Gorse
Heather
Many years ago, I suggested that the place-name and noun Godeu/Goddeu of Welsh poetry and myth was a sort of hypocoristic form for Gododdin, or perhaps a similar nickname for that kingdom. Alas, the old etymology for the Roman period tribal name, Votadini, which became first Guotodin in Welsh, then finally Gododdin, is no longer accepted. For the old etymology, I refer my readers to Rivet and Smith's THE PLACE-NAMES OF ROMAN BRITAIN. The relevant section is to be found pasted here:
"There can be no doubt that the proper form is Votadini, given the Welsh derivative Guotodin, later Gododdin. On the latter, important in the history of Welsh verse, see Jackson, The Gododdin (Edinburgh, 1969), especially 69-75, on the location of the Manau Guotodin of Nennius (62). Watson CPNS 28 says that in an eleventh-century Gaelic poem there appears Fotudain, which corresponds exactly to the Welsh forms. According to Watson the name can be compared with early Irish fothad 'support' ('Fothad, a mythical ancestor of an Irish people, perhaps derived from * Vo-tâdos' : O'Rahilly EIHM 10, note), with a suffix -in- as in many ethnic names. Th sense is not entirely clear, but seems preferable to others suggested by Holder II. 887. See also I. Williams, Canu Aneirin (Cardiff, 1938), xviii."
That etymology has now been universally rejected. Instead, we have the following proposed derivation, passed along to me by Dr. Simon Rodway of The University of Wales:
"Yes, the Rivet and Smith etymology doesn't work. Graham Isaac in his chapter on 'Scotland' in New Approaches to Celtic Place-Names in Ptolemy's Geography, ed. Javier de Hoz, Eugenio R. Lujan and Patrick Sims-Williams (Madrid, 2005), pp. 198-99 suggests < *wo-ta:di:- 'what is melted, smelted below', i.e. people connected with a certain technique of iron production."
Godeu (or Goddeu) can also not be related to Gododdin. In the words of notable British place-name expert Alan James (personal communication):
"'d' in OW - early MW orthography represented [ð], 'dd' in modern Welsh spelling. But 't' in OW represents [d], which is why Guotodin represents *Gwododdin. And [gwod-] is quite different from [goð-], there's no way they can be related.
The best recent discussion of godeu is by Marged Haycock in CELTIC LINGUISTICS, edited by Martin John Ball, "The Significance of the 'Cad Goddau' Tree-List in the Book of Taliesin." I am here posting as jpeg images her position on the best etymology for godeu:
Dr. Simon Rodway and Alan James both agree with the proposed etymology of "beneath/under" + "burning" is formally acceptable. However, this reading as applied to 'kindling-wood' and thence to 'wood' in general is considered by all authorities I have consulted as too much of a stretch. Instead, we need to make use of this etymology (from a presumed Proto-Celtic *uφo-*daw-je/o-) to identify a collective noun designating actual flowering plants that were somehow intimately associated with fire.
I seemed to recall reading at some point abotu so-called 'fire climax' species, i.e. those plants that when burned came back with renewed strength, and whose seed or too propagation could actually be improved by fire. It didn't ake much research to find the following:
In the GPC, I found this definition for goddaith:
"spot where burning of heather, gorse and bracken took place" →
When I asked Dr. Rodway about this word and its possible association with godeu, he responded:
"Yes, that is indeed etymologically related (if Haycock's etymology for goddau is correct). And it has the same prefix."
Taliesin is made of the flowers of trees and goddau. Both gorse and heather have flowers. Other phrases suggest goddau is something other than trees, but still a plant. Could goddau designate both heather and gorse as a collective noun?
I find in the following articles that gorse and heather in Britain ARE THE TWO FIRE-CLIMAX SPECIES.
Common gorse is described as one of 2 fire climax species in forests in Great Britain, along with a common associate, heather [51].
PLANT RESPONSE TO FIRE:
Common gorse responds to fire by sprouting from the basal stem region and by establishing from seed in the soil seed bank [5,42,74,92,98,99]. Postfire regeneration of common gorse can be prolific and rapid [42,80,82].
On heather:
Given all this, I would propose that godeu/goddeu means 'that which is burnt beneath or under', i.e. the plants gorse and heather that readily grow from an area that has just been burnt, intentionally or otherwise. Ancient people would doubtless have found such plants to be miraculous - perhaps even sacred.
Now, does that definition help us in locating Godeu in relationship to Rheged? Where was the land or kingdom of heather and gorse?
Well, I can make a guess. The Welsh poem THE BATTLE OF GODDEU features a fort named for one Nefyn. Again, all those years ago, as various divine or heroic figures who belonged to Gwynedd were brought into the action of that poem, and the poem contained a reference to a fortress belonging to Nefyn the Tall, I had guessed the battle occured on the Lleyn Peninsula at or near Nefyn and the great nearby hillfort, Garn Boduan. Given the motif of the battle of the trees, and the presence of one Achren, (cf. Irish achrann, "thicket, tangled undergrowth"), and twigs or branches and such, I theorized that there might be a connection to the Roman period Gangani tribe and Ganganorum Promontorium of the Lleyn Peninsula. The derivation of Gangani is probably from a British word similar to Welsh cainc, 'branch.'
But we must bear in mind that there was another Nefyn in the North, the wife of Cynfarch and mother of Urien of Rheged!
But we must bear in mind that there was another Nefyn in the North, the wife of Cynfarch and mother of Urien of Rheged!
It does not overly harm my argument that Caer Nefynhir may not be the Fort of Nefyn the Tall, but instead a reference to the Novantae tribe of Dumfries and Galloway. From Alan James (https://spns.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Alan_James_Brittonic_Language_in_the_Old_North_BLITON_Volume_II_Dictionary_2019_Edition.pdf):
"On the possibility that the eponym of Kaer Nefenhir in a poem to Llywelyn the Great by
Prydydd y Moch (c. 1215) is *Novantorix, 'ruler of the Novantae', see Haycock 2013 p.14."
So it is possible that Nefyn, wife of Cynfarch, rather than being a Welsh cognate of the Irish goddess name Nemhain (something which has generally been accepted), may be a reference to that tribe and show that Urien of Rheged descended from that tribe.
My best guess, therefore, is that Godeu/Godeu bordering on Rheged (whose nucleus was in Annandale; see https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2017/09/the-nucleus-of-uriens-kingdom-of-rheged.html) was a name for the old Novantae territory. Heather and gorse are ubiquitous in Galloway.
The presence of the Nefyn name in Lleyn probably led to the relocation of the Godeu name in legend.
NOTE: The Battle of Argoet Llwyfain
In the Taliesin poetry, we learn of a battle fought by Owein, son of Urien, supposedly against the English (although see below). A good English translation of the relevant passages on this battle can be found in http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/10352/1/10352_7146.PDF:
"In the morning of the day of Saturday there was a great battle,
From the time when the sun rises until it sets:
Flamdwyn hastened in four hosts:
Godeu and Rheged were mustering
to Dyfwy, from Argoed [Llwyfain] to Arvynyd."
Flamdwyn demanded hostages which Owain refused to give, calling
Flamdwyn the scourge of the east - which confirms the view that
Flamdwyn was an Angle, and Urien exhorted the Britons to attack ;
"And in front of Argoed Llfyfein
There were many corpses.
The ravens were crimson because of the warfare of men."
The location of Argoed Llwyfain, as well as those of Arvynyd and Dyfwy, are unknown. For Argoed Llwyfain, see James, Alan G., (2010) 'A Slippery Customer: IE *slei and its derivatives in some British place-names' Nomina 33, pp. 65–86. While there are a few candidates, the best for 'the forest in front of Llwyfain' is the Cumbrian Lyne.
But what of the others?
Dyfwy is also found spelled in the Taliesin poetry Deuwy. Looking in the area in question (broadly the Scottish Lowlands and Northumberland), I noticed the Teviot. Alan James has the Teviot etymologized as *ti- -m- -ja with the -ed suffix being added later. But I asked him if, instead, the name minus the suffix could originally have appeared in Welsh as Deuwy/Dyfwy.
His response?
"I don't see any obvious difficulty with that. It was called Tivy, Tividale by locals even in recent times."
"I don't see any obvious difficulty with that. It was called Tivy, Tividale by locals even in recent times."
If the Deuwy/Dyfwy is the Teviot, then Arvynydd may not be so difficult to situate. The name is from *Ar-monid/minid, 'in front of the mountain.' It describes, therefore, a region around Mynydd. As it happens, just a few miles north of the Teviot is Minto. The name may be from an original British Mynydd, with an English hoh appended later. As the Minto Hills are two conjoined hills, I suggested that this might be from Mynyddau. Alan James commented thusly:
"I agree Minto could be *mönïδ-öü. Not much of a name, though! I recorded the OE -hoh proposal as that's the only one that's been published, by Jessie Macdonald who was always reluctant to favour Brittonic or Gaelic etymologies. It's not well-documented, though, and the earliest record seems to be ecclesia de Myneton 1296, so it could be an OE -tun rather than -hoh."
I would guess that the land around the Minto is Arvynyd.
Flamdwyn or 'Flame-bringer' has not been identified. The entry on him from P.C. Bartrum's A WELSH CLASSICAL DICTIONARY runs as follows:
FFLAMDDWYN.
"The name means ‘flame-bringer’ (CB p.145). He is mentioned in two poems in the Book of
Taliesin (CT nos.VI and X) as a chieftain fighting against Urien and his son Owain. In the former, ‘The
Battle of Argoed Llwyfain’, he is said to have ‘advanced in four hosts’ and to have ‘shouted with great
bluster’. Urien and Owain appear to have won the victory. The other poem, ‘The Elegy of Owain’,
mentions that Owain killed Fflamddwyn.
According to the Historia Brittonum (§63) Urien fought against Hussa and Theodric, kings of
Northumbria. This suggests that Fflamddwyn, which is clearly not a real name, may be one of these
kings. W.F.Skene thought that it was Theodric son of Ida (The Four Ancient Books of Wales, I.232);
similarly John Rhys (CB p.145). For earlier guesses see John Morris-Jones in Cy. 28 (1918) p.154. On
the other hand Fflamddwyn might have been a chieftain of only local importance (PCB).
According to a triad (TYP no.80) the wife of Fflamddwyn was Bun, daughter of Culfanawyd
Prydain. She was one of the ‘Three Faithless Wives’ of Ynys Prydain, sister of Penarwan, the wife of
Owain ab Urien, and sister of Esyllt Fynwen.
From a poem by Cynddelw (Elegy on Owain Gwynedd, LlH p.92) it may be inferred that the
poet believed that it was at Argoed Llwyfain that Owain slew Fflamddwyn. There may have been a
tradition to this effect (John Morris-Jones, loc.cit. pp.169-170). So Lewis Morris (Celtic Remains, p.180 s.n. Fflamddwyn.
For references to Fflamddwyn by later poets, see TYP p.352."
For this place-name, see https://spns.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/MayWilliamsonComplete.pdf:
"BONCHESTER (Hbk): (86, 2 B):
Bunchester, 1588 L Ch; Bonnechesterr, Blaeu. /58/ The first element may be the same as
appears in Bonjedward (No VI). OE bune, “dogweed”, may also be considered: cf Bumpstead
(PN ESS, 508) and Bonwick (PN YER, 80). Bonchester Hill bears a large pre-English
earthwork."
For the fort of Bonchester, see https://canmore.org.uk/site/55300/bonchester-hill.
Bonchester hillfort stands over the Rule Water, a tributary of the Teviot.
A map, then, of the sites as I have laid them out:
Now, whether this means Flamdwyn was English or British is hard to say. Welsh has a word bun meaning 'maiden, woman, sweetheart.' But the location of Bonchester is about right for an incursion by the Bernicians against Rheged and Godeu.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.