ELIWLAD AND AILITHIR: A PROVABLE FAMILY CONNECTION FOR THE HISTORICAL ARTHUR?

An Artist's Reconsctruction of the Ribchester Roman Fort, Lancashire

Over the past week, I produced the followed posts:

https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2019/01/whats-in-name-problem-with-arthur.html

https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2019/01/banna-camboglanna-uxellodunumpetriana.html

As I went through them again, I realized I was STILL immensely dissatisfied with a problem that has haunted me for years now: the inability to be able to solidly identify Arthur's father Uther with a historically acceptable figure.  It is all well and fine to say that he may have been a man at the Banna Roman fort, where Dacians and their draco were present.  But at the same time I would have to say that he was Ceidio's father Arthwys, 'the man of the Arth [River].' Or, if we opt for Arthwys as Arthur (as Simon Keegan would have it), then Mar (= Fergus Mar/Mor of Dalriada, otherwise known as Gwrwst Ledlum by the Welsh) would have to be Uther.  And that is hardly satisfactory.

So I decided to review all my past research with an eye to finding something - anything - that might help us get a firmer grip on the slippery serpent that is Uther.  Bearing in mind, of course, that any Uther who wasn't in the North wasn't really worth considering.

One post in particular jumped out at me.  To be honest, I had more or less forgotten about it:

https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2018/10/eliwlad-grandson-of-uther-and-madog.html

When I re-read this piece, I was struck not only by the scholarly support for the idea - which was substantial and quite unexpected - but perhaps even more by the following passage:

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Oliver J. Padel in ARTHUR IN MEDIEVAL WELSH LITERATURE states that

“Barry Lewis has pointed out that a sixteenth-century dialogue between a creiriwr [crair + -iwr in the GPC] (‘pilgrim’) and Mary Magdalene of Brynbuga (the town of Usk) is remarkably similar in both form and content to the dialogue with the Eagle…”

As this comparative treatment of the two poems appears to be accurate, and if I am right about Eliwlad being an interpretation or attempted translation of Ailithir, then we have two nearly identical poems featuring characters named ‘Pilgrim’.

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Why did I abandon the notion that Uther Pendragon = Sawyl of Ribchester?  Well, because I felt that I had come up with one, maybe two etymologies for Eliwlad that might be superior to the Eliwlad = Ailithir theory.  I first proposed these alternative derivations in this post:

https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2018/11/eliwlad-and-occams-razor-bright-or.html

The problem with the alternative etymologies is obvious: they do not account for or, rather, sufficiently counter, other aspects of my argument in favor of Eliwlad = Ailithir.  And, indeed, this last article seems, on the whole, a bit forced and not very convincing.  Any workable etymology is a good etymology, but if the context in which it is found is ignored or doesn't seem to fit, then the validity of that proposed form must be called into question.

If I accept this reasoning - and I feel I must - then I can embrace the possibility, at least, that Uther did belong in the North and that he is to be identified with Sawyl of Ribchester.  Needless to say, a Chief Dragon at the fort where the Sarmatian veterans settled must surely have been called such because he was the magister draconum.  It would be difficult to maintain that the dragon of his epithet were merely a metaphorical term for a warrior, as is apparently true for the bulk of the instances in which the term is used in Welsh poetry.  The Sarmatians were famous for their draco standard and it is to be expected that the 5th-6th century descendants of Britons and Sarmatians at Ribchester would still be honoring inherited traditions.  It would not be surprising at all, therefore, if they designated their king or war-chieftain as the 'Terrible Chief-Dragon.'