Monday, August 24, 2026

THE TERRIBLE GHOST OF ILLTUD THE SOLDIER

Illtud on the Samson Cross

Now that I've made what I think a very good argument for the Welsh identification of Badon with Liddington Castle and Camlan with either the Afon Camlan in Merionethshire or the Cymenesora of the ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE

[For a few links on these, see





I have several parties coming after me screaming once again "WHY NOT KEEP UTHER/ILLTUD AS ARTHUR'S FATHER?"  They love the argument and are willing to sacrifice the Northern battles as a fraudulent construction, a fabulous padding out of Arthur's career.

For those unfamiliar with my Illtud = Uther theory, I will recap it here in brief, then list several links for some of the more salient details.  

I determined, pretty definitively, that Uther Pendragon was a straight-across Welsh rendering of Latin military terms/ranks used in the hagiographical texts devoted to Illtud.  I had come to this conclusion because I noticed that in the early Arthurian poem the PA GUR, Mabon as the servant of Uther P. was placed on the Ely River in Glamorgan.  I found myself asking, if Mabon is there, could his master be there as well?

I found something rather surprising.  The Ely is in the middle of Penychen, which was ruled during the Arthurian period by a chieftain named Pawl.  He ruled either from the known Dark Age citadel of Dinas Powys or from a refortified section of the great oppidum of the Silures at Caerau. I'm shown that the 'Emrys' at Campus Elleti in Penychen was not Ambrosius Aurelianus, but the 'divine/immortal one' Mabon (https://youtu.be/byq_Cojxw_Q?si=g8FoCJhaW4Yp7mFs).

A little research showed me that Illtud had served as captain of the soldiers for Pawl Penychen.  He was called a soldier and a knight, but also a magister militum and a princeps militum, both ranks that perfectly corresponded to Pendragon.  Uther as 'terrrible" was derived from the terribilis miles form assumed by Illtud after his death.  

Additional research then led to me believe that Illtud's Llydaw or Brittany and his father Bicanus were not what/who they seemed.  Instead, they pointed directly at Welsh Bicknor (originally a church of a St. Constantine) and Lydbrook in what had been Ergyng, themselves relocations of an identically named brook and dyke at the Liddington Badbury.  A Liddington/Badbury the Welsh identified as Badon, and which had born a Roman period name of DUROCORNOVIUM.  -cornovium, of course, contains the same name as Cerynw, the Welsh name for Cornwall, where we find major Arthurian associations.

The only thing I had to propose is that Arthur came from the Liddington area, that the Barbury or Bear's fort nearby may have been an English memory of the Arthur whom they encountered there (W. arth = 'bear'), and that our hero won a great victory at Badbury, only to die later at one of the two Camlans.  The Camlan in NW Wales had next to it an early St. Illtud church (Llanelltyd), which was probably built there only when that particular Camlan began taking on legendary associations with Arthur.  It is far more likely an Arthur fighting the English in the south died at Cymenesora (Selsey Bill).  His death almost perfectly coincides with the death of Cerdic of Wessex (534), who had just conquered the Isle of Wight directly across the Solent from Selsey Bill.

Some Illtud links, as promised:







All sounds great, doesn't it?

Until we take a look at the battles of the HISTORIA BRITTONUM list sans Badon.  Then it all seems to fall apart.

I once tried to force the HB battles to conform with the Gewissei battles of the ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE.  My efforts in that direction were clever, but unconvincing - even to myself.  All the HB battles seem to be situated firmly in the North.  This fact forces us to make a choice: either they belong to another Arthur or Arthurs or they have merely been culled from any number of sources and thrown together to make an impressive list for our hero of Badon.  Either one is absolutely possible.

I can go this far with all of this: the only known name for the famous Arthur is Uther Pendragon.  Yes, it may well have simply been chosen by Geoffrey of Monmouth because the hero otherwise had no patronymic.  It is clear from our extant Welsh sources that, oddly, Arthur's father's name is never mentioned. All of his companions have patronymics.  Only his is lacking.  Why?

More importantly, if Uther P. was not Arthur's father, why were everyone after Geoffrey of Momouth silent on this issue?  Why was the mistake - if it were a mistake - not corrected?  No rival claimant for Arthur's father ever came forward, so far as we know.  Everyone meekly accepted Geoffrey's usage of Uther. 

There is no real difficulty reconciling St. Illtud the cousin of Arthur with St. Illtud the father of Arthur.  Once the Uther P. name/epithet was conjured (by the author of the PA GUR or even before), he might very well have come to take on a life of his own until, eventually, he was considered an entirely different person.  This process may have been abetted by the monkish desire to separate out Illtud the soldier from Illtud the saint.  Thus two men were created out of one.  As Uther was Arthur's father, St. Illtud could not have been.  Instead, the latter was made the son of Uther's brother via a chieftain of Ergyng.  

I think we are faced with an almost impossible decision here (assuming I'm right about Illtud = Uther).  Either we can accept Uther/Illtud as Arthur's father, in which case the HB battle list sans Badon is useless, or we see in Uther a creative borrowing by Geoffrey of Monmouth and must grapple with a famous Arthur whose father must remain unknown.

The jury is still out for me, as we had Roman and Dalriadan Arthurs in the North who work great for the HB battle list.  

Is there room in our consciousness for both Arthur son of Illtud and a Northern Arthur(s)?
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THE FATHERLESS WELSH ARTHUR AND THE CASE FOR AEDAN OF DALRIADA'S SON AS 'THE' ARTHUR

Dunaverty Castle, Kintyre

The other day I was having an engaging conversation with Prof. Ken Dark regarding his new book TRADERS AND TYRANTS: TINTAGEL, ARTHUR AND THE LOST KINGS 
(https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/tyrants-and-traders-9781350519411/). In this title, the professor reiterated his opinion that Arthur son of Pedr is one of several possible candidates for a historical Arthur who can withstand conventional historical source-criticism. He had first presented his thinking on Pedr's son in "A Famous Arthur in the Sixth Century? Reconsidering the Origins of the Arthurian Legend", Reading Medieval Studies (Volume 26, 2000, pp. 77–95).  

What I came back with in our discussion was this:

If Arthur is son of Pedr, why the subterfuge when it comes to our HB/AC man? Why does Arthur in ALL THE WELSH MATERIALS always lack a patronymic? We don't find Uther attached to him until Geoffrey of Monmouth.  I've shown Uther Pendragon to be a Welsh rendering of the Latin military terms used to describe St. Illtud, and that Uther himself was then identified with the terrible warror of the COMPART MONGAN, allowing for the incorporation of the Arthur birth story.  

So if Arthur doesn't have a father, who is he?  Must we settle on the early 3rd century L. Artorius Castus?

We would think that someone, somewhere, certainly would have corrected the Uther fiction - would have, in fact, screamed to the heavens - that Arthur was Pedr's son.

Instead, Arthur consistently has no patronymic. Not in the poetry, not in the saints' lives, not in stories - nowhere. In constrast, characters in his orbit all have patronymics.

How do we find our way out of this predicament? I mean, it goes without saying that if we're given Arthur's historically attested father, then we'd know who was the real Arthur.

Well, there is an oddity in the Dalriadan royal genealogies which John Bannerman discussed, but never really resolved satisfactorily, in my opinion: Artur of Kintyre is given two fathers.

Artur son of Conaing son of Aedan son of Gabran son of Domangart son of Fergus

Artur son of Aedan son of Gabran son of Domangart son of Fergus

Conaing is an early Irish rendering of the Old English word for "king", cyning.  According to P. C. Bartrum, we find this borrowing in Welsh as well.  From his A WELSH CLASSICAL DICTIONARY:

"CYNIN. See also Conigc, Cunin, Cynan, Cynon. Anglo-Saxon cyning, ‘king’, yielded Welsh Conigc Cynin, and Irish Conaing. See OP II.421, LBS II.262, F.J.Byrne, Irish Kings and High Kings, 1973, pp.111-2."

So, what if we do something like this:

Conaing, wrongly thought to be a personal name, was originally merely a title used by the English for Aedan, inserted into an alternate Dalriadan genealogy.

Could Conaing then have been taken by the Welsh as the noun "king" and so Arthur "son of the king" lost his proper patronymic? And that a different patronymic was only to be supplied by Geoffrey of Monmouth much later in his fictional history?

If we might allow this, THE Arthur, who lacks a patronymic everywhere prior to Geoffrey, may actually have been Arthur son of Aedan "the king".

Okay, that's well and fine as a loose idea, but can we tighten it up any?

Perhaps so.

I've done extensive work recently on Arthur's Camlan battle, and have been able to make a couple of potentially valuable new observations.  First, I've been able to show that the AC 537 year entry for Camlan accords with year entries in the Irish Annals that contain the death of Comgall son of Domangart of Dalriada.  I was, to say the least, surprised that no one seems to have considered this fact unusual, given that we have a historical Dalriadan Arthur.  The Irish entries were even stranger, though, when one remembers that a later Domangart, brother of the Dalriadan Arthur, is said to fall together with that Arthur in battle.

As if that were not enough to cast doubt on the 537 entry, there was another very off-putting element present in the AC account: the death of Medraut.  I was able to demonstrate that the death of Comgall son of Domangart in 537 was re-entered in an Irish annal for 545, where it was paired with the same plague mentioned in the AC Camlan entry.  This pointed to the Gallic St. Medard, who died in this year at Noyens, the ancient Noviomagus.  Medard is easily metathesized to Medrad, which becomes Medrawd quite naturally in the Welsh. 

There were two Noviomagus places in Britain, one at Crayford and one at Chichester - both scenes of battles in the ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE.  The eponymous Cissa, founder of Chichester, is said to have fought at a Cymenesora on Selsey Bill near Chichester, and I've shown how Cymenesora can easily have been brought into accord with the Welsh Camlan.

At the time, that's really all I could do with the mess that was the AC 537 Camlan entry.

But then I remembered that I had done another piece on the Welsh Camlan at its localization in NW Wales:


The idea was pretty simple: that the Afon Gamlan was chosen as the battle-site because it was on the Afon Mawddach.  The Mawddach, in turn, derived from a root word or name Mawdd.  With the help of noted Brythonic place-name expert Alan James, it became apparent that the etymology for and meaning of Mawdd could be related to that of the Maeatae/Miathi.  According to Irish sources, Artur son of Aedan was said to have died either in Circenn or while fighting the Miathi.  

It thus appeared to me that the Afon Gamlan on the Mawddach was a relocation of the Northern Miathi battle.

The Irish sources also have varying accounts of when Artur's brother Domangart died.  I would refer my readers to John Bannerman's STUDIES IN THE HISTORY OF DALRIADA for details, but essentially Domangart is said to have died with Artur, but also with Bran, who is thought to have perished in a separate battle with the English.  

Now, Artur son of Aedan's death is said to have happened sometime between 590-596, but probably in 590, according to Bannerman.  The same scholar thinks Bran died fighting the English in 598.  

A backdating of the Miathi battle in 590 to the AC's 537 or 545 means we are looking at a gap of 53 or 45 years, respectively.  If we use the actual annal date of 596, we have a gap of 59 or 51 years.

Just for fun, I decided to use 598 as a starting point.  That yields a 61 year gap.  If we take that 61 one years and add it to the AC Badon entry of 516, we arrive at 577.  That is the year, according to the ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE, that the Gewissei defeated the Britons at Dyrham and took the city of Baðanceaster or Bath.

I'm found of citing Graham Isaac's extensive treatment of the name Badon, which strictly from the linguistic point of view must represent a purely British reflection of Old English Bathum, i.e. Bath.  

Before anyone makes a big deal about that last revelation, let me be quick to say that while it's an interesting numbers game, it's not a necessary piece of my argument regarding Artur son of Aedan as THE Arthur.  It is enough for us to demonstrate that it looks as if the Welsh may have backdated Arthur's death to fit Gildas' Badon battle fought c. 500 and that they relocated the fatal Miathi battle to NW Wales.

If this is what happened, where does that leave the Arthurian battles of the HB (minus Badon) and my belief that these belong properly to L. Artorius Castus?

Well, the Arthur name, which is a British version of Roman Artorius, entered the Dalriadan house when Aedan married the niece of a British king. A daughter of Aedan was named Maithgemma, the Irish name for bear, so it is possible Arthur was chosen for a son because the Britons believed it contained their word for bear, 'arth' (Irish 'art').  Or the opposite may have been the case. 

Best guess makes this British king out to be Rhydderch of Strathclyde.  The Artorius name had to come from somewhere, and my guess is that the Britons at Alclud had a folk memory of a great Roman hero who had been a part of the Emperor Septimius Severus' devastating war against a couple of tribal confederations in Northern Britain.  Castus, if I'm right about the reading of ARM.GENTES on his memorial stone, went against the Maeatae and the Caledonii.  I've always remarked on the similarity of this possibility with the Irish claim that Artur son of Aedan died fighting the Miathi.  In my treatment of the HB battles, I opt for Dunipace as the Bassas, a site directly between two hillforts of the Miathi. But between the Miathi forts on the Forth are pronounced river-bends and Gaelic Cambus place-names.

It is entirely possible, of course, that Artur son of Aedan was a mercenary captain, maybe even a sort of federate in the old Roman sense.  He might well have fought all the HB battles in the North.  Or he fought some of them (we know Aedan and has sons fought against the English more than once) and the others were drawn from the legendary engagements featuring Castus.  But at least this scenario allows us to narrow down the Arthurian battles to just two historical candidates.

Arthur son of Pedr of Dyfed would then not be hard to explain.  As with Dalriada, the Dyfed dynasty originated with an Irish tribal group, in the latter case the Deissi.  Any famous half-British half-Irish Dalriadan Arthur may well have had his name become popular enough to be picked up by the Dyfed royal family.  It is true that both dynasties had strong equine affinities
(see https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2026/01/stones-and-horses-on-reaching-final.html), and these may have contributed to the use of the name.  So might the presence in the Deissi pedigree of an Artchoirp.

The hypothesis floated above has the advantage of helping us understand how the famous Arthur could have lost his patronymic, and it allows us to have a valid historical candidate (or two) for that Arthur.  

A NOTE ON POLITICS

It is generally agreed that the HISTORIA BRITTONUM and ANNALES CAMBRIAE were written in Gwynedd. An argument could be advanced that given Gwynedd's long-standing antipathy towards Dyfed, a famous Arthur Dyfed may have been deprived of his patronymic and kingly status for that reason.

Howver, it is my contention that a Gwynedd writer would have deleted a Dyfed Arthur entirely and substituted one of their own heroes - or at least a hero not in any way affiliated with SW Wales.

I do not think merely deleting his patronymic would have been deemed sufficient.

And Artur son of Dyfed is recorded as a king of Dyfed. Artur son of Aedan never achieved that rank. He was merely one of several princes who were out fighting battles. 


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Monday, July 20, 2026

A POSSIBLE ASTRONOMICAL CORRESPONDENCE FOR ARTHUR'S SWORD IN THE ANVIL

Orion's Sword


Dr. Linda A. Malcor and John Matthews have recently published a new book on the Arthurian motif of the sword in the anvil (not sword in the stone!).  This book was just discussed on Richard Johnson's wonderful O'R GOLWG YouTube channel:


Unfortunately, in the co-authors' attempt to trace the mythological nature of the sword in the anvil, they neglected to closely examine the context in which that motif is found in the Arthurian tradition.

Elsewhere, I have shown some of the sources that may have contributed to the sword in the anvil story (see https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2026/04/the-non-mystery-of-arthurs-sword-in.html).  But I had not delved into any possible astronomical significance of the story for many years, having been dissatisfied with earlier efforts to do so.  

I now feel, though, that is often the case, any underlying astronomical symbolism, while in a sense profound, may not be that complicated. 

Robert de Boron first recounts the story in his MERLIN romance.  There we learn the following:

Kay is knighted on All Hallows or 1 November (the old pagan Samhain).  

The sword first appears at Christmas, 25 December (close to the winter solstice).

The next drawing and replacing of the sword happens at Candlemas on 2 February (1 February having been the pagan Imbolc).

The next drawing and replacing happens at Easter, which can fall on various dates between 22 March and 25 April.

The final drawing of the sword - with it not being placed back in the anvil - happens at Pentecost, which depending on the date of Easter can fall between 10 May and 13 June.

Now, various writers on the subject have chosen to emphasize the medieval significance of the Christian liturgical year with its round of festivals.  And it is true that holy days were often selected for medieval knighting and coronation ceremonies.  

However, what about the possibility that Arthur's sword was related to Orion's weapon?  This may seem on the surface a silly idea, but note below what Orion does during the year when viewed from the latitude of London:

Beginning in October at 51.5°N latitude (the latitude of London, Calgary, and Voronezh), the Orion constellation shifts into its late-night and early-morning viewing window, transitioning from a pre-dawn feature into a classic evening winter fixture. 

At 51.5°N latitude (the latitude of cities like London, Calgary, or Berlin), Orion the Hunter returns to the evening sky in early November, rising in the east-southeast at approximately 9:00 PM local time. By mid-to-late November, it emerges even earlier, becoming clearly visible by 8:00 PM.

At 51.5°N latitude (such as London, UK), Orion is highest in the southern sky around midnight in mid-December. Because the Earth's orbit shifts the constellation earlier by two hours each month, you can see it highest around 10 p.m. in mid-January, 8 p.m. in mid-February, and 6 p.m. in mid-March.

At 51.5° N latitude (the latitude of London, Calgary, and Voronezh), the constellation Orion dominates the southern sky during prime evening hours at the beginning of February. 

At 51.5° N latitude (the latitude of London, UK, and southern Canada), Orion is visible low in the southwestern sky at sunset during Easter, quickly sinking and setting due west by mid-evening. Because Easter occurs in early spring (late March to mid-April), Orion is ending its winter-long dominance of the northern night sky.

At 51.5° N latitude, Orion completely disappears from the evening sky in late April to early May. As spring progresses, the constellation sinks lower into the western horizon and becomes entirely lost in the sun's evening glare.Throughout May and June, Orion is positioned directly behind the Sun from Earth's perspective, making it completely invisible. It remains hidden from the night sky until late July or early August, when it finally reappears just before dawn in the eastern sky.

If we overlap the sword in the anvil's dated events with the movement of Orion's sword, we have this:

1) Kay is knighted when Orion first becomes prominent in the evening sky.

2) The sword first appears in the churchyard at midwinter, when Orion is at its highest in the southern sky around midnight.

3) The sword is drawn and replaced at the beginning of February when Oriion dominates the sky.

4) The sword is drawn and replaced as Orion is beginning to lose dominance in the sky.  

5) At Pentecost (if falling in early May), Arthur draws the sword for the last time, as it disappears in the sky and cannot be returned to the anvil (i.e. it does not set back into the earth).

This arrangement of the sword in the anvil story in accordance with an easily observable celestial phenomenon seems preferable to the tenuous connections Malcor and Mathews have sought to attach to the Arthurian motif.  




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Thursday, July 9, 2026

SULIS OF BATH AND SULIS OF CASTENNEC: A STRANGE CORRESPONDENCE INVOLVING ST. GILDAS

Castennec Hill (ancient Sulis/Sulim), Oppidum of the Osismii


Hermitage of St. Gildas at Castennec

Whenever we treat of Brittany it is important we bear in mind that it was subject to heavy migration from Britain in the 5th-6th centuries.  And this means that traditions and place-names could be brought from the latter island to the Gallic pennisula.

Still, I appear to have discovered (?) something odd about a well-known Gildas/Gueltas site in Morbihan.

According to legend, in 538 Gildas and a companion monk found an oratory or hermitage in a cave next to Castennec.  Why is this interesting?  Well, Castennec Hill is accepted as the location of a Sulis or Sulim hilltop fortification, thought to be an oppidum of the Osismii tribe.  The name is this hillfort preserves the goddess name Sulis, who was the tutelary deity of Aquae Sulis in Britain.

There are a great many Websites that discuss this location and St. Gildas' connection with it.  What follows is just a quick sampling:











Now, the British Aquae Sulis became known as Bath to the English, and our best linguists are sure that Gildas's Badonicus = Bathum. [1] The same is true of the later Welsh form of the name, Caer Faddon.  This is so despite an apparent traditional identification of Badon in the Welsh Annals and The Dream of Rhonabwy with the Liddington Badbury, something I've written about elsewhere in considerable detail.  The has always existed the possibility that a Badon/Bathum could have been confused at some point with the Baddan- of Baddanbyrig.  Or vice-versa.

What I'm a bit surprised about is that no one seems to have suggested (?) that given a Gildas at a Sulis site - a site on a fortified hill - that it is quite possible the Bath name from the British Aquae Sulis had at some point in the transmission through the centuries of Gildas's RUIN OF BRITAIN been transferred to the Breton Sulis location.  This would have been a fairly natural legendary development, I would think.  And if this is the way Badonicus came to be, then the original site of the Badon battle was neither Bath nor Badbury in Britain, but Castennec Hill in Brittany.  

I've before suggested that the English name Bathum may have been used in preference to the pagan-charged Sulis.

We may recall that Brittany, like Britain, had been subjected to heavy Saxon raids.  And, indeed, during the later Roman period Armorica comprised the Tractus Armoricanus et Nervicanus under the command of a dux responsible for defending the peninsula against seaborne Germanic invaders. Saxons were the chief foe.

On the map at the top of the page we can see another interesting name next to Gueltas and Castennec - Gamblen.  While the etymology of this place-name is not the same as that of the Camlan of Welsh sources (my research, not yet confirmed, shows it to be from the same initial element, meaning 'crooked', but a second derived from the Celtic word *lindo- for 'pool'), it is interesting to find such a river-bend name so close to what may have been the original Badon hillfort.

Some time ago I had written about an unusual Breton "Badon" place-name in the same region:


When I wrote that piece I had no idea about the presence of the nearby Sulis oppidum.

There is really no "safe" conclusion to draw from all this.  To begin with, the identification of the Breton St. Gueltas and St. Gildas has always been somewhat suspect.  And, again, we have the problem of British immigrants bringing their own place-names and traditional histories or folktales into Brittany.  But it is hard to ignore the obvious correspondence that exists between two confirmed ancient sites dedicated to the worship of Sulis and their connection with St. Gildas.  

[1]

Dr. Graham Isaac with an authoritative discussion of the Badon place-name (via personal correspondence):

"Remember in all that follows that both the -d - in Badon and the -th- in OE Bathum are pronounced like th in 'bathe' and Modern Welsh - dd-. Remember also that in Old English spelling, the letters thorn and the crossed d are interchangeable in many positions: that is variation in spelling, not in sound, and has no significance for linguistic arguments.

It is curious that a number of commentators have been happy to posit a 'British' or 'Celtic' form Badon. The reason seems to be summed up succinctly by Tolstoy in the 1961 article (p. 145):

'It is obviously impossible that Gildas should have given a Saxon name for a British locality'.

Why? I see no reason at all in the world why he should not do so (begging the question as to what, exactly, is the meaning of 'British locality' here; Gildas is just talking about a hill). This then becomes the chief crutch of the argument, as shown on p. 147 of Tolstoy's article: 'But that there was a Celtic name ‘Badon’ we know from the very passage in Gildas under discussion'.

But that is just circular: ' "Badon" must be "Celtic" because Gildas only uses "Celtic" names'. This is no argument. What would have to be shown is that 'Badon' is a regular reflex of a securely attested 'Celtic' word. This is a matter of empirical detail and is easily tested; we have vast resources to tell us what was and was not a 'Celtic' word. And there is nothing like 'Badon'.

So what do we do? Do we just say that 'Badon' must be Celtic because Gildas uses it? That gets us nowhere.

So what of the relationships between aet Bathum - Badon - Baddanbyrig? The crucial point is just that OE Bathum and the Late British / very early Welsh Badon we are talking about both have the soft -th- sound of 'bathe' and Mod.Welsh 'Baddon'. Baddanbyrig, however, has a long d-sound like -d d- in 'bad day'. Both languages, early OE and Late British, had both the d-sound and the soft th-sound. So:

1) If the English had taken over British (hy-pothetical and actually non-existent) *Badon (*Din Badon or something), they would have made it *Bathanbyrig or the like, and the modern names of these places would be something like *Bathbury.

2) If the British had taken over OE Baddanbyrig, they would have kept the d-sound, and Gildas would have written 'Batonicus mons', and Annales Cambriae would have 'bellum Batonis', etc. (where the -t- is the regular early SPELLING of the sound -d-; always keep your conceptions of spellings and your conceptions of sounds separate; one of the classic errors of the untrained is to fail to distinguish these). 

I imagine if that were the case we would have no hesitation is identifying 'Baton' with a Badbury place. But the d-sound and the soft th -sound are not interchangeable. It is either the one or the other, and in fact it is the soft th -sound that is in 'Badon', and that makes it equivalent to Bathum, not Baddanbyrig. 

(That applies to the sounds. On the other hand there is nothing strange about the British making Bad-ON out of OE Bath -UM. There was nothing in the Late British/early Welsh language which corresponded to the dative plural ending - UM of OE, so it was natural for the Britons to substitute the common British suffix - ON for the very un-British OE suffix -UM: this is not a substitution of SOUNDS, but of ENDINGS, which is quite a different matter. That Gildas then makes an unproblematic Latin adjective with -icus out of this does not require comment.)

To conclude:

1) There is no reason in the world why a 6thcentury British author should not refer to a place in Britain by its OE name.
2) There was no 'British' or 'Celtic' *Badon.
3) 'Badon' does not correspond linguistically with OE Baddanbyrig.
4) 'Badon' is the predictably regular Late British / early Welsh borrowing of OE Bathum.

Final note: the fact that later OE sources occasionally call Bath 'Badon' is just a symptom of the book-learning of the authors using the form. Gildas was a widely read and highly respected author, and Badon(-is) (from Gildas's adjective Badon -icus) will quickly and unproblematically have become the standard book-form (i.e. pri-marily Latin form) for the name of Bath. Again, all attempts to gain some sort of linguistic mileage from the apparent, but illusory, OE variation between Bathum and Badon are vacuous."





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Tuesday, July 7, 2026

BADON WAS FOUGHT IN BRITTANY, NOT IN BRITAIN?

NOTE: Since working on this piece, I've proposed a new etymology for Baden, Morbihan, Brittany: Breton bodenn, 'harbor'. This may be for Port Blanc or the Port de Larmor-Baden.  I do not think there is a problem with a form Baden, found relatively late (13th century).  The real question is whether Gildas' Badon - supposedly in England - could have influenced the spelling of an earlier Bodenn.  Or, as is equally possible, Badon is a misrendering of Bodenn and the battle in question was fought not in Britain, but in Brittany or Little Britain.  




Baden Commune, Morbihan

For a very long time now, historians have been stymied or nonplussed by the short passages in Gildas on Ambrosius Aurelianus and Badon:

After a certain length of time the cruel robbers returned to their home. A remnant, to whom wretched citizens flock from different places on every side, as eagerly as a hive of bees when a storm is threatening, praying at the same time unto Him with their whole heart, and, as is said, burdening the air with unnumbered prayers, that they should not be utterly destroyed, take up arms and challenge their victors to battle under Ambrosius Aurelianus. He was a man of unassuming character, who, alone of the Roman race chanced to survive in the shock of such a storm (as his parents, people undoubtedly clad in the purple, had been killed in it), whose offspring in our days have greatly degenerated from their ancestral nobleness. To these men, by the Lord's favour, there came victory.

tempore igitur interueniente aliquanto, cum recessissent domum[38] crudelissimi praedones, roborante deo reliquiae, quibus confugiunt undique de diuersis locis miserrimi ciues, tam audie quam apes alueari procella imminente, simul deprecantes eum tot corde et, ut dicitur, innumeris ‘onerantes aethera uotis’, ne ad internicionem usque delerentur, duce ambrosio aureliano[40] uiro modesto, qui solus forte romanae gentis tantae tempestatis collisione occisis in eadem parentibus purpura nimirum indutis superfuerat, cuius nunc temporibus nostris suboles magnopere auita bonitate degenerauit, uires capessunt, uictores prouocantes ad proelium: quis uictoria domino annuente cessit.

26. From that time, the citizens were sometimes victorious, sometimes the enemy, in order that the Lord, according to His wont, might try in this nation the Israel of to-day, whether it loves Him or not. This continued up to the year of the siege of Badon Hill, and of almost the last great slaughter inflicted upon the rascally crew. And this commences, a fact I know, as the forty-fourth year, with one month now elapsed; it is also the year of my birth.

26. ex eo tempore nunc ciues, nunc hostes, uincebant, ut in ista gente experietur dominus solito more praesentem israelem, utrum diligat eum an non: usque ad annum obsessionis badonici montis[41], nouissimaeque ferme de furciferis non minimae stragis, quique quadragesimus quartus[42] (ut noui) orditur annus mense iam uno emenso, qui et meae natiuitatis est.

I came to realize after considerable research that Ambrosius Aurelianus was a strange, conflated version of the prefect of Gaul of that name and his son and namesake, St. Ambrose.  I've written a considerable amount on this subject, and have confirmed (at least to my satisfaction) that the A.A. who appears in Britain, later under the Welsh guise of Emrys, is a complex folklore figure.  One of my better pieces on this can be found here:


I was thinking along these lines the other day when it occurred to me that as the prefect of Gaul might well have been involved in Brittany or Little Britain, and Gildas himself was present on that peninsula.  The Rhuys Peninsula of the Breton Gildas, as it happened, is very close to a Baden* place-name.  In the Baden commune is actually found an ancient church dedicated to St. Gildas.  The Baden place-name itself traces back to the 13th century and is of unknown etymology.

For some good links on Baden, see the following:



Baden - Baden

Baden , in Breton Baden , remains unexplained.

The oldest known spelling - in 1430 - is Badan , which we find in the year 1430 in the archives of the chapter of Vannes.

Hervé Abalain, professor at the UBO, would lean towards an anthroponym. No relation with the Baden of our Germanic neighbors has been demonstrated.



Shows  back to the 13th century.





Etymology :

* Dauzat and Rostaing (1978): " Badan , 1430; obscure ".

* Erwan Vallerie (1995): " Baden , 1267; Baden , 1304; Baden , 1387; Badan , 1430; Baden , 1453; Baden , 1516; Badain , 1731"

* Éditions Flohic (1996): " It remains obscure and debated because the connection with the Anglo-Saxon name has not been demonstrated ."

* Hervé Abalain (2000): " Baden , anthroponym only "


St. Gildas in Baden.


Note 1 : au village de Moustérian ou Moustéran, on remarque quelques vestiges qui passe pour être ceux d'une chapelle de saint Gildas. C'est là, dit-on, que se serait embarqué saint Bieuzy (blessé à mort et se rendant chez l'abbé de Rhuys) dont la "vie" a été écrite qu'en 1659. Il est fort possible qu'il y ait eu à cet endroit un établissement monastique détruit par les Normands au Xème siècle.

In the village of Moustérian or Moustéran, we notice some remains that are believed to be those of a chapel of Saint Gildas. It is said that it was there that Saint Bieuzy embarked (mortally wounded and on his way to the abbot of Rhuys), whose "life" was only written in 1659. It is quite possible that there was a monastic establishment here, destroyed by the Normans in the 10th century.

From Professor Matthieu Boyd I have this (personal correspondence):

Short answer to an etymology: no.

The answer from 1803 is that it means "baths" like the German towns in -bad: "Pour les villes de Baden en Suabe, en Suisse, en Bretagne, personne n'ignore que c'est de bad bain, qu'elles ont pris leur nom" (p. 49 in the "Belles-Lettres" section at https://www.google.com/books/edition/M%C3%A9moires_de_l_Acad%C3%A9mie_royale_des_scie/zH_NAAAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq).

But that seems like that's probably overreach. There are places in Brittany with "bath" names, from Latin balneus, but those are all Bain in French, Baen in Breton, e.g. Bain-de-Bretagne.

Hervé Abalain, Noms de lieux bretons (Jean-Paul Gisserot, 2000), in contrast to the "Bain" names gives "Baden" as:

- Baden (56 [=Morbihan]), Baden (anthroponyme seul)

I don't have Albert Deshayes' placename dictionary here to check what he says.

Rosenzweig's topographical dictionary of the Morbihan (https://www.google.com/books/edition/Dictionnaire_topographique_du_d%C3%A9parteme/jcsFAAAAQAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1, p. 4) says the name goes with a creek of the same name and was attested as Badan in 1430.

Now, something that we have overlooked when it comes to Gildas in Britain and in Brittany is the very real possibility that the movement of tradition from one place to the other may have been transmitted in either direction. What I mean by that is that a tradition of a battle near where a St. Gildas was in Brittany could have at any time been transferred in story to Britain.  I'm talking about a sort of migrating legend here.  The difference between a spelling like Badan and Badon may be important for modern linguists, but it was of negligible significance for ancient hagiographers and chroniclers.  Non-standardized spelling was pretty much the rule of the day, in fact, in many instances.  Of course, it is possible Baden in Morbihan was identified with a similarly spelled place in Britain, i.e. one of the Bath or Badbury place-names. 

Sure, it is possible that this Baden name has been transported from Britain to Brittany, and plunked down amidst Gildas sites because, well, it was Gildas' Badon.  But that seems rather unlikely to me.  Especially given that his A.A. was in Gaul, of which Brittany was a part.  Not in Britain.

However, the Breton specialists cannot make anything out of this Baden. In short, it does not look like a Breton place-name at all.  That fact lends support to the idea that an immigrant from Britain brought it to Brittany and intentionally applied to to a region ripe with Gildas sites. 

But, if we do have both an Ambrosius Aurelianus and a Badon in Brittany, not Britain, then I have no hestitation in saying that Arthur's name has merely been attached to the battle site because he was a famous legendary British hero.

AND WHAT MIGHT THIS HAVE TO DO WITH ARTHUR'S CAMLAN?

I feel the same lack of confidence regarding Arthur's Camlan.  For one, if he were attached to a Badon battle dated traditionally c. 500-520, then his death-date at Camlan may well have been fudged to accord with Badon.  We know Dyfed was at war with its Gwynedd neighbors to the North from early on (and, in fact, later struggles between the two regions is enshrined in the tale MATH SON OF MATHONWY).  It is quite credible that an Arthur who dies at the Afon Gamlan/Camlan might actually be Arthur son of Pedr of Dyfed.  The chronological adjustment would not have been difficult to make, especially given that the war-leader of the Camlan entry is not provided with a patronymic. 

In fact, I will go further with this: Medraut/Modred is from L. moderatus.  There is a very interesting Welsh word that conveys the same meaning:

GPC

pwyllus 

[pwyll1+-us] 

a.

Pwyllog, a chanddo’r gallu i wneud penderfyniadau cyfrifol, doeth, cymedrol, rhesymol, synhwyrol, dwys, call, meddylgar, ystyriol; gochelgar, gofalus, hamddenol, araf:

•  characterized by deliberation, discreet, wise, moderate, rational, sensible, grave, prudent, thoughtful, considerate; cautious, careful, leisurely, slow. 

This brings to mind the famous Pwyll Lord of Dyfed, hero of the Mabinogion story.  Pwyll's son, Pryderi, is said to have conquered Ystrad Tywi and Ceredigion.  

It would be fitting if Arthur son of Pedr of Dyfed died fighting with a warrior/chieftain whose Latin name had been chosen as a deckname for the mythical Pwyll. 

I had earlier come up with an idea for Camlan as a reflection of the death of Arthur of Dalriada in battle against the Miathi:


While that is a possibility, it still leaves us with the problem of the Dalriadan Arthur fighting the Miathi, which itself looks to be a folk memory of L. Artorius Castus fighting the Maeatae.

And, indeed, the profound skepticism with which I now view both Badon and Camlan in an Arthurian context has me perilously close to seeing the HB Arthurian battles - excepting Badon, of course - as a perfect campaign list for L. Artorius Castus under Severus and Caracalla.  More and more, I'm seeing the great Arthur of the HB as a ghost of an early 3rd century dux of British legions sent against the Maeatae and the Caledonii.  A ghost whose name was taken by Irish coming into Britain centuries later, Irish who were intent on making themselves as British - and as Romano-British - as possible. 

To have that, I must opt for my own proposed reading of ARM(ATAS) GENTES for the lacuna of the Castus memorial inscription. 

*
My friend and fellow Arthurian enthusiast/independent scholar Chris Gidlow has notified me that the Baden site has been discussed before in 'Will the Real King Arthur Please Stand Up' by Ronald Miller.  Thus I did not originate this idea.  
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Monday, July 6, 2026

Ambrosius Vs. Vitalinus, Son of Vitalis and St. Ambrose With the Two Vitalises

The Martyrdom of Saint Vitalis by Federico Barocci

I once tried to make a case for Vitalis, father of the Vitalinus who supposedly fought Ambrosius at Wallop, being either a Latinization of the AS personal name Fitela, found in a place-name close to Amesbury, or that Fitela may have contributed to a Vitalis being located in the region:


At the time, I did not have the benefit of being able to access some wonderful source materials which appear to show that Fitela was, indeed, Latinized.  These sources (the URLs of which are supplied below) record instances of Vitalis being used for Fittleton and similar place-names elsewhere in England.

I asked Dr. Richard Coates about the matter.  What follows is our discussion on the subject:

Richard,

The older place-name books all give an OE Fitela for Fittleton in Yorkshire. But I find some excellent recent sources giving L. Vitalis...

Any idea which is right?



Fitela could be a (weak masculine) adaptation of Vitalis, but only after Latin [w] had become [v] in a Western Romance language. [v] >> [f] presents no problem in OE, because early <f> may well often represent  [v]. But the date of first usage is critical.

So Fitela is more likely, later being Latinized as Vitalis. Correct?

Possibly.

When I was exploring the Fitela-Vitalis connection, I had missed something, however.  For it turns out that St. Ambrose (who, apparently, was conflated with his Gallic prefect father of the same name) had to do with not just one, but two saints named Vitalis.

In the first instance, Ambrose was involved in the translation of relics of a St. Vitalis of Bologna.  But it is the second Vitalis who is more interesting.  He was a saint of Ambrose' own Milan who was martyred in Ravenna by being tossed into a well (L. puteus).  See



pŭtĕus, i, m. (neutr. collat. form of the plur. pŭtĕa, ōrum, Varr. ap. Non. 217, 4) [root pu-, to cleanse; whence also purus, putus, purgo],
a well: puteum fodere, Plaut. Most. 2, 1, 32 (379): ex puteis jugibus aquam calidam trahi, Cic. N. D. 2, 9, 25; id. Div. 1, 50, 112: virgines se in puteos abjecisse, id. Prov. Cons. 3, 6; Plin. 9, 25, 41, § 80; 37, 9, 43, § 127; Plin. Ep. 2, 17, 25; 5, 6, 25: putei perennes, Hor. Ep. 1, 15, 15: puteum vitare patentem, id. ib. 2, 2, 135 et saep. —Of a cistern, Auct. B. Alex. 5 fin.—Prov.: in puteum conicere, to throw away, Petr. 42, 7.—
Transf., a pit, Verg. G. 2, 231; for storing grain in, Varr. R. R. 1, 57, 2; in mines, a pit, shaft, Plin. 33, 4, 21, § 68; 33, 6, 31, § 95; an air-shaft, air-hole, Vitr. 8, 6; a dungeon for slaves, Plaut. Aul. 2, 5, 21 (347); 2, 7, 3 (365); Col. 1, 6.

His sons, Gervasius and Protasius, were later exhumed by St. Ambrose.  Another set of saints - Celsus and Nazarius - are also dug up by Ambrose.  I have elsewhere associated this with the motif of Emrys digging up the two cinerary urns at Dinas Emrys. 

It is the martyrdom by being deposited in a well that here should concern us.  Why?  Because of the accepted etymology of Ambrosius's Wallop battle site.

Wallop is from the AS and means "valley of the well/spring". Hence Geoffrey of Monmouth's 'springs of Galabes' of his Merlin-Ambrosius story.

From Bosworth and Toller on the place-names first element:

willa
noun [ masculine ]

willa, wella, wylla, an. ; m.
A well, spring, fountain (lit. and fig.)

So, the placement of Vitalinus, son of Vitalis at Wallop looks to be yet more fraudulent history in the HB, as well as being more evidence for Ambrosius being Continental and of the 4th century, not of the 5th century.




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Friday, June 26, 2026

EMBREIS GULETIC, MABON AND THE RED DRAGON OF WALES

A Double Urn Cinerary Burial

Having just written this piece on Emrys and Mabon -


- I felt I should tie up the loose ends with a closer look at the origin of the Red Dragon of Dinas Emrys.  While I'll felt fairly confident about my findings on this subject for many years now, a sort of summary was long overdue.

The story of the Red Dragon as found in the HISTORIA BRITTONUM is as follows:


iterum puer ad magos dixit “proferte
mihi quid est in stagno.” et siluerunt et non potuerunt reuelare illi. et ille
dixit illis “ego uobis reuelabo. duo uasa conclusa sunt in eo. et sic
inuenietis.” uenerunt et uiderunt sic. et puer ad magos dixit “quid in uasis
conclusis habetur?” at ipsi siluerunt et non potuerunt reuelare illi. at ille
asseruit “in medio eorum tentorium est. separate ea et sic inuenietis.” et
rex separari iussit et sic inuentum est tentorium complicatum sicut dixerat.
iterum puer interrogauit magos eius “quid in medio tentorii est? etiam
nunc narrate.” et non potuerunt. et dixit puer “duo uermes sunt in eo,
unus albus et alter rufus. tentorium expandite.” et extenderunt et duo
uermes dormientes inuenti sunt. et dixit puer “expectate et considerate
quid faciant uermes.” et coeperunt uermes ut alter alterum expelleret;
alius autem scapulas suas ponebat ut eum usque ad dimidium tentorii
expelleret, aliquando usque ad oram tentorii pellebat. et sic faciebant
tribus uicibus. tamen tandem infirmior uidebatur uermis rufus, et postea
fortior albo fuit et extra finem tentorii expulit. tunc alter alterum secutus
trans stagnum est et tentorium euanuit.

Again, the boy said to the wizards “Tell me what is in
the pond.” And they were silent and could not tell him. And he said to
them “I shall tell you. Two vessels are contained in it. And you will find it
so.” They came and saw it was so. And the boy said to the wizards “What
is held in the sealed vessels?” And they were silent and could not tell him.
But he declared “There is a tent in the middle of them. Break them and
you will find it so.” And the king ordered them to be broken, and so a
folded tent was found, just as he had said. Again, the boy asked his
wizards “What is in the middle of the tent? So tell me now.” And they
could not. And the boy said “There are two worms in it, one white and the
other red. Unfold the tent.” And they unfolded and two sleeping worms
were found. And the boy said “Watch and think about what the worms will
do.” And the worms began, one to push out the other; the other, though,
placed its shoulders so that it could push it to the half of the tent,
sometimes it drove it right to the door of the tent. And they did this on
three occasions. However, eventually the red worm appeared the weaker
but afterwards was stronger than the white and pushed it from the
bounds of the tent. Then one chased the other across the pond and the
tent vanished.

Emrys interprets this marvel as follows:

regni tui est figura tentorium. duo uermes duo dracones sunt. uermis rufus draco
tuus est et stagnum figura huius mundi est. at ille albus draco illius gentis
quę occupauit gentes et regiones plurimas in brittannia et pęne a mari
usque ad mare tenebunt. et postea gens nostra surget et gentem
anglorum trans mare uiriliter deiciet. 

The tent is a symbol of your kingdom. The two worms are two dragons.
The red worm is your dragon and the pond is a representation of this
world. But that white dragon is of that people that has occupied peoples
and many regions in Britain and will control it almost from coast to coast.
And afterwards, our people will rise up and manfully throw the people of
the English across the sea.

Now, I have a great many articles treating of this folktale. A couple important ones are provided here:



Along with a good recent article on serpents in the Roman lararium:


In brief, what we have in the Dinas Emrys story is Emrys causing to be excavated two cinerary urns.  Inside the urns are the cloth-wrapped bone remains of cremated warriors or chieftains (i.e. "dragons"). The use of the word tent (tentorium) may be a confusion for the pall (L. pallium) that could be draped over the urns. Red and white were traditional colors for Otherworld animals in Welsh tradition and I've discussed before the red and white sexual dimorphism of the Common European Viper in Britain.  After the discovery of the urns the story veers in another direction. The two dead dragons ("sleeping" is a metaphor for death in this context) are associated with the frequently paired snakes of the Roman lararium.  These creatures themselves have been linked to the geni loci, protective spirits of places.  And from there it was an easy step to make one into the genius loci of the British and the other the protective spirit of the Saxons.  

But the real question is why Emrys is the one who reveals the two geni loci at Dinas Emrys?

Well, if I'm right and the historical Ambrosius (himself a conflation of the Gallic prefect and his saintly son) was also combined with Mabon, we need only remember that Mabon was identified in the Roman period with Apollo.  And what was Apollo most famous for?

He slew the Python, a great serpent-dragon who guarded the sacred omphalos at Delphi in Greece.  And what was the omphalos? The symbolic center of the world.   As the guardian of this place, the Python served the function of a genius loci. 

In Britain, the omphalos was Stonehenge at Amesbury, transferred in legend to Dinas Emrys in Gwynedd.

Perhaps the most important conclusion from all of this is that the Red Dragon of Wales does not represent a relic of the Roman draco, a conclusion we might draw from the account of Uther's standard in the pseudo-history of Geoffrey of Monmouth.  Instead, it quite plainly stands for the genius loci of the British people.  Monmouth's fable is due entirely to his misinterpreting the Pendragon epithet.  To him, the term meant 'the Dragon's head.'  In reality Pendragon means either 'Chief-warrior' or 'Chief of warriors' (Bromwich, TRIADS). The attempt to then relate Uther's draco standard to the Sarmatian dragon standard is misplaced.  For not only had the draco in the Late Roman period become a "standard" standard (if my readers will permit the bad pun) for the entire army, but there is, in fact, absolutely no evidence for a draco existing among the Sarmatians (see https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2024/02/there-is-absolutely-no-evidence-for.html).



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