WHO WAS BURIED AT DINAS EMRYS?: A REASSESSMENT OF THE DATA

Roman Cinerary Urn with Serpent Handles
(Photo Courtesy https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/257818?searchField=All&sortBy=Relevance&when=A.D.+1-500&what=Sculpture%7cVessels&ft=*&offset=0&rpp=20&pos=9)

Who was Buried at Dinas Emrys?

My readers will by now be aware that I've settled on Dinas Emrys as the fort of Edern, father of Cunedda.  While Ambrosius or 'the Divine/Immortal One' is a strange conflation of St. Ambrose, his Gaulish governor father and the god Lleu, the Ambrosius of Gildas and Nennius is ditinguished by having an unnamed father who wore the purple.  Given that Edern ( = Latin Aeternus) can also mean 'the Immortal One', I proposed that the original inhabitant of the fort was Edern son of Padarn/Paternus 'the fatherly' of the Red Tunic.  If so, then Dinas Emrys would seem to have been the primary fort of Cunedda.

Cunedda, father of Ceredig/Arthur, was called the Terrible Chief-warrior (or similar). Uther's origin in Llydaw, supposedly Brittany, would seem to point instead to the Llydaw in Gwynedd.  This is the name of a lake into which and out of which the river Glaslyn flows.  It is the Glaslyn that then passes by Dinas Emrys.

The St. Ambrose story may have influenced that of Dinas Emrys.  We find, for example, the saint's exhuming the remains of pairs of martyrs.  One individual martyr was named Celsus, a Roman name that perfectly corresponds in meaning with the British precursor or Uther (cf. Irish uachtar, 'high, lofty').  In the pseudo-history of Geoffrey of Monmouth, Uther, along with Ambrosius, is said to have been buried at Stonehenge next to Amesbury.

We can, then, be somewhat confident in placing Uther/Cunedda in death at Dinas Emrys.

And what do we make of Ambrosius being buried there as well?  We've just seen that this character is complex - and confusing. Uisneach, the Irish version of Stonehenge, was where the god Lugh's grave was found.  Ambrosius in Nennius is brought to Dinas Emrys by Vortigern as a foundation sacrifice.  So we could say that Lleu, the Welsh cognate of Irish Lugh, was "buried" at the fort.

However, Ambrosius would also seem to be the substitute for Edern.  And that might mean that it was Cunedda's father who was buried at Dinas Emrys.  We are told in Welsh tradition that Cunedda's father had come with him to Wales.  However, it is certainly possible Edern had come there before Cunedda, with his son only joining him later at the fort.  

The Constantine Geoffrey says was also buried at Stonehenge seems to have been placed there only because he was chosen as the fictional successor of Arthur.  But this is Constantine the Dumnonian, who in Gildas is called the tyrant whelp of the filthy lioness.  Lion in Welsh is llew, a word easily confused for Lleu.  I wouldn't press this argument, of course, as it is probably merely an interesting coincidence. We must recall, after all, that Geoffrey makes Uther and Ambrosius the sons of a Constantine who is, in the main, patterned after the usurping Roman emperor Constantine III.  I elsewhere discussed that Caernarfon is generally thought to be the City of Constantine of the city list found appended to Nennius.  But even if it isn't, Nennius in 25 states that the tomb of Constantine, son of Constantine the Great, is at Caernarfon.  Dinas Emrys is only some 20 kilometers distant from Caerenarfon. 

While many factors went into the making of the colors of the worms/dragons of Dinas Emrys, one might well have to do with the red tunic of Padarn.  This would not mean that Padarn was buried there, but rather his wearing red might might have been incorporated into the color of the genius loci.  In other words, the genius paterfamilias of Padarn 'the paternal' may have been fused with the genius loci of the Britons.  I have stressed that this kind of confusion among the ancients was possible when I cited the famous passage from the AENEID in which Aeneas visits his father's tomb and, upon encountering a fabulous serpent, is "uncertain whether he should think that it was the genius of the place or his father's familiar."

Tuathal Techtmar, Uisneach and Caer Dathal

In the following blog post, I sought to identify the Caer Dathal of Welsh tradition:

https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2019/01/caer-dathal-and-its-ancient-ruler.html

In that piece I proposed that Caer Dathal had been named for Tuathal Techtmar, an early Irish king who had spent a considerable period of time min Britain.  But one thing I did not really take into account was that Tuathal had later built the Royal Palace at the Hill of Uisneach!

I've been writing fairly extensively about Stonehenge and Uisneach, the sacred centers of England and Ireland, respectively (see https://mistshadows.blogspot.com/2019/12/ambrosden-amesburyuisneach-and-dinas.html).  Dinas Emrys would appear to have been a sort of Gwynedd equivalent, the sacred center of Cunedda and his sons' northwestern territory in Wales.  

  

This map shows that Craig Y Dinas and Dinas Emrys are not much over 20 kilometers from each other as the crow flies.  Craig Y Dinas is on the Afon Llyfni, the river that flows from Lleu's (and Mabon's) Nantlle.  

Tuathal was a king of Mide, and Cunedda and his sons came from the same kingdom (Drumanagh in Brega).