Celtic Folklore: Welsh and Manx (Volume 2 of 2)

by Sir John Rhys

‘It was said by the old people that on the site of this bog once stood the old town of Swansea, and that in clear and calm weather the chimneys and even the church steeple could be seen at the bottom of the lake, and in the loneliness of the night the bells were often heard ringing in the lake. It was also said that should any person happen to stand with his face towards the lake when the wind is blowing across the lake, and if any of the spray of that water should touch his clothes, it would be only with the greatest difficulty he could save himself from being attracted or sucked into the water. The lake was at one time much larger than at present. The efforts made to drain it have drawn a good deal of the water from it, but only to convert it into a bog, which no one can venture to cross except in exceptionally dry seasons or hard frost.’

On this I wish to remark in passing, that, while common sense would lead one to suppose that the wind blowing across the water would help the man facing it to get away whenever he chose, the reasoning here is of another order, one characteristic in fact of the ways and means of sympathetic magic. For specimens in point the reader may be conveniently referred to page 360, where he may compare the words quoted from Mr. Hartland, especially as to the use there mentioned of stones or pellets thrown from one’s hands. In the case of Crymlyn, the wind blowing off the face of the water into the onlooker’s face and carrying with it some of the water in the form of spray which wets his clothes, howsoever little, was evidently regarded as establishing a link of connexion between him and the body of the water—or shall I say rather, between him and the divinity of the water?—and that this link was believed to be so strong that it required the man’s utmost effort to break it and escape being drawn in and drowned like Cynan. The statement, supremely silly as it reads, is no modern invention; for one finds that Nennius—or somebody else—reasoned in precisely the same way, except that for a single onlooker he substitutes a whole army of men and horses, and that he points the antithesis by distinctly stating, that if they kept their backs turned to the fascinating flood they would be out of danger. The conditions which he had in view were, doubtless, that the men should face the water and have their clothing more or less wetted by the spray from it. The passage (§ 69) to which I refer is in the Mirabilia, and Geoffrey of Monmouth is found to repeat it in a somewhat better style of Latin (ix. 7): the following is the Nennian version:—

Aliud miraculum est, id est Oper Linn Liguan. Ostium fluminis illius fluit in Sabrina et quando Sabrina inundatur ad sissam, et mare inundatur similiter in ostio supra dicti fluminis et in stagno ostii recipitur in modum voraginis et mare non vadit sursum et est litus juxta flumen et quamdiu Sabrina inundatur ad sissam, istud litus non tegitur et quando recedit mare et Sabrina, tunc Stagnum Liuan eructat omne quod devoravit de mari et litus istud tegitur et instar montis in una unda eructat et rumpit. Et si fuerit exercitus totius regionis, in qua est, et direxerit faciem contra undam, et exercitum trahit unda per vim humore repletis vestibus et equi similiter trahuntur. Si autem exercitus terga versus fuerit contra eam, non nocet ei unda.

‘There is another wonder, to wit Aber Ỻyn Ỻiwan. The water from the mouth of that river flows into the Severn, and when the Severn is in flood up to its banks, and when the sea is also in flood at the mouth of the above-named river and is sucked in like a whirlpool into the pool of the Aber, the sea does not go on rising: it leaves a margin of beach by the side of the river, and all the time the Severn is in flood up to its bank, that beach is not covered. And when the sea and the Severn ebb, then Ỻyn Ỻiwan brings up all it had swallowed from the sea, and that beach is covered while Ỻyn Ỻiwan discharges its contents in one mountain-like wave and vomits forth. Now if the army of the whole district in which this wonder is, were to be present with the men facing the wave, the force of it would, once their clothes are drenched by the spray, draw them in, and their horses would likewise be drawn. But if the men should have their backs turned towards the water, the wave would not harm them[6].’

One story about the formation of Bala Lake, or Ỻyn Tegid[7] as it is called in Welsh, has been given at p. 376: here is another which I translate from a version in Hugh Humphreys’ Ỻyfr Gwybodaeth Gyffredinol (Carnarvon), second series, vol. i, no. 2, p. 1. I may premise that the contributor, whose name is not given, betrays a sort of literary ambition which has led him to relate the story in a confused fashion; and among other things he uses the word edifeirwch, ‘repentance,’ throughout, instead of dial, ‘vengeance.’ With that correction it runs somewhat as follows:—Tradition relates that Bala Lake is but the watery tomb of the palaces of iniquity; and that some old boatmen can on quiet moonlight nights in harvest see towers in ruins at the bottom of its waters, and also hear at times a feeble voice saying, Dial a đaw, dial a đaw, ‘Vengeance will come’; and another voice inquiring, Pa bryd y daw, ‘When will it come?’ Then the first voice answers, Yn y drydeđ genhedlaeth, ‘In the third generation.’ Those voices were but a recollection over oblivion, for in one of those palaces lived in days of yore an oppressive and cruel prince, corresponding to the well-known description of one of whom it is said, ‘Whom he would he slew; and whom he would he kept alive.’ The oppression and cruelty practised by him on the poor farmers were notorious far and near. This prince, while enjoying the morning breezes of summer in his garden, used frequently to hear a voice saying, ‘Vengeance will come.’ But he always laughed the threat away with reckless contempt. One night a poor harper from the neighbouring hills was ordered to come to the prince’s palace. On his way the harper was told that there was great rejoicing at the palace at the birth of the first child of the prince’s son. When he had reached the palace the harper was astonished at the number of the guests, including among them noble lords, princes, and princesses: never before had he seen such splendour at any feast. When he had begun playing the gentlemen and ladies dancing presented a superb appearance. So the mirth and wine abounded, nor did he love playing for them any more than they loved dancing to the music of his harp. But about midnight, when there was an interval in the dancing, and the old harper had been left alone in a corner, he suddenly heard a voice singing in a sort of a whisper in his ear, ‘Vengeance, vengeance!’ He turned at once, and saw a little bird hovering above him and beckoning him, as it were, to follow him. He followed the bird as fast as he could, but after getting outside the palace he began to hesitate. But the bird continued to invite him on, and to sing in a plaintive and mournful voice the word ‘Vengeance, vengeance!’ The old harper was afraid of refusing to follow, and so they went on over bogs and through thickets, whilst the bird was all the time hovering in front of him and leading him along the easiest and safest paths. But if he stopped for a moment the same mournful note of ‘Vengeance, vengeance!’ would be sung to him in a more and more plaintive and heartbreaking fashion. They had by this time reached the top of the hill, a considerable distance from the palace. As the old harper felt rather fatigued and weary, he ventured once more to stop and rest, but he heard the bird’s warning voice no more. He listened, but he heard nothing save the murmuring of the little burn hard by. He now began to think how foolish he had been to allow himself to be led away from the feast at the palace: he turned back in order to be there in time for the next dance. As he wandered on the hill he lost his way, and found himself forced to await the break of day. In the morning, as he turned his eyes in the direction of the palace, he could see no trace of it: the whole tract below was one calm, large lake, with his harp floating on the face of the waters.

Next comes the story of Ỻynclys Pool in the neighbourhood of Oswestry. That piece of water is said to be of extraordinary depth, and its name means the ‘swallowed court.’ The village of Ỻynclys is called after it, and the legend concerning the pool is preserved in verses printed among the compositions of the local poet, John F. M. Dovaston, who published his works in 1825. The first stanza runs thus:—

Clerk Willin he sat at king Alaric’s board,

And a cunning clerk was he;

For he’d lived in the land of Oxenford

With the sons of Grammarie.