"So as sir Bagdemagus rode to se many adventures, so hit happed hym to com to the roche thereas the Lady of the Lake had put Merlyon undir the stone, and there he herde hym make a grete dole; wherefore sir Bagdemagus wolde have holpyn hym, and wente unto the grete stone, and hit was so hevy that an hondred men myght nat lyffte hit up. When Merlyon wyste that he was there, he bade hym leve his laboure, for all was in vayne; for he might never be holpyn but by her that put hym there."
Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur (Winchester MS., Book IV, Chapter V)
I've elsewhere written quite a bit on the probable location of Myrddin's/Merlin's grave. The most salient conversation on that topic can be found in the following link. However, I have excerpted that and pasted it below for the convenience of my readers.
http://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2018/02/ive-been-asked-to-post-my-study-on.html
But why Drumelzier at all? If I am right and the sacrifice of Merlin at the hands of Meldred’s shepherds is merely a story invented to both Christianize him and provide him with a death-tale (the actual nature of his madness being misunderstood), why was this location on the Tweed chosen?
I’m convinced the answers lies in a relocation. In Liddesdale, at Newcastleton, the Tweeden Burn empties into the Liddel Water.
Early forms of this stream-name include Tueeden (Blaeu/Pont map 1654), Tweden (1541, 1580), Tweden (1583), Tueden (1599), Twyden (1841). However, a spelling even closer to that of Tweed is also known:
http://www.astro.ubc.ca/people/scott/book.pdf
"Tweeden (twee-din) n. former seat of the Armstrongs, just to the east of Newcastleton. ‘Young Ector Armstrng’ was there in 1541, when he reset some other Armstrongs, referred to as English rebels. It is recorded as ‘Twyde’ on a map of Liddesdale drawn up by Sir William Cecil, c.1561. Ringan, Hector and Jock of Tweeden are recorded in 1583 and Ninian of Tweeden in 1606. William and John Armstrong ‘of Tueden’ are recorded in 1611. ‘Johne Armstrang, callit of Tueden’ is recorded in 1622 and Francie ‘callit Tueden’ in 1623. It may be the same place that is on the list of parts of the Lordship of Liddesdale in 1632 as ‘Helene Tweidmes lands’. In the same document is recorded the farm of ‘Megie Twedmes’, whose meaning is also obscure (it is ‘Tweden’ in 1541, ‘Twedane’ in 1576, ‘Tweden’ in 1580, ‘Twedon’ in 1583 and ‘Tueden’ in 1599 and 1622)."
According to Alan James, an expert on Brittonic place-names in Northern Britain, this stream-name appears to represent Tweed + a diminutive Brittonic –in suffix, and this
“… pushes the name back to the 12th century or earlier, possibly a lot earlier, and implies the stream was called Tweed or something similar before that.”
Also of possible interest is the presence at Drumelzier of Tinnis Castle. Tinnis Hill and Burn are found in Liddesdale just a few kilometers downstream from the Tweeden Burn. Tinnis is from Cumbric 'dinas', fort. So once again we have very similar place-names found in both locations.
Given that Myrddin/Llallogan fought at Arthuret where the Liddel and the Esk meet, and Meldred/Maldred may have been the lord of Cumbria, I would identify as the proper death-place of our “madman” the Tweeden Burn. This notion is made all the more attractive by the presence at Old Castleton, a bit further up the Liddel, of a very early St. Martin’s Church, quite possibly an establishment originating from Whithorn. I have suggested elsewhere that Myrddin was either identified with St. Martin or replaced by the saint in several locations in Lowland Scotland.
If I’m right and the Tweeden Burn is the place where Myrddin underwent his triple sacrifice, then the churchyard he was buried in must be that of St. Martin’s at Old Castleton. Note that there is no St. Martin or St. Ninian connection to Drumelzier.
However, we have forgotten about the Powsail Burn at Drumelzier. This place-name is from *pol-, ‘pool’, plus the word for ‘willow.’ Not coincidentally, there is a Willow Pool at the confluence of the Liddel Water and the Esk. This is also the location of the Liddel Strength fort, sometimes also referred to in the sources as the Moat of Liddel (not to be confused with the castle at Old Castleton in Liddesdale).
For years now I have accepted the most recent translation 'green chapel' for the edifice that supposedly stands near where Myrddin/Merlin is buried. However, knowing as I do all too well the freedom translators can take when rendering medieval Latin, I went to the source and checked it out myself.
The most recent version of the relevant passage drawn from the Vita Kentigern was done by a Zacharias P. Thundy and is found in Peter Goodrich's The Romance of Merlin. It reads:
“Lailoken said, There is something I very much desire; you can easily grant me that besides my freedom. I want you to bury me in the eastern part of the city in the churchyard, where the faithful are interred, not far from the green chapel where the brook Pausayl flows into the River Tweed, which, indeed, will take place in a few days after my triple death.”
The actual Latin text is as follows:
Respondit Lailoken. vnum valde dabile postulo. libertate non pretermissa. videlicet vt tradas corpus meum sepulture, ad partem huius oppidi orientalem. in loco funeri. fidelis defuncti competenciore, haut longe a cespite. vbi torrens Passales in flumen descendit Tuedense. Futurum est enim post paucos dies, trina nece me morit[urum].
What I wanted to know was simply this: where is the 'green chapel' in this Latin?
My understanding of cespite is that is means 'grassy ground, grass, earth, sod, turf, altar/rampart/mound of sod/turf/earth. It does not mean 'chapel'. It, in fact, must mean a mound of grassy earth, i.e. a barrow mound. So there is no poetic description here of a barrow mound, no 'green chapel' - the Latin is quite specific.
Cespite is from caespes, turf, sod, "used for altars, mounds (of tombs), for covering cottages, huts, etc."
In brief, a cespite as a grassy mound COULD mean a grave mound. But we also need to bear in mind that the word moat, which we now think of as a defensive ditch, often filled with water, is from French via Middle English and during the medieval period it meant MOUND. It was the mound made by scooping dirt out of the surrounding ditch and flinging it up into a gigantic pile, upon which the castle would then be built.
W.F. Skene, in the 1800s, spoke with the farmer at 'Upper Moat', now Highmoat farm. This is located immediately SW of Liddel Strength, itself often described with the word mote or motte. Willow Pool ( = the exact meaning of the Powsail in Tweeddale) is right here at Highmoat. The farmer told Skene there was a local tradition of Romans and Picts (!) being slain in a great battle and buried in the orchard of Highmoat farm.
The Tweeden is a major tributary of the Liddel, but it is the Liddel that joins the Willow Pool at the Liddel Strength fortress.
Going back to the Tweeden Burn, I should not neglect to point out that there is found above that river on Tweeden Rigg a significant chambered long cairn. Details about this cairn can be found here:
https://canmore.org.uk/site/67938/langknowe
https://books.google.com/books?id=nH5bAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA346&lpg=PA346&dq=%22Tweeden+rigg%22&source=bl&ots=1GGLbjQAjO&sig=mDB-Ci_IiQBeLmqkWLBwAPwBAmk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi6i56EraDdAhWsHzQIHVMVD5wQ6AEwAHoECAEQAQ#v=onepage&q=%22Tweeden%20rigg%22&f=false
The location of the cairn is shown on the following map:
Modern Long Knowe appears as Tweeden Rig on John Thomson's Atlas of Scotland, 1832:
Here is an aerial photograph of the cairn:
The interesting thing about the Old Castleton site with its St. Martin's Church is that at some point in the development and transmission of the Myrddin/Merlin tradition, this former place could have been confused with Newcastleton further down the river. The Tweeden Burn empties into the Liddel at Newcastleton.
It is possible, therefore, that at some point in time the Langknowe cairn was thought of as Myrddin's grave. Once this cairn was "transferred" in legend to the Tweed (where no cairn is in evidence, and the testimony of such a cairn ever being present is suspect), it's true location was forgotten.
While all of the above is interesting, we must also treat of the later Arthurian romance material on Merlin's tomb. I wrote about that quite some time ago in my book THE MYSTERIES OF AVALON. The following is a selection from that source, which I have slightly revised and amended.
In Welsh tradition, Nyfain (variants Nyuein, Nyven, Nevyn) daughter of Brychan is the name given to the mother of Urien...
Nyfain’s name cannot, as some have thought, be an eponym for the ancient Novantae tribe, whose territory (roughly Dumfries and Galloway) was ruled over by Urien. The identification is etymologically impossible. But the name could very easily represent the Irish goddess Nemhain. Nemhain was one of the premiere battle-goddesses of Ireland, and was often paired with Macha, Morrigan and Badb.
In the Vulgate Merlin, the forest name of the Lady of the Lake is first given as the Forest of Briosque and only later as Broceliande, the name used by Chretien de Troyes. While Broceliande has been sought in various places, none of the candidates work geographically or etymologically. I would derive the Old French ‘Briosque’ from the –fries component of Dumfries, the town situated just West-Southwest of Lochmaben in Dumfriesshire. While once thought to be the ‘Fort of the Frisians’, authorities now correctly identify –fries with Gaelic preas, Angl. Pres(s), gen. phris, Angl. –fries, gen. pl. preas, (b)p(h)reasach, ‘bush, copse, thicket’. Spellings such as Dunfreisch, Droonfreisch, and Drumfriesche occasionally occur in old documents.
The second component is probably something similar to Welsh llwyn:
[bnth. Llad. lignum, cf. H. Lyd. loin, loen mewn e. lleoedd, ?Crn. Diw. loinou (ll.)]
eg. (bach. g. llwynyn, ll. llwynynnau) ll. llwynau, llwyni, llwynydd (bach. ll. (prin) llwynïos).
bush, shrub, brake, thicket; copse, grove, arbour; woods, forest; (esp. in love-poetry) the traditional rendezvous of lovers, symbol of love or romance.
Broceliande itself may be evident in compounds like Welsh prysglwyn, "shrub, shrubbery, bush, brake, undergrowth, thicket, copse, jungle, also fig." and brysglwyn, "thicket, copse, brushwood."
It makes a great deal of sense to envisage Merlin and Viviane in the Dumfries region, as this was the home stomping grounds of Myrddin, the Welsh prototype for Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Merlin. Broceliande, then, is simply a name for Dumfries.
In the context of any discussion of Myrddin and Nemhain in southwest Scotland, it is necessary to mention the Locus Maponi or ‘place of [the god] Maponus’, identifiable with Lochmaben in Dumfries (or perhaps the Ladyward Roman fort near Lochmaben, or even with the Clochmabenstane just south at Gretna Green; see the listing for Mabon in Chapter 6). As is well known, Mabon was the son of Modron, i.e. Matrona, the Divine Mother. This is the same Modron who is presented as the wife of Urien, son of Nyfain/Nemhain.
There is a strong probability the “stone” under which Merlin was imprisoned by the Lady of the Lake in Broceliande is none other than the Clochmabenstane, once the site of a stone circle. Her “lake” may have been at nearby Lochmaben. I would add that in Welsh tradition, the gods Lleu (with whom Myrddin has a very close affinity) and Mabon both appear in death at the same place in Gwynedd. Lleu is found as the death-eagle in Nantlle, and the grave of Mabon is placed there also. If the same identification of youthful sun gods occurred in the North (see, for example, Luguvalium, the ancient name of Carlisle only a dozen or so kilometers to the SE of the Clochmabenstane, the fort that is 'Lleu-strong' or the fort of a man who was strong like Lleu), Myrddin would naturally have been placed at a site sacred to Mabon.
While it is tempting to give Modron the Divine Mother the name Nemhain, we are not justified in making this assumption. And, indeed, given the proximity of Lochmaben to the Annan River, and the presence of a St. Ann’s on a tributary of the Annan which has its confluence with the latter river at Lochmaben, it makes more sense to associate Modron/Matrona ‘the Divine Mother’ with a British version of the Irish goddess Anu. Annan is the genitive of anau, cognate with Welsh anaw ‘riches’, Gaelic Anu the name of the Irish goddess of prosperity. Geoffrey of Monmouth made this goddess, in the guise of ‘Anna’, the sister of Arthur.
This is especially so as I have identified the heartland of Urien's kingdom of Rheged as Annandale
We have seen above that Urien's mother was Nefyn, while his wife was Modron.
CONCLUSION
I've not included in this survey of possible Myrddin tombs two other noteworthy examples which I've also investigated in previous works: the great ancient cairn atop Tinto in South Lanarkshire (a mountain associated with Myrddin in the early Welsh poetry; see http://secretsavalon.blogspot.com/2016/09/slight-revision-of-merlinmyrddin.html) and Dawston in Liddesdale (see http://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2017/11/the-actual-location-of-degsas-stone.html), whose name may be derived from or otherwise related to that of Gwenddydd, sister of Myrddin. Gwenddydd is said by Geoffrey of Monmouth to have built her brother a celestial observatory which, as described, was certainly a stone circle.
So how do we decide between these various possible Myrddin graves? Well, to begin, we can safely discount that claim that he was buried in a churchyard. This is merely a typically sad effort on the part of a Christian author to confine a pagan figure in consecrated soil. Myrddin, either Lleu himself or a mortal avatar of that god, can only be saved in the end by being granted a Christian burial.
The answer to the riddle is, I think, somewhat surprising, although obvious once we lay out a reasonable argument. I draw once again from my earlier work on Myrddin (http://secretsavalon.blogspot.com/2016/09/slight-revision-of-merlinmyrddin.html), where a possible etymology for Arfderydd/Arderydd is proposed:
As we are dealing with a hill at Arthuret, the initial component is almost certainly ardd, ‘hill, height’. But what of the second element?
The clue, interestingly enough, is also found in the Welsh sources. In an early Myrddin poem we learn that two of the warriors present at Arderydd were Errith and Gwrrith (spelled Gurrith in the MS.). Errith is cognate with an Irish word, arracht, from ar + richt, meaning specter, ghost, apparition. Gwrrith is 'Man-specter/ghost/apparition'. This last matches the meaning of the name Myrddin according to Dr. Graham Isaac of The National University of Ireland, Galway - *Moro-donyos or "Specter-man".
While some scholars have claimed that Errith and Gwrrith belong to Dyfed (where Myrddin as Merlin was transferred in later medieval tradition), there is no good reason for thinking they were not considered to be present at the Battle of Arderydd.
“The most recent change in the topography of the battlefield occurred in the 1950s when the western of two mounds known as Arthuret Knowes was bulldozed. It had been quarried for sand during the Second World War. The twin knowes were long-believed to be prehistoric burial mounds but the sand is now thought to have been deposited on the boulder clay beneath by a glacial icesheet.”
It is important to note, however, that earlier writers thought that perhaps these two mounds had originally been one:
“The church and rectory at Arthuret are situated on a raised plateau on the west side of the river Esk which flows past them at a lower level, and to the south of the church and rectory garden there rise two small wooded hills known as the “Arthuret Knowes." These are separated from each other by the public road, and I think that at one time they formed one low hill or ridge about 500 yards long, but were divided into two when the highway was made."
And here the same assessment of the mounds is made:
https://books.google.com/books?id=bSwRAAAAIAAJ&pg=PR91&lpg=PR91&dq=arthuret+esker&source=bl&ots=LU2aWhmF9s&sig=N_WX1go7l7f0Y1Da4MdyVIEepyo&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwixzYHOgardAhUJJDQIHf9kBr8Q6AEwCnoECAQQAQ#v=onepage&q=arthuret%20esker&f=false
This is a Greenwood map of 1824, showing the hill or hills bisected by the road:
More accurate information on the ridge or mounds at Arthuret comes from Mark Brennand, Lead Officer Historic Environment and Commons, Environment and Regulatory Services, Cumbria County Council"
"I am afraid we hold nothing that would provide a definitive answer as to the original form of the mound or mounds at Arthuret. In A Tour of Scotland and Voyage to the Hebrides (1790), Thomas Pennant wrote of Arthuret that ‘near the village are some high and irregular sandy eminences; probably natural, notwithstanding a contrary opinion has been held, because some coins and an urn have been found in them’. Note that Pennant uses the plural for the mounds, although we, of course, cannot be sure which ‘eminences’ he was describing.
By the time of the Ordnance Survey first edition, the road is in the position that it still occupies today, and a sand pit is recorded on the western side of the western mound. Writing in the 1860s, William Forbes Skene recorded ‘south of the church and parsonage there rise from this platform two small hills covered with wood, called the Arthuret Knowes’. The road was, of course, already in place by this time. In Prehistoric Age in England (1904) Professor Windle noted tumuli (plural) at Arthuret, whereas this came from a survey of 1893 by Chancellor Ferguson, who later revised his interpretation to that there were probably eskers (Collingwood, Transactions 1926).
You will have noted that Henry Barnes stated it was his own personal interpretation that the two mounds were originally one, later divided by the road. I cannot find another early study that states the two mounds were one, although in this respect your own research is probably far more detailed than the information in the Historic Environment Record. My own inclination would be that if the road was constructed on that particular line, then it is possible that there was already an accessible route through at that point. We do not have any other evidence to suggest that the two mounds could originally be seen as one single geological formation, but that does not mean to say that it was not so in the sixth century."
Final word on the subject comes from Stephen White of the Carlisle Library:
The Hodgkinson and Donald Map of 1770 shows the then road to Carlisle from Longtown going apparently between the church and rectory. WT MacIntyre discussed the Knowes in an article in the Cumberland News in 1944. He speculates that they may have been a part of one ridge cut through by the road - see attached copy. Also in 1926 in the Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society WG Collingwood says in an article on the Knowes that in 1907 on a Society’s visit to the area Mr Hesketh ‘ pointed out that the Knowes are parts of a long ridge divided by the road into two hills’.
Below for your interest is the area on the 1860 Ordnance Survey sheet
Lastly, see below detail from the 1975 1:10,000 map of this area with contour lines
If we are talking about two mounds having existed anciently at Arthuret, I would propose that one was called Ardd Gurrith/(G)urrith (the /G/ quite naturally being lost, as is typical in such Welsh compounds) and the other Ardd Errith. Otherwise, these may be two alternate names for the same hill.
Although Gwrrith and Myrddin may mean the same thing, and Myrddin was also known by an attested second name – that of Llallogan – we cannot be sure Gwrrith = Myrddin in terms of an identification of actual personhood. But it is tempting to see both Specter Man names as descriptors for Llallogan, making Arthuret the home and ruling center of Myrddin.
The Welsh Arderydd probably stands for Ardd Errith. As suggested by Isaac, Myrddin’s father’s name Morfryn or Mor-bryn = ‘Spirit-hill’. This would exactly match in meaning Ardd Errith.
In the past, I was content in seeing in Arthuret a small fortification (see http://www.pastscape.org.uk/hob.aspx?a=0&hob_id=10819) belonging to Myrddin /Merlin or, perhaps, to the people who worshiped the 'Spirit-man' (cf. the Irish god Lugh as the ferscal or specter-man). But in considering these "mounds" as being thought of in the past as sepulcher in nature, and given their proximity to the River Liddel, I'm inclined to designate them as the final resting place - or perhaps we should say residence - of Myrddin.
Despite the extensive damage we've inflicted on the Arthuret Knowes in recent times, perhaps Myrddin is still there?
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