boil; but if meat for a brave man were put in it, it would boil quickly (and thus the brave could be distinguished from the cowardly’. (18)

      It is clear this cauldron serves an initiatory function distinguishing the brave and the cowardly and this might be linked to the tradition of the hero’s portion wherein the bravest hero gets the choicest cut of meat.

      On a deeper level this ‘food’ or ‘meat’ is awen and this might be understood both in the sense of one’s inspiration and one’s destiny. Only the bravest win the best awen, the best fates, from the Cauldron of the Head of Annwn.

      An image on the Gundestrup Cauldron may represent Gwyn, a hound at His side, plunging a line of warriors headfirst into a cauldron to be reborn. They emerge on otherworldly steeds with horns and animals on their helms. Perhaps this shows the transformation of the bravest of the battle-dead riding on to new lives, new destinies, symbolised by the features on their headgear, or that they have been gifted with immortality as riders on Gwyn’s Hunt.

      Rather than facing their testing by Annwn’s ruler and the nine maidens, Arthur and his men steal the cauldron and bear it back to the Thisworld.

      4. The Cauldron of Rebirth

      Taliesin’s theft of the awen from Ceridwen’s cauldron results in the poisoning Gwyddno’s land and an episode from the Second Branch of The Mabinogion suggests the consequences of stealing the cauldron from Annwn will be just as disastrous.

      ‘The Cauldron of Rebirth’ is brought to Bendigeidfran by a ‘huge monstrous man’ ‘with yellow-red hair’ from the Lake of the Cauldron. (19) It has ‘the property’ ‘that if you throw into it one of your men who is killed today, then by tomorrow he will be good as ever except that he will not be able to speak’. (20)

      Bendigeidfran gives the cauldron to the King of Ireland who uses it against him in war. ‘The Irish began to kindle a fire under the Cauldron of Rebirth. Then they threw the corpses into the cauldron until it was full, and they would get up the next morning fighting as well as before except that they could not talk’. (21)

      This cauldron, brought from the depths of a lake, may be the Cauldron of the Head of Annwn. In Thisworld the magic by which it brings the dead to life does not function fully, bringing them back in their old forms, deprived of speech.

      What Arthur and Taliesin do with the cauldron, if they can use it all, outside the presence of its custodians – Ceridwen, Gwyn, the nine maidens, is unknown.

      5. The Unfettering of Taliesin

      In ‘The Battle of the Trees’ Taliesin claims he has been ‘unfettered’ suggesting that, by his theft of the awen, he has freed himself from the cycle of reincarnation and attained a state akin to moksha ‘liberation’.

      This is evidenced by his claim that his ‘native abode / is the land of the Cherubim’ and his boasts of visiting the Court of Don and the fortresses of Gwydion and Arianrhod (22) as well as singing in Caer Siddi ‘The Fairy Fort’. (23)

      He might be seen to share a kinship with the ‘ascended masters’ of the Dharmic religions explaining why he remains such a presence as a ‘legendary master’ (24) of the bardic tradition who is still channelled today by bards.

      Yet, his state is not well won, but a stolen one. One wonders whether Gwyn and his huntsman will one day catch him and throw him back in the cauldron.

      This, along with the image on the Gundestrup Cauldron of warriors potentially becoming riders on Gwyn’s hunt suggests that whereas some of the dead passed quickly through Annwn and into the cauldron to reborn others joined the living for far longer or even achieved immortality.

      6. Those Who Return to Utter Darkness

      In the reading presented so far it seems only the prestigious – warriors and bards – attain liberation from the cycle of reincarnation and join the immortals. 

      This raises a number of questions. Firstly, what happens to those who do not taste the awen, who do not die bravely, who like Afagddu remain in ‘utter darkness’? (25)

      Parallels with the Dharmic religions suggest they might shift back into animal, plant, mineral, object and elemental forms or descend to lower levels of Annwn where monsters reside and furious spirits are held in check. (26)

      This raises further questions about the hierarchical and anthropocentric viewpoints inherent in the Dharmic religions which are less evident in our texts. Is reading Taliesin’s transformations as an ‘ascent’ from a being of ‘seven consistencies’: fire, earth, water, air, mist, flowers and ‘the fruitful wind (27) through a ‘multitude of forms’ to an ‘unfettered’ bard the only way?

      Might unfettering not also be seen, contarily, as a joyful return to plant and animal forms, to the elements, to the utter darkness of the womb of Ceridwen, to the vastness of cauldron, that precedes creation?

      Conclusion – The Custodians of the Mysteries

      In this article I have pieced together a picture of how souls are reborn based on the likenesses between the transformations of Taliesin and the cycle of reincarnation in the Dharmic religions and the material surrounding the cauldron.

      It appears that souls takes a number of forms, passing to Annwn, being reborn from the Cauldron of Rebirth, until by some brave deed or inspired work (or act of theft) they win a longer time amongst the living or are granted immortality.

      Those of us who wish to engage with these mysteries have the choice of whether to approach the cauldron and its custodians with respect or to continue the thieving and plundering traditions of Arthur and Taliesin.

      REFERENCES

      1. The One Tree Gathering organised by OBOD ‘explores and celebrates the idea that Indian and European cultures share a common origin’ https://druidry.org/get-involved/the-one-tree-project
      2. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p174, l1 – 24
      3. Ibid. p121, l229 – 233
      4. Ibid. p121 – 122, l234 – 236
      5. Ibid. p122, l237 – 240
      6. Ibid. p122 – 123, l241 – 263
      7. Hughes, K. From the Cauldron Born, (Llewellyn Publications, 2013), p32
      8. Ibid. p34
      9. Ibid. p37
      10. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p313
      11. Ibid. p317, l26
      12. Hughes, K. 13th Mt Haemus Lecture: Magical Transformation in the Book of Talieisn and The Spoils of Annwn, (OBOD, 2019), p24
      13. Hughes notes that the cauldron has ‘three symbolic functions’ – ‘a vessel of inspiration’, ‘a transformative device’ and ‘a vessel of testing’. Ibid. p24
      14. Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023), p147 – 154
      15. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p 435, l13
      16. Geoffrey of Monmouth speaks of ‘nine sisters’ who rule ‘the island of apples’, or the Island of Avalon, an Annuvian location Gwyn is associated with. Morgen possesses the skills of healing, shapeshifting and flying. Monmouth, G. The Life of Merlin, (Forgotten Books, 2008), p27
      17. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p 435 – 6, l16 – 17
      18. Bromwich, R. The Triads of the Island of Britain, (University of Wales Press, 2014),p259
      19. Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p26
      20. Ibid. p25
      21. Ibid. p33
      22. Parker, W. (transl), The Mabinogion, (University of California Press, 2008), p173
      23. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p277, l45
      24. A term used to describe Taliesin by Gwilym Morus-Baird. Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023), p269
      25. Afagddu means ‘Utter Darkness’. Hughes, K. From the Cauldron Born, (Llewellyn Publications), p32
      26. Evidence for monsters of Annwn can be found in ‘The Battle of Trees’ where Taliesin speaks of ‘piercing’ ‘a great-scaled beast’, ‘a black forked toad’ and ‘a speckled crested snake’. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p175, l30 – 37. Gwyn is said to hold back the fury of the ‘devils of Annwn’ to prevent them from destroying the world. Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p199
      27. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p517

      BIBLIOGRAPHY

      Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007
      Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007)
      Hughes, K. From the Cauldron Born, (Llewellyn Publications, 2013)
      Hughes, K. 13th Mt Haemus Lecture: Magical Transformation in the Book of Talieisn and The Spoils of Annwn, (OBOD, 2019)
      Monmouth, G. The Life of Merlin, (Forgotten Books, 2008),
      Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023)
      Parker, W. (transl), The Mabinogion, (University of California Press, 2008)

      Annwn – A Land of the Living or the Dead?

      6 Comments

      Introduction – Annwn ‘Very Deep’

      Over the last couple of centuries there has been a good deal of scholarly debate about whether Annwn is a land of the dead or whether, instead, it is a land of the living. Annw(f)n, from the suffix an ‘Very’ and dwfn ‘Deep’ (1), features in medieval Welsh literature and is generally understood to be the Brythonic Otherworld and later became known as Faery.

      In this article I will introduce the evidence for and against the presence of the dead in Annwn in the source texts and the arguments of scholars past and present. Then, on the basis of this inquiry, I will present my conclusion.

      1. The Fairest Men

      In the First Branch of The Mabinogion, in which Pwyll prince of Dyfed takes the place of Arawn, a King of Annwn, for a year, there is no evidence that Annwn is a land of the dead. The people of Annwn are very much alive. They, their land, dwellings and accoutrements are far brighter and more beautiful than anything seen in Thisworld and they appear to live a life of endless pleasure.

      ‘He could see… the fairest and best-equipped men that anyone had seen, and the queen with them, the most beautiful woman that anyone had ever seen, wearing a golden garment of brocaded silk… They spent the time eating and drinking, singing and carousing. Of all the courts he had seen on earth, that was the court with the most food and drink and golden vessels and royal jewels.’ (2)

      We find a very similar depiction of the fortress of Gwyn ap Nudd, another King of Annwn (3), in The Life of St Collen.

      ‘And when he (Collen) came there, he saw the fairest castle he had ever beheld, and around it the best appointed troops, and numbers of minstrels, and every kind of music of voice and string, and steeds with youths upon them the comeliest in the world, and maidens of elegant aspect, sprightly, light of foot, of graceful apparel, and in the bloom of youth and every magnificence becoming the court of a puissant sovereign. And he beheld a courteous man on the top of the castle, who bade him enter, saying that the king was waiting for him to come to meat. And Collen went into the castle, and when he came there, the king was sitting in a golden chair. And he welcomed Collen honourably and desired him to eat, assuring him that, besides what he saw, he should have the most luxurious of every dainty and delicacy that the mind could desire, and should be supplied with every drink and liquor that his heart could wish; and that there should be in readiness for him every luxury of courtesy and service, of banquet and of honourable entertainment, of rank and of presents: and every respect and welcome due to a man of his wisdom.’ (4)

      However, it is hinted at that the fairness of these men and their ruler and the banquet they offer is illusory and behind them lies a more sinister reality. Collen refuses to eat the food calling it ‘the leaves of trees’. He disdains the ‘equipment’ of the men saying ‘red… signifies burning’ and ‘blue… signifies cold.’ (5) The implication is that the beauty of the banquet is an illusion cast by fairy magic and that these people are hellish and might even number the dead.

      The paradisal view of Annwn is echoed in the poetry of Taliesin. In ‘The Spoils of Annwn’ he speaks of seven fortresses raided by Arthur. One is called Caer Vedwit ‘The Mead Feast Fort’ and in its centre lies the cauldron of the Head of Annwn. In Caer Rigor ‘The Petrification Fort’ ‘sparkling wine’ is set in front of a batallion. A youth named Gweir sings in chains in front of the glittering spoils in Caer Siddi ‘The Fairy Fort’. (6)

      In ‘The Chair of Taliesin’ Caer Siddi is described more fully:

      ‘Harmonious is my song in Caer Siddi;
      Sickness and age do not afflict those who are there…
      Three instruments/organs around a fire play in front of it
      and around its turrets are the well springs of the sea;
      and (as for) the fruitful fountain which is above it – 
      Its drink is sweeter than the white wine.’ (7)

      However ‘The Spoils of Annwn’ is shot through with images of restriction and violence. Gweir in his ‘heavy grey chain’ (8) and the Brindled Ox ‘with his stout collar, / and seven-score links in his chain’. (9) The six thousand unspeaking men and the uncommunicative watchman guarding the glass walls. The lightning thrust of Lleog’s ‘flashing sword’ into the cauldron and its theft by Lleminog’s hand. The refrain, ‘save seven none returned from the … fort.’ (10)

      In ‘The Conversation of Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’, Gwyn speaks of His ‘sorrow’ at seeing battle at one of the seven fortresses, Caer Vanddwy. ‘I saw a host / Shields shattered, spears broken, / violence inflicted by the honoured and fair.’ (11) Here Gwyn, who I believe to be the Head of Annwn, laments that his fair people were forced to inflict violence on Arthur and his men, because of their raiding behaviour killing three shiploads. ‘Three full loads of Prydwen we went into it: save seven none came back.’ (12) This shows death can take place in Annwn. 

      No mention is made of whether there are casualties on the side of the Head of Annwn and His people. A parallel tale in Culhwch ac Olwen suggests the cauldron-keeper and retinue are killed (13) and, possibly, the king himself. Yet, like another Annuvian figure, the Green Knight, He doesn’t stay dead long. His fair men, unaging, unsickening, may likewise be immortals.

      2. Such the Fairies Seize and Keep

      A source showing more explicitly that the dead can be found in Annwn / Faery is the medieval Breton lay Sir Orfeo. This retelling of the Greek story of the descent of Orpheus (Orfeo) to Hades (Annwn / Faery) to recover Eurydice (Heurodis) is set in Winchester (which may be named after Vindos / Gwyn). 

      Here the dead are found by Orfeo in the castle of the Fairy King:

      Some headless stood upon the ground,
      Some had no arms, and some were torn
      With dreadful wounds, and some lay bound
      Fast to the earth in hap forlorn.

      And some full-armed on horses sat,
      And some were strangled as at meat,
      And some were drowned as in a vat,
      And some were burned with fiery heat, 
      Wives lay in child-bed, maidens sweet…

      … such the fairies seize and keep.’ (14)

      It is notable these people died untimely deaths. Implicitly, when Heurodis was bitten by the snake, she died and the Fairy King and Queen restore her to life.

      Additionally, in Breton culture, the dead are said to go to Annwn. (15) In later folklore there are numerous tales of fairies taking the living and dead to their realm.

      3. Gwyn ap Nudd – Gatherer of Souls

      In ‘The Conversation of Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’ Gwyn is represented as a ‘bull of battle’, a divine warrior and huntsman, who appears to gather the soul of Gwyddno, who implicitly is dead, back to Annwn. In this poem Gwyn speaks of attending the deaths of a number of famous warriors. This is followed by a lament which shows His immortal nature:

      ‘I was there when the warriors of Britain were slain
      From the east to the north; 
      I live on; they are in the grave.

      I was there when the warriors of Britain were slain
      From the east to the south;
      I live on; they are dead.’ (16)

      In Culhwch ac Olwen we learn ‘God’ has put the aryal ‘fury’ of ‘the demons of Annwfn’ in Gwyn and ‘he will not be spared from there’ ‘lest the world be destroyed’. (17) Reading beneath the Christian overlay we find the suggestion that part of Gwyn’s role as a King of Annwn is to contain a host of dangerous spirits, who may number the dead, to prevent Thisworld’s destruction.

      We are told ‘Twrch Trwyth will not be hunted until Gwyn ap Nudd is found.’ (18). ‘Twrch Trwyth’ ‘Chief of Boars’ is presented as a human king changed into a boar ‘for his sins’ ‘by God’. (19) Again, reading beneath, we see the twrch is a human soul in animal form. He cannot be hunted until Gwyn is found as Gwyn is the leader of the hunt for souls – the Wild Hunt.

      In later folklore Gwyn is depicted riding out with the Hounds of Annwn on Nos Galan Gaeaf, again leading the Wild Hunt, (20) and as a demonic figure with a black face and horns hunting the soul of a sinner on Cefn Creini. (21)

      Put together with the evidence in Sir Orfeo this suggests Gwyn hunts and gathers the souls of dead (in particular the battle-dead and those who died traumatically) and takes them to his fortress in Annwn. His people, the spirits of Annwn / fairies also play a role in the passage of the souls of the dead.

      Thus, so far, we have a picture of Annwn as primarily a land of the living to which the dead (and occasionally the living) are taken by Gwyn and His fair men.

      4. A Final Destination?

      I shall pause here to consider some scholarly opinions. John Rhys clearly views Annwn as a land of the dead for he equates it with Hades, the Greek underworld, where souls stayed forever in a shadowy afterlife. Rhys speaks of another otherworldly fortress, Caer Arianrhod, as a ‘Court of Death’ (22) and of Gwyn and His ‘hell-hounds’ hunting ‘disembodied souls’. (23)

      Contrastingly, Roger Sherman Loomis (here cited in a lecture by Kristoffer Hughes) claims Annwn ‘is the realm of the ever-living ones, the immortals, or the abode of the Celtic Gods.’ It lacks mortal inhabitants and those who venture there do not undergo death and usually return unharmed. (24) 

      Recent scholars take a more nuanced view. Angelika Rudiger argues for the Welsh belief: ‘the realm of the fairies was not generally a realm of the dead but reserved for a special kind of deceased… a kind of liminal space where those souls can linger whose moral life has prematurely ended, but who are not yet “ripe” to be accepted into heaven or hell’ resembling the ‘Catholic limbo’. (25) She cautions against ‘reducing Annwn… to a land of the dead’ or ‘fairies to the spirits of the dead’ and concludes ‘Annwn is a liminal world, though not an abode set aside exclusively for the departed’ (26).

      Considering whether Annwn is ‘a type of land of the dead’ Gwilym Morus-Baird cites Dafydd Epynt who describes ‘how in death the poet “casts aside his spear and the four elements”’. Morus-Baird compares this to Taliesin’s creation from ‘seven substances’ (the traditional four elements air, fire, earth and water along with mist, flowers and wind) and says ‘the common idea in all these poems is that the four elements are the foundations of physical existence, and therefore don’t belong in Annwn’. (27)

      Annwn is, instead, a place where spirits reside. These include the spirits of dead bards such as Taliesin and Merlin. Both of these famous bards have been through the process of death and rebirth many times. Thus Morus-Baird concludes that Annwn ‘is not a final destination for one’s death, but a place the soul passes through on the way to further incarnations’. (28)

      Morus-Baird’s view fits with the evidence from Roman writers on the beliefs of the ancient Celts. For example Julius Caesar says they believe ‘the soul does not die but crosses over after death from one place to another’ (29) and Diodorus Siculus that they ‘subscribe to the doctrine of Pythagoras that the human spirit is immortal and will enter a new body after a fixed number of years’. (30)

      Conclusion – A Joyful Union

      Following on from these arguments I am led to conclude that Annwn is primarily a land of the living in which the spirits of the dead reside for a period of time before being reborn. Rather than being a final destination, like Hades, or a limbo-land like Purgatory, it is a living realm where spirits are joyfully united with other immortals (such as Gwyn and His people) and reminded of their immortality before moving on into another form. These spirits, dead to us in Thisworld, in the Otherworld are very much alive. Only in rebirth, when they put back on the four elements, do they become mortal again.

      *

      This is the first in a series of articles exploring the existing lore about Annwn, Gwyn ap Nudd and the spirits of Annwn, and the dead. I’m planning to write more about my personal experiences of journeying to Annwn and how they relate to the source material and more widely on spiritwork in the Brythonic tradition.

      I stopped writing such articles for a while because I got down-hearted by the fact that others, such as Gwilym Morus-Baird, Greg Hill, Kristoffer Hughes and Kris Hughes, do it a lot better (some more engagingly on video) and also because I was exploring Annwn more experientially and creatively. I’ve recently been given a kick by my Gods to bring the academic and the experiential together. And been told I have a unique perspective to share as a devotee of Gwyn guided by Orddu and her ancestors in the traditions of the Old North.

      You can support my work by joining my Patreon HERE.

      REFERENCES

      1. There are a number of translations of Annwn and this one is from Kristoffer Hughes. Hughes, K. 13th Mt Haemus Lecture: Magical Transformation in the Book of Talieisn and The Spoils of Annwn, (OBOD, 2019), p10. Gwilym Morus-Baird notes: an ‘is often read as the preposition “in”, or in this context “inside or inner”, dwfn is a noun that has a few meanings in Middle Welsh: “world” or “sea”; but also as in Middle Welsh “deep” and “profound.” Altogether, Annwfn can be read as meaning “inner world” or “inner depth with connotations of profundity’. Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023), p220-21
      2. Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p5
      3. Some argue that Gwyn ap Nudd, ‘White son of Mist’, and Arawn (meaning unknown) are titles of the same deity who is the ruler of Annwn.
      4. Guest, C. (transl), The Mabinogion, (1838)
      5. Ibid.
      6. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p435 – 437
      7. Ibid. p277, l45 – 52
      8. Ibid. p435, l6
      9. Ibid. p437, l39 – 40
      10. (10) Ibid. p436, l18 -19
      11. (11) Hill, G. (transl), ‘The Conversation between Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’, Awen ac Awenydd, l30 – 33
      12. The lines cited here refer to Caer Siddi but the number of men on the ship and the refrain hold for all the fortresses. Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007), p435, l9 – 10
      13. ‘Bedwyr got up and took hold of the cauldron… Llenlleog grabbed Caledfwlch and swung it round and killed Diwrnarch Wyddel and all his retinue.’ Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p208
      14. Hunt, E. E. (transl), Sir Orfeo, (Forgotten Books, 2012), p21
      15. Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023), p261
      16. Hill, G. (transl), ‘The Conversation between Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’, Awen ac Awenydd
      17. Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007), p199
      18. Ibid. 199
      19. Ibid. 209
      20. Rhys, J. Celtic Folklore, Welsh and Manx, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1901), p203
      21. Ibid. p216
      22. Rhys, J. Studies in the Arthurian Legend, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1891), p157
      23. Ibid. p 342
      24. Hughes, K. 13th Mt Haemus Lecture: Magical Transformation in the Book of Talieisn and The Spoils of Annwn, (OBOD, 2019), p11
      25. Rudiger, A. ‘Y Tylwyth Teg. An Analysis of a Literary Motif,’ (Bangor University, 2021), p75
      26. Ibid. p78 – 79
      27. Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023), p258
      28. Ibid. p261
      29. Koch, J. The Celtic Heroic Age, (Celtic Studies Publications, 2003), p22
      30. Ibid. p12

      BIBLIOGRAPHY

      Davies, S. (transl.), The Mabinogion, (Oxford University Press, 2007
      Guest, C. (transl), The Mabinogion, (1838)
      Haycock, M. (transl), Legendary Poems from the Book of Taliesin, (CMCS, 2007)
      Hill, G. (transl), ‘The Conversation between Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’, Awen ac Awenydd
      Hughes, K. 13th Mt Haemus Lecture: Magical Transformation in the Book of Talieisn and The Spoils of Annwn, (OBOD, 2019)
      Koch, J. The Celtic Heroic Age, (Celtic Studies Publications, 2003)
      Morus-Baird, G. Taliesin Origins, (Celtic Source, 2023)
      Rhys, J. Studies in the Arthurian Legend, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1891)
      Rhys, J. Celtic Folklore, Welsh and Manx, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1901)
      Rudiger, A. ‘Y Tylwyth Teg. An Analysis of a Literary Motif,’ (Bangor University, 2021)

      Evidence of Monks of Annwn in The Book of Taliesin?

      2 Comments

      Inbetween my decision to rewrite In the Deep and beginning I decided to return to some of the source material. I had been avoiding The Book of Taliesin for a long long time because, as a devotee of Gwyn ap Nudd, a King of Annwn, I find his support of Arthur in the raiding of Annwn (1) and of Lleu and Gwydion in battling against Annuvian monsters (2) incredibly emotive.

      Still, I took another look, and didn’t find anything I hadn’t remembered. And Taliesin’s warmongering and bragging had got no less annoying.

      Then, when, I was out running this morning I found my mind wandering to Taliesin mocking ‘pathetic men’ (monks) who do not know when God / the Lord, potentially Pen Annwn ‘Head of the Otherworld (3), was born / created then referring to monks who ‘congregate’ or ‘howl’ (4) like a pack of dogs’ and ‘like wolves’ ‘because of the masters who know’ the answers to certain riddles such as ‘the wind’s course’, ‘how the light and darkness divide’.

      I had always assumed those monks were Christians but as I was running the question came into my mind, ‘What if they were monks of Annwn?’ 

      *

      My first intimation of the possibility of the existence of previous monks and nuns of Annwn occurred during my night long vigil for my lifelong dedication to Gwyn.

      I spent the first six hours alone in my friend’s living room drawing a card from the Wildwood Tarot for each hour. My first card was the Four of Vessels – Boredom. Disappointing. But not unexpected. So I sat and surrendered to the likelihood the first hour was likely to be very boring. But instead of getting bored I got very lonely and found myself lamenting that I had no tradition to follow, no-one else for support in making such deep vows to Gwyn.

      Then I had a vision. I was no longer alone. I was in some kind of underground shrine, chapel, or tomb, with long lines of monks and nuns wearing dark robes carrying candles before and behind me. 

      I had always thought they were monastics from other traditions who walked similar paths and had come to provide me with company but now I’m wondering if they might have been past and future monastic devotees of Annwn.

      *

      This reasoning might seem a bit wild particularly considering there is no evidence for monks or nuns of Annwn in Brythonic literature or lore. 

      However, if we look at those lines from Talieisn, first off we find them in Preiddeu Annwn ‘The Spoils of Annwn’ wherein the bard accompanies Arthur on his devastating raid on Gwyn’s realm from which only seven return. 

      Secondly, the monks are exhibiting extremely strange behaviour for Christians – congregating or howling like dogs or wolves. This would make far more sense if they were devotees of Gwyn who is associated with a red-nosed hound called Dormach (5) and the Cwn Annwn ‘Hounds of the Otherworld’ (6) and whose father, Nudd, is referred to as ‘the superior wolf lord’ (7).

      Thus, it might be argued, Taliesin is taunting monks of Annwn with accusations of not knowing the mysteries of their God – Pen Annwn – when He was born / created, of the source of the wind, the division of light and darkness. These seem bound up with Annw(f)n (from an ‘very’ and dwyfn ‘Deep) as the primordial reality that ‘underlies or underpins our known universe’ (8).

      *

      Even further, another of Taliesin’s taunts, is that they do not know ‘how many saints are in the void, and how many altars’. Again it would seem odd if saints and altars were consigned to ‘the void’ rather than raised to the Christian Heaven. If they were Christians… yet the consignment to the void of Annuvian saints and altars would make a lot more sense. 

      Read into this more deeply and we find the disturbing possibility there existed monastic devotees of Annwn with saint-like qualities who with the altars of their Gods were committed by the likes of Taliesin and Arthur to the void. 

      It is notable here ‘void’ is translated from diuant ‘space, void, annihliation, death’. These monastics have not returned to Annwn, ‘the Deep’, the regenerative deep home of their God but have instead been annihilated. Their names and memories chillingly wiped by Christianity from existence. 

      Could it be their voices I hear from the void at this time the veil is thin?

      (1) In ‘The Spoils of Annwn’, 
      (2) In ‘The Battle of the Trees’.
      (3) Potentially the Christian God but another possibility is Pen Annwn, the Head of the Otherworld, as in the second instance ‘Lord’ is translated from Pen.
      (4) Margeret Haycock’s translation reads ‘congregate’ and Sarah Higley’s ‘howl.’
      (5) In ‘The Conversation of Gwyn ap Nudd and Gwyddno Garanhir’.
      (6) In the story of Iolo ap Huw in John Rhys Celtic Folklore. 
      (7) In ‘The Pleasant Things of Taliesin’. 
      (8) Kristoffer Hughes, ‘The Thirteenth Mount Haemus Lecture: Magical Transformation in the Book of Taliesin and The Spoils of Annwn’.

      Skull

      5 Comments

      I.
      If only 
      I could find a skull
      to give me back the breath of life –

      the voice of a dead man is the only thing
      that can give me back my creativity

      when trying to write is difficult
      as raising the dead.

      II.
      There are secrets
      between life and death
      that float like faces, like voices,

      in that vastness, in that whiteness,
      in that mist, in that silence before speech

      where all the lost voices wander and a god says:

      “When you cannot speak why not listen?”

      How can I listen to the silence,
      the silence of the mist?

      III.
      If only
      I could light a candle
      in the jaw of a skull like a tongue –

      a flickering flame to guide me to where

      the skulls and the skull keepers 
      know of voices silenced,

      smoky threads.

      IV.
      If only 
      I could find a skull
      that is not shattered like this one,

      held together by strings of spider-thread,

      broken by so many blows,
      so many blows to
      the head.

      V. 
      When I find
      his skull, broken, 
      occipital and foramen magnum
      cracked along with his back molar

      it reminds me of how I clench my teeth

      when I am driving the roads that do not lead
      to the next life, circuiting the M60,
      praying I do not die

      and am not found
      skeletal fingers clasping
      the steering wheel wondering
      where on this road I lost my creativity.

      VI.
      Somewhere, somehow with the help
      of the spiders I will learn to sew
      our skulls together

      and in the silence,
      in the mist, we will listen 
      and understand the words of a god.

      *This poem relates to Worsley Man whose story can be read and his skull viewed here – https://www.manchesteropenhive.com/view/9781526150196/9781526150196.00013.xml

      For the Dead, for the Mad, for the Poets

      14 Comments

      for the torn apart all the parts of our bodies will ride tonight,
      crawl up from the bogs onto our swampy horses,

      not the bog bodies who were found,
      but those who were not found.

      *

      You summon back our voices like the mast on Winter Hill.

      You make us appear again like television. Your hunt
      would make a good film but most times myth
      is better told in softly spoken words
      and half-seen visions.

      Radio broken. 
      Someone smashed the television.

      *

      You are always off screen.
      You are the one who is not named.
      You are the one whose face is the face of a god.

      The howls of the wind are the chorus of your hounds,

      your words are furies and each has a hand, 
      clutching, pulling, ripping, tearing.

      *

      You are the god of illusion
      and the rending apart of all illusions.

      The one who tears our false truths to shreds.

      The jostling elbows, stuck-out toes, the heels dug in.

      *

      This is the time of fire, flood, rain, and catastrophe,
      yet the beech leaves are yellow, gold, and green

      in the kingdom beyond the kingdom beyond the kings 

      and we call you a king without knowing the true meaning

      of sovereignty, that your throne means more than gold.

      *

      Are you silence or the breaker of silence? 

      So long ago I wrote: 

      “The universe began 
      with a howl and from the howl came death.”

      The death-hounds within me giving tongue to a mythos
      that came to me before my world had begun.

      *

      AWEN is not always a smooth chant
      in the mouths of druids, but the broken vowels
      of an awenydd when language cannot help and poetry fails.

      Still, the body, its dislocated limbs, remember how to ride tonight.

      *

      And where is she in all of this? Riding ahead treading air un-abducted? 
      Did you take her from the underworld or did she take you there?

      Time, the clock does not obey, pivots like she on her wild white mare

      like a dislocated limb. I have found that myth dislocates too,
      frees itself from time and space, free and true.

      This poem marks the first time I have felt inspired to share something here for a long time, something I felt compelled to share for my god after a walk near Winter Hill on Nos Galan Gaeaf. Maybe there will be more, maybe not, no promises, no deadlines…

      Rigantona’s Departure

      4 Comments

      I.
      The fall of tempered leaves
      stamps itself out mid-November
      like leaf-shaped arrow heads

      the yellow birch my old daggers

      distant memories of the ancestors
      contort the gloaming wearing

      cloaks as grey as your shroud

      and the grey spider who hangs
      above watching you departing from
      the darkness without a thread.

      II.
      I cannot imagine you Great Queen
      as the young girl who was taken
      against her will when the last leaf

      fell by the hunter with the horns

      and the ember-eyes headlight bright

      before there were cars and cars and cars…
      before with the leaves the forest fell…
      before Annwn was known as Hell.

      III.
      You always knew where you were going
      didn’t you? Needed no thread to lead
      you back to your own home in his arms?

      They knew that too – our ancestors

      who offered up coins minted like leaves
      in fairyland where money grows on trees
      and crumbles likes us to grey dust.

      IV.
      I have no coin the leaves in my pockets
      are old and withered as grey spiders.

      When my fingers are dust I shall
      follow without a thread shrugging into
      your shroud joining the contours

      of the grey-cloaked ever-marching dead.

      A Farewell

      6 Comments

      The ship is tall, leaning. Its only crew are the gulls, who tie the knots in the sails; old, old, sailor souls. On its prow stands Barinthus, the helmsman, dark-cloaked, stern, implacable.

      No-one sees if his lips move beneath the shadows of his hood as he reads out the roll call: the names of Londeners, Devonians, Bristolians, Scousers, Mancunians, Lancastrians, Glaswegians, Brummies, whose accents mix in the huge make-shift camp that has grown up in the marshy hinterland between the worlds.

      They’re mostly old. Veteran souls move between them, boiling tea on stoves that burn on no gas. They drink from metal cups, pull blankets around them, attempt to recall to one another their stories.

      Some of them are funny – drunken exploits – other people’s knickers and roundabouts. Some are tragic – motorcycle crashes, the loss of daughters and sons, spouses who lost their memory yet lived on.

      “How did we get here?” few recall that journey or what brought them.

      White hounds with red markings on their ears, noses, the tips of their tails, patrol the edges of the camp. If anyone tries to leave they are there. A grin and friendly growl is always enough. The pups like to play amongst the child souls, tongues lolling, letting their bellies be rubbed. When their master calls them, not liking them to get attached, they leave whining with their tails between their legs.

      “Where are we going?” few recall that journey they have made so many times before.

      “The biggest shipload since the last war,” my god’s voice from where he stands invisible so as not to frighten the souls.

      Their leaving seems to take forever, one by one getting up from their camp stools, boarding across a wobbly plank and taking their places in the cabins, more cabins-worth of souls than there are cabins on board?

      “The number of cabins, the space of the hold, the expanses of the deck, are limitless, infinitesimal,” Gwyn informs me. Speaking ominously “no matter how many passengers the ship is never full.”

      I watch with Gwyn as the camp fires go out and the ship sinks deeper and deeper into the waters.

      As a gull flies down and with a practiced twist of her yellow red-spotted beak unties the mooring rope I clasp my hands, bow my head in mourning, say farewell to 980 Britons who I never knew.

      As I leave, dropping a tea bag in a pot for the next souls, I see them already beginning to arrive. Some are escorted by their ancestors, others by the hounds, others by white birds. A little boy is carrying a white red-spotted hamster wrapped up in his school blazer.

      Their numbers are endless.

      Twelve Days of Prayer

      2 Comments

      ‘The Twelve Days of Christmas’ is a ‘sacred and festive season’ marked by Christians between Christmas Day (25th December) and the Epiphany (6th January). It was instituted by the Council of Tours in 567 to mark the period between the birth of Jesus and the revelation he is God incarnate on the visit of the magi.

      For me, as a Brythonic polytheist who venerates Gwyn ap Nudd as Winter’s King, the mid-winter holy days have always felt particularly special and sacred. They begin with Eponalia, on 18th December, the feast of the horse-goddess and midwife of the sun. This is followed by the Winter Solstice, 21st / 22nd December, the height of Gwyn’s reign and presence within the land. 24th December is Mother’s Night and, although this is traditionally an Anglo-Saxon festival, one I associate with the Mother Goddesses such as Matrona/Modron and Anrhuna. 25th December is the day of the rebirth of the sun-child Maponos/Mabon. Then the next twelve days are a time of rest and celebration based around casting out the old year and welcoming in and preparing for the new.

      Over the past few years I have noticed an increasing number of other pagans and polytheists exploring ways of marking these holy days. There are existing traditions of using them for divination. From my mum I learnt of the tradition of recording one’s dreams and linking them numerically to the calendar months. Cailtin Matthews has suggested using the Twelve Days for reading nature omens in a similar way.

      In his essay ‘On the First Day of Christmas, the Dead brought back to me…’ Lee Davies connects the Twelve Days with Gwyn, the Wild Hunt, and the dead, who ride out to clear the ground for the New Year and also bring blessings of prosperity. He speaks of the koryos tradition in which people not only embody but ‘become the dead’ – a possible root of the misrule associated with the Twelfth Night.

      With this in mind I decided to use the Twelve Days as a period of more intensive prayer and prayer writing for Gwyn and the spirits of Annwn and the dead with whom he rides out on his hunt through the winter months. This resulted in a series of visions and visionary dialogues. Here I share a selection from the twelve prayers.

      Twelve Days of Prayer

      For Gwyn

      I.
      Prayer
      is to open
      the little box of the heart
      to let in the god who cannot fit within

      two sides of a membrane
      flap, dissolve like
      the so-called
      ‘veil’

      between the worlds
      when you ride from the mist
      on a creature somewhat like a horse
      two hounds with teeth within teeth
      all the countless uncontainable
      monsters of Annwn

      filling
      this little box
      I sometimes call a heart.
      When it bursts and otherworlds
      spill forth I know it is
      so much more.

      …

      III.
      You are ghost.
      You and your legions.

      You clothe yourselves
      in cloud, in mist, you move
      through our world like the wind.
      Sometimes we hear you passing through.
      Sometimes we sense only your silence
      as you fill our vales with neither
      your presence or absence.

      Sometimes I feel ashamed
      of my flesh and my fear to follow
      you into battle in the wars that
      rage on between the worlds.

      Could it be that I’m afraid of death?

      Of seeing my ghost looking back at me
      as I write this poem from amongst your kind?

      “You wear your flesh and your fear well.”

      You speak in the voice that turns gold to leaves
      and flesh to dust and skin to paper bearing
      an elegy on the heels of your host.

      …

      IV.
      “Fierce bull of battle,
      awesome leader of many,”
      I find myself whispering
      Gwyddno’s words as though
      they were the beginning
      of an ancient prayer.

      “Who will protect me?”

      “I will protect you.”

      Your armour is a night
      of stars and each of them
      wields a spear against

      my deep demonic fears.

      I am awed by your strength
      as I am mystified by its origin
      for to whom does a god turn?
      To whom does a god pray?

      I see a bull striding majestic
      down a passageway of light
      into the infinite brightness
      of a star, a heart, a fortress,
      the Otherworld within his chest.

      …

      VI.
      I come to pray
      when I want to scream.

      If I could comprehend you
      could I contain the spirits within?

      I fear to scream is the obliteration

      of all prayer until you show me

      how you tend to all the silent
      and the unsilent screams

      for a scream is prayer
      as crescendo.

      …

      VIII.
      I pray to you
      as your awenydd
      as your inspired poet

      speak of my restlessness
      the jangling of spirits within
      my intimation I could be

      so much more and you say:

      “Poetry is more than rhyming words.
      Awen is more than human speech.

      The soul of the earth is living poetry
      and each soul itself a poem breathed –

      part of the divine breath which keeps

      the rivers afloat, the mountains high,
      the deer running through the woodlands,
      the birds in the skies, the flowers growing
      upwards turning their heads towards the sun.
      And has the power to transform it all –
      hurricanes, volcanic flames, tidal waves,
      the death-wind from a nuclear blast creating
      the wolves with glowing eyes and the monsters
      with limbs where there should not be limbs
      spoken of by awenyddion of long ago.

      It can destroy (or fix) everything.

      Why do you think I keep the awen
      in a cauldron in a fortress that disappears
      that spins that is shrouded by mystery and mist
      and is sometimes known as the towers of the winds
      and sometimes as the whale’s belly?

      There is nothing more – I should know
      for I have sought, I have hunted, with every
      hound of Annwn beyond where the winds
      of Thisworld and Otherworld blow beyond
      the Universe and its moment of conception and
      come back with nothing on my bloodless spear,
      my hounds with nothing in their empty jaws,
      bearing nothing in my empty hands but
      knowing a little more about nothing.

      One cannot be any more and about nothing
      there is nothing to be said so be happy
      as you are, awenydd, whilst still
      a bearer of the divine breath.”

      …

      XII.
      Your gift

      is a shining bow
      washed in the light
      of the New Year’s sun.

      I pray for the strength to draw it.
      I pray for the patience to carve the arrows
      each engraved with the words of a spell.
      I pray for the focus to shoot true,

      mind, body, and bow as one,
      straight to the heart.