Culhwch and Olwen

(ca. 1100)

   Culhwch and Olwen is the oldest of the Welsh tales included in manuscripts of The MABINOGION, and the earliest extant narrative concerning the court of King ARTHUR. A complete text survives in the Red Book of Hergest (ca. 1400), and a fragmentary version in the White Book of Rhydderch (ca. 1325), but linguistic evidence suggests that the tale was composed hundreds of years before these manuscripts were assembled.

   The tale encompasses a number of traditional folklore motifs and is at the same time a compendium of British tradition. Culhwch is the son of the British king Cilydd, and is cursed by his stepmother so that he can never marry unless he wins Olwen, daughter of the chief of giants, Ysbaddaden. Consumed with love for Olwen (even though he has never seen her),Culhwch goes to the court of his cousin, King Arthur, to seek help in winning the giant’s daughter.He is first confronted by Arthur’s porter, Glewlwyd Gafaelfawr, who speaks of having been with Arthur in Scandinavia, India, Greece, and other kingdoms, including mythical ones—thus Arthur is presented as a major figure on the world stage, rather than simply as a Celtic hero. It is a picture that anticipates GEOFFREY OF MONMOUTH’s presentation of Arthur in the 12th century.

   Arthur’s chief lieutenant is Cei (who later is Sir Kay in Arthurian legends), and next to him Bedwyr (Sir Bedivere) is his best knight.When Culhwch requests Arthur’s help, the king agrees, and sends seven of his best men, led by Cei and Bedwyr, to help Culhwch achieve his love.When Culhwch approaches Ysbaddaden, the giant imposes 40 seemingly impossible tasks on Culhwch that he insists must be accomplished before Culhwch may wed his daughter. Many of these have to do with the preparations for the wedding feast, including the shaving of the giant. For instance, the giant insists that a great thicket be uprooted and burnt, plowed, planted, and harvested all in one night; he requires that the divine Mabon, son of Modron, be freed from a secret watery prison in which he is being held; and he wants blood obtained from the Black Witch from the Valley of Grief in the uplands of Hell.

   Arthur himself joins his men for some of the more difficult tasks, in particular the hunting of Twrch Trwyth, a great magic boar who holds between his ears the razor, comb, and sheers that must be used to shave the giant. Arthur and his men chase Twrch Trwyth from Ireland to Wales and into Brittany, finally catching him and taking the comb from him in Cornwall after a great battle. The boar then charges into the sea and is never seen again. Ultimately, the tasks accomplished, Culhwch kills the giant and marries the beautiful Olwen.

   The tale is interesting for its many folklore elements— the jealous stepmother, for instance, or the beautiful maiden who is loved from afar and who must be won through the performance of difficult tasks. Another folklore motif is the legend of the “oldest animal”: In the search for Mabon, Arthur’s men inquire about him of a number of animals, each of which directs them to an older animal who is more likely to know the answer. Thus they ask a blackbird, a stag, an owl, and an eagle before they learn the answer from the salmon, the oldest animal of all. The story has parallels in Irish, Persian and Sanskrit folklore. More specifically Celtic elements have also been the object of scholarly study of Culhwch and Olwen. The hunt of the magic boar may be related to the fact that swine were considered sacred animals by the ancient Celts, and loomed large in their mythology. It has even been suggested that embedded in the narrative of Culhwch is an ancient Celtic myth of the birth of the swine god.

   This kind of conjecture, of course, is impossible to prove.More obviously related to old British legend is a catalogue of some 200 names that appears in the text. This is purportedly a list of all of Arthur’s retainers, warriors, and attendants, but seems to list a number of legendary British figures. Another area of scholarly debate concerns the authors’ familiarity with Ireland. It was once believed that the story was originally an Irish one, retold in Welsh, but more recent studies have suggested that the author knew almost nothing about Ireland itself, thus the author and the tale seem almost certainly native Welsh in origin.

   Bibliography

   ■ Breeze, Andrew. Medieval Welsh Literature. Dublin: Four Courts Press, 1997.

   ■ Bromwich, Rachel, A. O. H. Jarman, and Brynley F. Roberts, eds. The Arthur of the Welsh: The Arthurian Legend in Medieval Welsh Literature. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1991.

   ■ Foster, Idris Llewelyn. “Culhwch and Olwen and Rhonabwy’s Dream.” In Arthurian Literature in the Middle Ages, edited by Roger Sherman Loomis, 31–41. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1959.

   ■ Loomis, Richard M., trans. “The Tale of Culhwch and Olwen.” In The Romance of Arthur, edited by James J.Wilhelm and Laila Zamuelis Gross, 27–55. New York: Garland, 1984.