Cyfarwyddyd: Welsh Tales and Foreign Adaptations

Medieval Adaptations from Latin and French

• Henry Lewis (gol.), Brut Dingestow (1942, 1975). An edition of the Dingestow Court version of Brut y Brenhinedd (NLW MS 5266B, `The History of the Kings'). This is one of three early independent Welsh translations of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, written during the thirteenth century. According to the ninth-century Historia Brittonum, Brutus, or Britto (a fictitious (great) grandson of the Trojan Aeneas), was the first colonizer to come to the Island of Britain. He was regarded as the eponymous ancestor of the Britons and the Welsh, and later was claimed as the direct ancestor of the ruling dynasty of Gwynedd. By extension `Brut' came to mean `chronicle, history'. [See further B.F. Roberts, Brut y Brenhinedd (Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1971), and idem, `Geoffrey of Monmouth and Brut y Brenhinedd', chapter iv of The Arthur of the Welsh.
• D. Simon Evans, Historia Gruffud vab Kenan. Gyda Rhagymadrodd a Nodiadau (1977). An extensive study and edition of the only medieval Welsh biography of a layman: Gruffudd ap Cynan ruled Gwynedd from the late eleventh century until his death in 1137. The Historia is a translation, made in the second half of the thirteenth century, from a lost Latin original. In the 300 pages of introduction the editor investigates all historical sources relevant to Gruffudd's life and times, which come from Ireland, Wales and Britain as a whole: the Welsh, Irish, Norse and Anglo-Norman chronicles, annals and records are all examined, together with the relevant Welsh bardic poetry. Linguistic and historical features of the brief text are then fully discussed and annotated, and it is concluded that the original Latin work was composed during the reign of Gruffudd's son, Owain Gwynedd, in order to establish the prestige and authority of his dynasty. [An English translation of the Historia by D.S. Evans was published by Llanerch Enterprises in 1990.
• Ifor Williams, Chwedlau Odo (The Tales of Odo) (1926, 1957). A selection, from an early thirteenth-century translation of Latin animal fables, by an English cleric named Odo of Cyrinton (Cheriton in Kent). Such parables, in which human characteristics are assigned to animals, are ultimately based on Aesop's fables, and variants of Aesop enjoyed wide popularity all over Europe, not least as exempla for use in sermon literature. The text is from Llanstephan 4 (end of fourteenth century). Edited with a comprehensive introduction and notes, which are of much general interest, though intended primarily for young students.
• Henry Lewis (gol.), Chwedleu Seith Doethon Rufein (1925; new edn 1958, 1967). An edition, with introduction and notes, of fifteen tales from the Welsh adaptation in the Red Book of Hergest of the Historia Septem Sapientum Romae. This is a frame- collection of fabliaux which circulated widely over Europe from the twelfth century, and which is ultimately of ancient oriental origin. The fourteenth-century Welsh text is a free rendering, rather than a translation, of the Latin original; it contains two tales which are not found in any other version. It recalls the narrative style and traditional openings of the Welsh `chwedlau', with examples of `araith' (oration, rhetoric), and phrases which echo the actual wording of passages in `Culhwch ac Olwen', `Breuddwyd Maxen' and `Owein' (texts which are also found in the Red Book). Chwedleu Seith Doethon Rufein is the ultimate source for the fable of the faithful hound Gelert, which later became associated with Beddgelert in Snowdonia.
• Thomas Jones (gol.), Y Bibyl Ynghymraec (1940). A Middle Welsh translation of a part of the Latin Promptuarium Bibliae - a summary of mainly Old Testament names, genealogies and events. The text is from Peniarth 20 (most recently dated by Daniel Huws to c.1330). An addition links the story with `Brut y Brenhinedd' and `Dares Phrygius' by tracing the descent of Eneas Ysgwydwyn (the progenitor of Brutus) from Japhet, son of Noah. The beginning of the text is defective, and a translation of the first chapter of Genesis has been added from a sixteenth-century copy (believed to come from Peniarth 20) in the hand of Thomas Wiliems, Trefriw. (For excerpts see Drych yr Oesoedd Canol.)
• Nesta Lloyd and Morfydd E. Owen (goln), Drych yr Oesoedd Canol (A Mirror of the Middle Ages) (1986). This work enriches the cultural background to the poetry and `cyfarwyddyd' of the Middle Ages by offering a selection of edited passages from prose works written between the thirteenth and the fifteenth centuries. These are subdivided under the headings of religion, history, law, geography, agriculture, hunting, medicine, etc. The extracts are for the most part medieval translations from Latin (since Latin was then the universal language for the communication and transmission of knowledge). Indigenous Welsh learning is, however, represented by extracts from Cyfraith Hywel (the Law of Hywel), the Triads and the Lives of the Saints, while some archaic concepts of British geography are quoted from the tract on `The Names of the Island of Britain'. Each section is prefixed by an introductory note, and there is an informative general introduction and a glossary.
• D. Simon Evans (ed.), The Welsh Life of St David (1988). An early fourteenth-century translation of the Latin Life of the saint by the eleventh-century Rhigyfarch of Llanbadarn Fawr, edited with introduction and notes from the text in the Llyfr Ancr Llanddewibrefi (Jesus Coll. MS 2=119). The extensive introduction discusses the evidence for the cult of St David, with a full account of Rhigyfarch, his family and his literary, cultural and political ambience, the effects of the Norman Conquest on the Church in Wales, and all other questions which are common to the Latin and Welsh Lives of the saint. The unknown Welsh translator may have been a monk attached to St David's or to some other church in the diocese. [This edition partly supersedes DSE's earlier Buched Dewi (1959, 1994), which was based on the collation of the text of the Life in Llanstephan 27, with variants cited from other manuscripts. This appeared before J.W. James's definitive edition of Rhigyfarch's Life of Saint David became available in 1967.]
  (The four following works all illustrate the high standard in the art of translation and paraphrase from French texts which was attained under the increasing French influences which were brought to bear on Wales during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. At the same time, they show how the developing art of translation became fully integrated into the traditional style of Welsh narrative. The tendency of all these Welsh translators, however, was to shorten or to summarize.)
• S.J. Williams (gol.), Ystorya de Carolo Magno (1930; 2nd edn 1968). Edited translations from parts of a Latin chronicle and French poems relating to Charlemagne, grouped together in the Red Book of Hergest in such a way as to form a cycle. The framework is provided by the Turpini Historia, attributed to a certain Madog ap Selyf, who worked under the patronage of a descendant of the Lord Rhys of Deheubarth between 1265 and 1283. Into this is interpolated a translation of the passage from the `Chanson de Roland' describing the battle of Roncevaux and the hero's death, and a further passage from the French poem `Otinel'. With introduction, notes and glossary.
• Morgan Watkin, Ystorya Bown de Hamtwn (1958). Diplomatic edition of the text preserved in the White Book of Rhydderch (c.1350-), with introduction and notes. The text is a thirteenth-century translation of a lost Anglo-Norman Geste de Boun de Hamtone. It blends elements from romance, epic, folk-tales and saints' legends: the hero fights with dragons and Saracens, travels widely, and marries a (converted) princess. The story was widely popular all over Europe, and exists in many vernacular versions. The Welsh rendering belongs to the same literary milieu as the Charlemagne tales, and the translator's creative language maintains the same high standard as is found in these, with some lively vernacular dialogue. `Syr Bwn' was known to later Welsh poets as a paragon of courage and Christian virtues.
• Patricia Williams, Kedymdeithyas Amlyn ac Amic (The Friendship of Amlyn and Amic) (1982). The Welsh version of this famous story from the Red Book of Hergest is a rather free translation of the twelfth-century Vita Amici et Amelii carissimorum, a tale known also from its French counterpart Li Amitiez de Ami et Amile. Both represent the `hagiographic' rather than the `romantic' version of the story of the two friends, which was widely known over Europe, and is marginally associated with the Charlemagne romances (the pair die as martyrs, fighting for Charles). The simple but elegant prose of the Welsh version frequently recalls the speech-patterns of the Mabinogi. It is difficult to date the tale more precisely than as pre-1400, since the existence of a thirteenth-century Anglo-Norman poem, representing the `romantic' version, may well underlie the emotional evocation of the names of this pair of perfect friends in elegies by the poets Dafydd ap Gwilym and Iolo Goch.
• Thomas Jones (gol.),Ystoryaeu Seint Greal: Rhan 1: Y Keis (Stories of the Holy Grail: Part 1: The Quest) (1992). Thomas Jones's posthumous work is introduced by J.E. Caerwyn Williams, with an introduction by Ceridwen Lloyd-Morgan, notes and glossary. The Keis is an abbreviated translation of the thirteenth-century Queste del Saint Graal, edited from the late fourteenth-century manuscript Peniarth 11, with variants from NLW 3063E, and a full discussion of the manuscripts by Daniel Huws. The scribe of Peniarth 11 was Hywel Fychan, who is better known as the main scribe of the Red Book of Hergest. In Peniarth 11 a translation of the romance of Perlesvaus follows as Part 2 of the Grail stories, and an edition of this second part is in preparation.

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