Old Celtic tales

by E. M. Wilmot-Buxton

The Tale of Taliesin

Tegid Voel and Caridwen his wife lived on an island in the midst of Lake Tegid. (Nowadays the lake is called Bala, and there is no island to be seen.) They had an elder son, a fair and comely youth, and a very beautiful daughter; but their youngest son was uglier than anyone in the whole world. This troubled his mother Caridwen at first; but she said to herself: "If he cannot be handsome, he shall, at anyrate, be very learned." Now, Caridwen was a witch, so she set to work to boil a Cauldron of Knowledge, of which the boiling must not cease for a year and a day. At the end of that time it would yield three drops of precious liquid, which would make whoever drank it wise for the rest of his life. She set Gwion Bach, who was passing by, to stir the cauldron, and a blind man named Morda to keep up the fire underneath; but, fearing that Gwion Bach had seen what she put into the cauldron, and would tell her secrets to others, she made up her mind to kill him directly he had done his work for her.

Now, one day, as the end of the year drew nigh, while Caridwen was in the fields gathering herbs, it chanced that the three magic drops flew out of the cauldron, and fell on the finger of Gwion Bach. They scalded his hand so that he promptly put it to his mouth, and sucked his fingers; and immediately he became very wise, and knew all that Caridwen meant to do to him, and his need of guarding against her wily plots! He fled from the house, therefore, and ran towards his own land; and the cauldron, left unstirred, burst in two, and the poisonous liquid ran out of the door, and into a stream where the horses of Gwyddno were drinking; and when they had drunk of the poisoned water they all died.

When Caridwen returned, and saw the year's work was lost, she took up a billet of wood, and began to beat the blind man Morda. But he answered: "You do wrong to beat me; the loss was not because of me."

"You speak truly," said Caridwen. "It was Gwion Bach who robbed me." And she set to running after him as fast as she could. He soon looked back, and saw her, and changed himself into a hare; for the magic liquid had given him many different kinds of skill. But as he fled, she changed herself into a greyhound, and had nearly caught him up when he ran towards a river and changed himself into a fish. Then she became an otter, and chased him till in his weariness he took the form of a bird. But she at once changed herself into a hawk, and gave him no rest in the sky.

Just as he was in fear of death, he saw a heap of grains of wheat on the floor of a barn; so he dropped among them, and became one of the grains. Then Caridwen changed herself into a high-crested black hen, and scratched among the grains till she found him. She was just about to swallow him, when, with his last remaining effort of skill, he became a very beautiful little child, and when she looked at him she had not the heart to kill him on the spot. So she took her own form again, and, having put the child into a leathern bag, she cast him into the sea just below the weir of Gwyddno, which is not far from Aberystwith, on the 29th of April. Then Caridwen returned home again, and thought no more of the matter.

Now, it had been the custom on every May-day eve to go fishing in that weir, and every year fish were taken to the value of a hundred pounds. Its owner, Gwyddno, had an only son named Elphin, the most unlucky of youths, who was always needing and never getting. This year his father, pitying his ill fortune, granted to him all the weir should contain on May-day, in order to give him something wherewith to begin the world. So the nets were set to catch the fish below the weir, and next day Elphin hurried to see how many they had caught. But the nets were quite empty, and nothing was to be found but a leathern bag which had caught in one of the poles of the weir. Then said one of his companions: "Men were unfortunate before, but never so much as now, when your luck has turned away the fish from a weir that has been worth a hundred pounds every May-eve till now, when there is nothing but a skin in it."

"Perhaps," said Elphin, "the bag may have something in it which is worth a hundred pounds." So his friend hooked up the bag, and opened it, and there peeped out the bright face of a little lad. "See, what a bright face within the bag!" cried his companion. And Elphin said: "Let him be called Taliesin, then" (which means "bright or shining face"), and lifted the child gently on to his horse, and made it walk softly, and went homeward with a very heavy heart.

THE FINDING OF TALIESIN

But as he rode along, the boy behind him sang to him a song of consolation so sweetly that Elphin was much amazed, and asked how he had learnt so beautiful a song. The child replied that, though he was very little, he was notwithstanding very wise.

Then Elphin asked if he were a mortal child or a spirit; upon which the boy sang another song, telling what he had been, and how he had fled from Caridwen, and how he came to be entangled in the weir.

When Elphin reached the house of his father, the latter asked him if his haul were good.

"Father," he answered, "I have caught a poet-minstrel."

"Alas! what good will that do thee?" said Gwyddno.

And Taliesin answered for himself: "He will do him more good than the weir ever did for thee."

Then Gwyddno looked at him, and said: "Art thou able to speak when thou art so little?" And the child replied: "I am better able to speak than thou to question." "What canst thou say?" asked Gwyddno. Upon which Taliesin sang a song of such wondrous beauty, that everyone hastened to the spot to hear the marvellous child.

Soon afterwards Elphin, with his usual ill luck, managed to offend the powerful King Maelgwn, who cast him into a dungeon barred by thirteen locked doors. But when father Gwyddno was lamenting his son's ill fate, the child Taliesin bade him be of good cheer, since he was going to rescue him. Setting off at daybreak he reached the King's palace at the time of the evening meal, and entered the hall just as the bards were beginning to sing the praises of the King, as was their custom every evening. Then Taliesin cast a spell upon these bards, so that instead of singing they could only pout out their lips and make mouths at the King. He forced them also, by his magic power, to tap their fingers on their mouths, as they tried in vain to sing, making a curious sound like "Bler-m! Bler-m!"

The King, naturally, thought they were treating him with great disrespect, and ordered one of his squires to give a blow to the chief bard; and the squire took a broom, and struck him on the head, so that he fell back on his seat. This rough treatment seemed to bring him to his senses, and he then explained that they could not help themselves, but had been put under a spell by a spirit, who was sitting in a corner of the hall under the form of a child. So the King ordered the squire to fetch the child; and Taliesin, nothing loth, was brought up to the head of the table. Being asked who he was and whence he came, he at once proceeded to sing another wonderful song, in which he informed them that he was the chief bard of Elphin, that his native country was the land of Cherubim, but that at present he was dwelling upon this earth, and might even stay here until the Judgment Day.

The King and his nobles marvelled greatly, for they had never heard the like from a boy so young as he. But as he was the bard of Elphin, who had offended His Majesty, the King determined that his own bards should get the better of him in song. So he ordered the chief bard to stand forth, and then all the four and twenty of them, to strive with Taliesin. But when they came forward to do his bidding they could do no other than play "Bler-m! Bler-m!" on their lips.

Then the King, angry and disappointed, asked the boy Taliesin his errand.

And the child replied in song: "I am come to deliver Elphin, who is imprisoned in this castle, behind thirteen locks."

"I will never let him go," said the King.

Then Taliesin foretold that there should come up from the sea-marshes a wonderful golden worm, which would take revenge upon the King for his cruelty; but, finding his threat had no effect, he turned, and left the hall. Outside the castle he sang a charm to the wind, bidding it blow open the prison of Elphin; and while he thus sang, near the door, there suddenly uprose such a storm of wind that the King and his nobles crouched in terror, expecting that the castle would fall upon their heads. Directly he realised that this was the work of the mysterious child-bard he sent for Elphin from the prison, and implored Taliesin to stay the wind-storm, which he accordingly did. So Elphin was brought into the hall, loaded with chains; at sight of which Taliesin sang another charm song, and the chains immediately fell off his hands and feet. By this time the King was so full of admiration for the skill and wisdom of the boy that he begged him to take the spell off his own bards, and to test them with questions.

So Taliesin set them free from his charm, and then began to rain questions upon them.

"Why is a stone hard?"

"Why is a thorn sharp-pointed?"

"What is as salt as brine?"

"Who rides the gale?"

"Why is a wheel round?"

"Why is the speech of the tongue different from any other gift?"

These were some of the questions he put, and ended with: "If you and your bards are able, let them give an answer to me, Taliesin."

But none of them could answer a single word.

Then the King dismissed them all with scorn; but still he would not let Elphin go free away.

Then Taliesin bade Elphin wager the King that he had a horse both better and swifter than the King's horses. The King accepted the challenge, and fixed day and time and place for the wager to be tried, and promised him his freedom if he should win the race. The King went thither with all his people and four and twenty of the swiftest horses he possessed. The course was marked out and the horses placed for running. Then came Taliesin with four and twenty twigs of holly, which he had burnt black, and he bade the youth who was to ride his master's horse to place them in his belt. Then he ordered him to let all the King's horses get before him, and, as he should overtake one horse after another, to strike the horse with a holly twig over the crupper, and then let that twig fall, and then to take another twig, and do the same to every one of the horses as he should overtake them.

Moreover, he bade the horseman to watch carefully where his own horse should stumble, and to throw down his cap on the spot. All this was done, and, behold! each horse that was struck with the holly twig began to lag behind, and the horse of Elphin easily won the race. When all was over, Taliesin brought his master to the spot where his horse had stumbled, and ordered workmen to dig a hole there; and when they had dug deep enough they found a cauldron full of gold. Then said Taliesin: "Elphin, take thou this as a reward for having taken me out of the weir and reared me from that time until now."

So Elphin went home a rich man to his father, and the work of Taliesin was accomplished.

From the Welsh Romance of Taliesin. Thirteenth century.