A NEW IDENTIFICATION OF GWENDDYDD, MYRDDIN'S/MERLIN'S SISTER

The Stone of Goronwy (or Gronwy; see https://clasmerdin.blogspot.com/2009_02_01_archive.html)

Late Welsh tradition insists that Gwenddydd, Myrddin's sister, is the Morning Star (Venus).  Here is the entry for Gwenddydd from the GEIRIADUR PRIFYSGOL CYMRU:

gwenddydd 

[gwen+dydd] 

eb. (a hefyd fel e.p. Gwenddydd, chwaer Myrddin).

Y seren ddydd, y seren fore, y blaned Gwener pan welir hi yn y dwyrain cyn toriad dydd:

the morning star, Lucifer, the planet Venus visible in the east before dawn. 

Dchr. 17g. J 10 98, gwenddydd, Lucifer.

1707 AB 217, gwenddydd, the morning-starr. [Henry] S[alsbury].

1722 Llst 189, gwenddydd, f. the morning star.

1753 TR.

1770 W d.g. aurora [the morning star], Lucifer [the morning-star], morning, morning-star [the planet Venus so called when she appears in the morning].

1800 P.

This identification may partly have been based on Geoffrey of Monmouth, who has Ganieda (= Gwenddydd) build a stone circle observatory for Merlin:

"So raise me a house... Before the other buildings build me a remote one to which you will give seventy doors and as many windows, through which I may see fire-breathing Phoebus with Venus, and watch by night the stars wheeling in the firmament..." [LIFE OF MERLIN]

As the reader will note, Venus is given special prominence in the list of celestial bodies that are to be observed.

Her name also doubtless contributed to her being thought of as the Morning Star.  'White Day' or 'White like the Day' does bring to mind a planet that heralds the dawn.  

I've also recently connected her with Degastan/Dawston in Liddesdale, where 'Day's Stone' - an English place-name - may well have replaced an earlier Cumbric name for a standing stone sacred to Gwenddydd.

While contemplating this stone, I came up with an interesting question: suppose the stone did not only refer to a goddess called 'Day' or 'White Day', but to a particular day that was sacred to the goddess?  This was an unusual shift in meaning, but I found some basis for pursuing the notion in the Welsh story MATH SON OF MATHONWY.  In this tale the god Lleu and his wife Blodeuedd are associated with a stone that has marked seasonal properties.  As I've indicated in much of my past research, Myrddin may either be a demoted version of Lleu or a sort of Lleu-avatar.  It is, therefore, always important to thoroughly analyze the mythical motifs associated with the god when we are trying to better understand Gwenddydd's brother.  

Before I clarify this last statement, let us take a look at the entry on Blodeuedd from P.C. Bartram's A CLASSICAL WELSH DICTIONARY:

"BLODEUEDD, BLODEUWEDD. (Legendary). Blodeuwedd is the commoner spelling, which may be translated ‘flower-like’; the earlier form is Blodeuedd, meaning ‘flowers’ in a collective sense. (John Rhys, Hib. Lect., p.239 and note). Compare Ifor Williams, Pedeir Keinc y Mabinogi, p.283. In the Mabinogi branch of ‘Math’ we are told that Arianrhod had put a destiny on Lleu Llaw Gyffes that he should never have a wife ‘of the race that is now upon this earth’. So Math and Gwydion by charms and illusion enchanted a woman for him out of flowers. ‘They took the flowers of the oak, and the broom, and the meadow-sweet, and out of them invoked the fairest maiden that man ever saw ... and gave her the name Blodeuedd.’ (WM 100-1, RM 73). This is referred to in a poem called ‘Cadair Ceridwen’ in the Book of Taliesin (BT 36): Gwydion ap Dôn, of mighty powers, Who made by magic a woman from flowers. (Trans. Gwyn Jones and Thomas Jones, The Mabinogion, Everyman edition, p.xiii). 

  She was wedded to Lleu Llaw Gyffes, but later fell in love with Gronwy Befr of Penllyn, and helped him to slay Lleu, who was transformed into an eagle. Later, however, Gwydion restored Lleu to life again and then invaded the lands of Gronwy. When Blodeuedd heard that they were coming, she took her maidens with her and set out for the mountain. And through the river Cynfael they reached a court that was on the mountain. Fear caused them to proceed with their faces turned backwards, so that they fell into a lake and were all drowned except herself. Gwydion overtook her and said: ‘I will not slay you but will do what is worse for you. I will let you go in the form of a bird, and because of the shame which you have done to Lleu Llaw Gyffes you will not dare to show your face in the light of day, through fear of all birds. It shall be in their nature to mob and molest you wherever they find you. And you will not lose your name but will ever be called Blodeuwedd.’ So the owl (Welsh dylluan) is still called Blodeuwedd. (WM 101-9, RM 73-80). It appears that the owl was called ‘Blodeuwedd’ in medieval times by the Welsh but it does not seem to be in use today. (T.P.Ellis and J.Lloyd, The Mabinogion, I. p.130 note). The lake where the maidens of Blodeuedd perished is supposed to be Llyn y Morynion, ‘Lake of the Maidens’, near Ffestiniog, at the head of the river Cynfael. (Lady Charlotte Guest, The Mabinogion, Everyman edition, p.302). Grid reference SH 7342 (Rhestr). In a poem ascribed, uncertainly, to Dafydd ap Gwilym, Blodeuwedd is said to be the daughter of a lord of Môn, ‘a second Meirchion’. Because of her infidelity with Gronwy Befr, she was punished by Gwydion ap Dôn, who transformed her into an owl at a place on the river Conwy. (W.J.Gruffydd. Math vab Mathonwy, pp.253-5). Another poem, by Anthony Powel, describes her as the daughter of Meirchion lwyd, and implies that she was overwhelmed by a remarkable rock called Craig y Ddinas in the Neath valley. (John Rhys, Celtic Folklore, p.439). It seems possible that this Blodeuwedd may have had a relationship with Eliwlod (q.v.) similar to that of the earlier Blodeuwedd with Lleu Llaw Gyffes. (PCB) For another version of the legend of Blodeuwedd, see Huan ap Gwydion. The ‘Hanesyn Hen’ tract makes Blodeuwedd the daughter of Math and Arianrhod, and sister of Lleu Llaw Gyffes and Dylan ail Ton (ByA §26 in EWGT p.90). W.J.Gruffydd thought that Blodeuedd, the maiden made from flowers, who was unfaithful to her husband and caused his death, was originally distinct from Blodeuwedd, ‘flower-face’, who was turned into an owl. The former may be connected with the Irish Bláthnat, wife of CúRoí, through an intermediate form Blodeunad. The stories were combined because of the similarity of the names. (Math vab Mathonwy, pp.253-295)." 

Now, as part of her plan with her lover Gronwy to kill her husband, Lleu, the goddess has all the goats of the cantref brought together at the Afon (River) Cynfal [1].  The goat and bathtub between which Lleu stands when he is mortally wounded, represent, respectively, the goat of Capricorn and the water-bearer of Aquarius. Lleu’s annual death thus occurred originally at February 1 or Imbolc, if calculated around 1200 A.D., the approximate date for the Mabinogion tale in which he is featured. In 3000 BCE, the sun was between these two signs on the Winter Solstice.

Lleu’s solar twin, Gronwy Pebr, ‘the Radiant’, would himself be killed by his resurrected rival either on Lughnasadh/August 1 (assuming an Imbolc death for Lleu) or on the Summer Solstice (assuming a Winter Solstice death for Lleu). Lleu's spear, a typical divine lightning weapon, passes through a stone that Gronwy is attempting to use as a shield.  The hole in the stone, therefore, would mark an exact day of the sacred year.  

If we wish to "get Freudian", the pierced stone may literally represent the goddess, with the god's lightning-weapon having a decided phallic quality.  Her failure to shield Gronwy would represent a betrayal of her lover that matches her earlier betrayal of her husband.

To add some good, old-fashioned (and some would say defunct or discredited) solar mythology to the tale, we could interpret Gronwy the sun god covered by the lunar shield as being symbolic of a total solar eclipse.  This is always a good time to stage the sun's death.   

Blodeuedd’s sacred bird was the barn owl, a nocturnal bird whose round, white face symbolized the full moon. Thus she is the same goddess as Lleu's mother Arianrhod ("Silver Wheel", a poetic description for the full moon). [NOTE: The late tradition identifying the heavenly Caer or Castle Arianrhod with the Corona Borealis/Northern Crown probably came about because the crown was mistakenly viewed as a 'silver wheel', i.e. as the goddess herself.]

Granted, Blodeuedd is Lleu's wife.  She is never designated as his sister.  In Irish mythology, Lleu's counterpart Lugh has a sister named Ebliu (or or Eblenn, Eibhleann).  According to D. O'Corrain and F. Maguire (IRISH NAMES), the first element of this goddess's name is probably from Old Irish oiph, 'sheen, beauty, radiance.'  She also bears the epithet soluscnis meaning (according to the Electronic Dictionary of the Irish Language) 'radiant-skinned' or 'fair-skinned.'   Alas, we aren't really told anything about her in the Irish tradition.  

It would not be unrealistic, though, for 'White like the Day' to be a reference to the moon goddess.  The moon is, after all, remarkably white. In my book THE MYSTERIES OF AVALON, I presented the following Classical definition of the divine name Diana, the Roman lunar goddess counterpart of the Greek Artemis:

Modern philologists as well as Romans (see Carin M.C. Green’s “Roman Religion and the Cult of Diana at Aricea”, Cambridge University Press, 2007) derive Diana’s name from the same root found in Latin dies, ‘day’, and Diana (like Juno and Hekate) was given the bynames of Lucina, ‘the light-bringing’ or ‘bringing to light’ (lucina being, ultimately, from L. lux) and Lucifera, ‘light-bringer’.  The Vulgate and Post-Vulgate either associate the Lady of the Lake with Diana, or literally identify the two goddesses.  This identification came about because the goddess was also Diana Nemorensis, whose shrine was in a wood on Lake Nemi.  Her Greek counterpart Artemis was called Limnaie/Limnaea, ‘Of the Lake’.

Cicero, De Natura Deorum 2. 27 (trans. Rackham) (Roman rhetorician C1st B.C.) :

“The name Apollo is Greek; they say that he is the Sun, and Diana [Artemis] they identify with the Moon . . . the name Luna is derived from lucere ‘to shine’; for it is the same word as Lucina, and therefore in our country Juno Lucina is invoked in childbirth, as is Diana in her manifestation as Lucifera (the light-bringer) among the Greeks. She is also called Diana Omnivaga (wide-wandering), not from her hunting, but because she is counted as one of the seven planets or ‘wanderers’ (vagary). She was called Diana because she made a sort of Day (Dia) in the night-time. She is invoked to assist at the birth of children, because the period of gestation is either occasionally seven, or more usually nine, lunar revolutions, and these are called menses (months), because they cover measured (mensa) spaces.”

Also in THE MYSTERIES OF AVALON I touched upon the Welsh Goleuddydd ('Light or Brightness of Day'), whose name is strikingly similar to that of Gwenddydd:

Goleuddydd as wife of the son of Celyddon, who gives birth to Culhwch, the ‘Lean Pig’, may be an educated reference to the Greek Artemis (= Roman Diana), who sent the Calydonian Boar.  One of the primary sub-plots of “Culhwch and Olwen”, of course, is the hunt for the monstrous boar Twrch Trwyth.

It is also worth noting that when Goleuddydd became pregnant she went “gwyll”, i.e. gwyllt, usually defined as “mad”, but more accurately as “wild” (see Geiriadur Prifysgol Cymru for gwyllt/gwyll, ‘wild, living in a natural or primitive state, uncivilized, savage; demented, raving, frantic, mad), and wandered in uninhabited places.  This is also a hallmark of Artemis/Diana the Huntress, who lived in the wilderness. Finally, madness is typically associated with the moon.

Given all of the above, I can only come to the conclusion that Gwenddydd has been wrongly taken to be the Morning Star/Venus, and that in reality she was originally a lunar deity.

[1] To further complicate matters, the sacred calendar day of the goddess Brighid was February 1, Imbolc or Oimelc.  Her special animals were the sheep and goats who were birthed and suckled at this time.  All evidence strongly suggests Brighid (the Roman period Brigantia) was a sun goddess.