Hu Gadarn

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Hu Gadarn ("Hu the Mighty") is supposedly[1] a figure from Welsh mythology. He is said to have brought the Welsh to Britain from the Summer Country (Gwlad Yr Haf), also called Deffrobani (a medieval name for Ceylon, and sometimes called Atlantia (in modern neo-druidism), taught them to plough, and invented song to strengthen memory and record. His oxen pulled the afanc, a water-dwelling monster, from a lake, preventing floods.

He derives from a series of Triads purportedly collected by the 18th century antiquarian and literary forger Iolo Morganwg.[2] Robert Graves, following Iolo, identified Hu Gadarn as a Welsh horned god;[3] others have identified him with the Celtic god Esus:[4] as such he is popular with neo-pagans.

He is also popular among British Israelites, some of whom identify him as the Biblical Joshua,[5] while others identify him with Jesus under the name Hu-Hesus, an idea originating with Iolo's Barddas.[6]

However Iolo's Triads are considered a forgery,[7] and there is no real evidence of a prior Welsh tradition featuring this character. The poem known as "Echrys Ynys" in the Book of Taliesin contains the word hu,[8] but the meaning and context is obscure. In the Campau Siarlymaen, a Welsh adaptation of the medieval French romance Pèlerinage de Charlemagne found in several manuscripts, including the Red Book of Hergest and White Book of Rhydderch, Hu Gadarn is the Welsh rendering of the French Hugun le Fort, the emperor of Constantinople.[9] Another mention, but simply as a metaphor, is in Y Llafurwr, a poem by Iolo Goch,[10] though it refers to the Hu Gadarn of the romance.[11] Otherwise, medieval Welsh literature is silent on the subject of Hu Gadarn.

[edit] References

  1. ^ See for instance A. C. Rejhon, 'Hu Gadarn: Folkore and Fabrication' in Celtic Folkore and Christianity, ed. Patrick K. Ford (Santa Barbara, 1983), pp. 201-12.
  2. ^ Iolo Morganwg, Triads of Britain 4, 5, 54, 56, 57, 92, 97; see also W. Jenkyn Thomas (ed) (1907), The Welsh Fairy Book: "Hu Gadarn"
  3. ^ Robert Graves, The White Goddess
  4. ^ Hu Gadarn at Jones' Celtic Encyclopedia
  5. ^ For example, this website
  6. ^ Barddas at Sacred Texts
  7. ^ Iolo Morganwg: The Forger and A. C. Rejhon, op. cit.
  8. ^ The "Elegy of Aeddon Mor", a 19th century translation of "Echrys Ynys" which takes hu as a personal name
  9. ^ "The Pilgrimage of Charlemagne". Selections from the Hengwrt Mss. Preserved in the Peniarth Library. Williams, Robert, ed. & trans. London: Thomas Richards, 1892
  10. ^ Dafydd Johnston (ed.), Gwaith Iolo Goch (University of Wales Press, 1988), poem XXVIII.
  11. ^ Dafydd Johnston, op. cit., p. 340