Page:Le Morte d'Arthur - Volume 1.djvu/23

Rh the Sons of Palug, in Anglesey. The contests here mentioned with monsters, hags and witches, form also a feature of the story of Kulhwch and Olwen, not to mention Irish stories, such as that of Bricriu’s Feast, which abound in them. Moreover, the majority of Arthur’s followers in the Black Book poem, figure as such in the Kulhwch also, namely Glewlwyd, Kei, Mabon son of Modron, Gwyn Godyvron, Mabon son of Mellt, Angwas Edeinawc, Llwch Llawyniawc, Bedwyr, and Arthur’s son Llacheu; not to mention Manawyddan, who is forced into Arthur’s train in both poem and story. On the other hand, only two of Arthur’s men enumerated in the former, evade identification elsewhere, namely, Wythneint and Kysceint. Perhaps the most remarkable thing in the Black Book poem, is the position which it assigns to Kei, who there towers far above all the rest of the Arthurian train: he is, in fact, not to be conquered by man or beast, so that his death could only be attributed to the direct interference of the Almighty. The next in importance to Kei was Bedwyr, the Bedewere or Bedyuere of Malory’s Morte Darthur, and the positions of both heroes are relatively the same in the Kulhwch story.

Another allusion to Arthur occurs in the Black Book, to wit in an elegy to Madog son of Meredydd, prince of Powys, who died in the year 1159. The poem is ascribed to Madog’s contemporary, the well-known Welsh poet Cynddelw, who, in alluding to the mourning and grief among Madog’s men, characterises the uproar as being—Mal gavr toryw teulu arthur.

This leads, however, to no inference of any importance in this context. The same remark may be made concerning a mention of Arthur in a poem called Gorchan Maelderw in the Book of Aneurin, a manuscript of the latter part of the thirteenth or of the beginning of the fourteenth century: the passage is unfortunately obscure.