[16] See Choice Notes from ‘Notes and Queries’ (London, 1859), p. 147. [↑]
[17] It is more likely that it is a shortening of Ỻyn y Barfog, meaning the Lake of the Bearded One, Lacus Barbati as it were, the Bearded One being somebody like the hairy monster of another lake mentioned at p. 18 above, or him of the white beard pictured at p. 127. [↑]
[18] So far from afanc meaning a crocodile, an afanc is represented in the story of Peredur as a creature that would cast at every comer a poisoned spear from behind a pillar standing at the mouth of the cave inhabited by it; see the Oxford Mabinogion, p. 224. The corresponding Irish word is abhac, which according to O’Reilly means ‘a dwarf, pigmy, manikin; a sprite.’ [↑]
[19] I should not like to vouch for the accuracy of Mr. Pughe’s rendering of this and the other Welsh names which he has introduced: that involves difficult questions. [↑]
[20] The writer meant the river known as Dyfi or Dovey; but he would seem to have had a water etymology on the brain. [↑]
[21] This involves the name of the river called Disynni, and Diswnwy embodies a popular etymology which is not worth discussing. [↑]
[22] It would, I think, be a little nearer the mark as follows:—
Come thou, Einion’s Yellow One,
Stray-horns, the Particoloured Lake Cow,
And the Hornless Dodin: