FIRST-MILLENNIUM CELTIC BARDS

MAELGWYN - 6th century
TALIESIN - 8th century
ANEIRIN - 8th century

MAELGWYN (Melkin, Melchinus)

"Melkin, supposedly, was a pagan Celtic bard who lived before Merlin, sometime in the fifth century. A prophecy, probably dating back no farther than John of Glastonbury's fourteenth century "Chronicle,", is attributed to him wherein Joseph of Arimathea, together with two "cruets" containing the blood and sweat of Christ (which he allegedly brought with him on his mission to Britain) were buried near the Old Church on the grounds of Glastonbury Abbey.

"There is a faint trace of a connection, here, with a comment by Gerald of Wales in his account of the exhumation of the body of King Arthur on the grounds of Glastonbury Abbey in 1190. In the account, he states that Henry II had been told the location of Arthur's body by a "British soothsayer." In this case, too, we have a seer or prophet of the Celtic tradition making known the location of a previously unknown grave of an individual of significance to the Arthurian legend, within the confines of Glastonbury Abbey's cemetary. Perhaps "Melkin's" prophecy is merely a re-working of an older prophecy about Arthur. The prophecy promised that when Joseph's grave was found and opened, Britain would never again know drought. In part, the prophecy read:

[www.britannia.com/backs/history/docs/melkin.html]

"John of Glastonbury mentions a vaticinator (one who foresees the future) called Melkin, who lived before Merlin and uttered a prophecy about Glastonbury, couched in obscure Latin, which is difficult to interpret. It may refer to Glastonbury as a place of pagan burial and to a future discovery of the tomb of Joseph of Arimathea. Apart from an entry in the Annals of Glastonbury Abbey, evidence is scanty for his existence, but there is a strong indication that he embodied an ancient tradition before Christian times. It has been suggested that Melkin is to be identified with Maelgwyn, a sixth-century ruler of Gwynedd. Henry VIII's royal antiquary, John Leland (c.1503-52) claimed to have seen Melkin's book at Glastonbury Abbey. # 156 - 344 - 454

[http://www.celt.net/Celtic/celtopedia/m.html]

TALIESIN

pronounced tal YESS in

"Taliesin exemplified the image of the poet as sober craftsman and upholder of the social order. His poems are above all songs of praise to his lord, the ideal ruler Urien Rheged (King of Rheged), who protected his people by bravery and ferocity in battle, but who was magnanimous and generous in peace. The poems remind the king of his responsibilties at the same time they remind his followers of their duties to their leader. The vivid impressions of the poems are compressed into complex patterns of alliteration and internal rhyme that later developed into the peculiarly Welsh system known as cynghanedd [http:/ www.cybercom.net/~klb/part1.html] in which key words are linked by repetition of consonants. In his elegy on the death of Urien, Taliesin incorporated Christian elements such as the prayer for the soul beginning and ending the poem, but also the pagan ideal of worship of the warrior leader. " from The Long Struggle for Identity: The Story of Wales and its People, by Peter Williams, Ph.D. [http: //www.britannia.com/wales/whist.html]

Taliesin was once bard to Brochfael of the Tusks, a younger son of King Cyngen Glodrydd who lived in the early 6th century. [www.britannia.com/bios/ebk/brochypw.html]

The figure of the bard was among the most important at the court of the Celtic princes. Their task was to remember the songs and stories which told of every man's ancestors. Thus the Celts buried their dead in unmarked graves since they knew that while the bards survived so would the memory of the mighty dead. Undoubtedly the most famous of these men was Taliesin, an actual historic personage who lived towards the middle of the sixth century and left a substantial body of material behind, though in a form much muddled and misunderstood.

His fame as a semi-mythical character in the HANES TALIESIN (Story of Taliesin) wrought a curious circumstance whereby a vast amount of mythical and mystical teaching constellated around the figure of the historical bard. An entire system of Celtic magical teaching lies buried within the poems and stories about Taliesin and many attempts have been made to decipher it. Among the first to attempt a serious and reasonably accurate translation was the nineteenth-century scholar W. F. Skene, who published the text and translation of THE FOUR ANCIENT BOOKS OF WALES (including 'The Book of Taliesin') in 1868. His work was shortly followed by a lengthy commentary with further translations by D. W. Nash, whose vituperative attack on his predecessors is often, in retrospect, amusing. The extract, gives the best of his commentary, which is exhaustive and lively. His book remains the most reliable until now on the subject.

Taliesin was the greatest poet of the Island of Britain: he saw and foretold many of the events of Arthur's reign and the ages to follow. According to a seventeenth-century text (of admittedly earlier provenance) attached to the MABINOGION collection, he was once named Gwion Bach and was set to watch over the cauldron of Ceridwen in which was brewed a drink of knowledge and inspiration intended for her son, Morfran or Afagddu. Some drops splashed out onto his fingers which he then thrust into his mouth, in order to cool them. So did he have access to all knowledge. He subsequently underwent a series of transformations (analogous to his poetic initiation) and was finally reborn of Ceridwen as Taliesin (Radiant Brow). - She set the baby poet in a coracle and he was found on May-Eve at the Salmon Weir by Elphin who became his patron. Taliesin subsequently rescued his master from prison and silenced the bards of Maelgwn.

He sailed with Arthur on Prydwen when the king led the raid on Annwn in order to recover the Hallows of Britain. He has been identified with a sixthcentury poet of the same name and is associated with both Merlin and Aneurin. A similar gaining of knowledge scenario is told of Fionn. In Taliesin, the mantic and magical powers of the ancient poet-kind are revealed. His famous 'I have beens' boast, in which he lists the places and people he has been and met throughout time reveal the nature of his poetic initiation in which all knowledge is recapitulated.

His pursuit by Ceridwen in her hag-aspect is a remnant of a once widespread myth in which the Cailleach Bheare/Bheur pursues her son, the God of Youth or Mabon, through countless transformations until he is possessed of all knowledge. Taliesin became famed for his poetry. He is said to have adressed Urien of Rheged poetically, but he may have been a visitor to Urien's realm rather than a resident and have been of south Welsh provenance. Taliesin was regarded as both poet and prophet. In both Welsh tradition and the VITA MERLINI he is represented as discoursing with Merlin. The verse ascribed to him is difficult to understand. Tolstoy contends that it may originally have been regarded as the work of Merlin and only later attributed to Taliesin.

[http://www.celt.net/Celtic/celtopedia/t.html]

ANEIRIN

pronounced an OI rin

"Aneirin, the other great poet of the period, is best remembered for the "Gododdin", which commemorates the heroics of small band of warriors and their allies at the Battle of Catraeth about 600 AD, in which they were defeated by a much larger force of Angles. In the poem, after slaying many times their number of enemies, all except one of the band were killed. Their willingness to die is emphasized as a duty that they owed their lord in return for his hospitality. Their deaths also ensured them everlasting glory. Because the poem constantly circles around the main event of the battle, possessing no liner development, no regular beginning or end, it is seen as a prototype of Celtic design, an early, sophisticated literary expression of the circular motifs expressed so beautifully in other art forms of the Celtic peoples all over Europe. In addition to the intricate interweaving of emotion produced by the tension between grief and exhilaration, the poem's vivid imagery gives it a powerful impact even in these few lines in a modern translation:

Men went to Catraeth, swift was their host
Fresh mead was their feast and it was poison.
Three hundred fighting according to plan,
And after jubilation there was silence.
Though they went to churches to do penance,
The inescapable meeting with death came to them."

from The Long Struggle for Identity: The Story of Wales and its People, by Peter Williams, Ph.D. [http: //www.britannia.com/wales/whist.html]

�2002 Myra Hope Bobbitt. This is not an official SCA web site. Any opinions &c expressed in the text of these pages are mine alone. Please drop me a line if you're interested in further discussion.