This poem has a strong resemblance in its character and sentiment to the oldest poems in the Cymmrian dialect.
The oldest known poem in this dialect which has been preserved in its original orthography is a short poem of three stanzas, written in the Irish character in a parchment MS. at Cambridge, containing a paraphrase of the Gospels by Iuvencus, a Latin poet. The writing of this MS. is anterior to the year 700.
The poem is as follows:—
I. Ni guorcosam nemheunaur henoid, Mi telu nit gurmaur. Mi am franc dam an calaur.
II. Ni canu ni guardam ni cusam henoid, Cet iben med nouel Mi am franc dam an patel.
III. Na mereit im nepleguenit henoid Is diszur mi coueidid Donn am riceur im guetid.
It is the song of a warrior mourning his fate and his solitude, and may be thus translated:—
Neither repose nor sleep for me this night, My house is no longer great. For me and my servant no caldron more, No songs, no smiles, no kisses this night, As when I drank the fortifying mead. For me and my servant no goblet more, No longer joy for me this night. My supporter is discouraged; No one aids me in my distress.
The Irish character, in which this poem is written, is of the eighth century, and Villemarqué has remarked upon its resemblance in sentiment and character to a poem of Llywarch Hen, a Cumbrian bard of the sixth or seventh century, whose poems are universally admitted to be genuine, the orthography of which is much more modern. The poem is in triplets, the first line also ending with “heno,” and a single stanza or two will show the resemblance:—
Y stafel Kyndylan nis esmwyth-heno Ar benn karec Hydwyth Heb ner, Heb nifer, Heb ammwyth.