Annwn

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ANNWN

ANNWN . The Celtic otherworld is known in Welsh as Annwn or Annwfn, variously analyzed as connoting "nonworld," "within-world," or "very deep." There is no formal description of this world in Welsh, and allusions in medieval Welsh texts and folklore suggest that it had many aspects. Its identification in medieval times with Hell and in modern folklore with fairyland is, of course, secondary. It is sometimes located below ground and is entered by subterranean tunnels, or it may be below the waters of a lake. Both concepts occur in medieval texts and in recent folktales. In the "Four Branches" of the Mabinogi (c. 1060–1120), the medieval Welsh collection of mythological tales, Annwn is conceived of as a world adjacent to the natural world, between which there are no boundaries but an awareness of a new dimension. Thus the hero Pwyll travels from his own land of Dyfed in southwestern Wales to Annwn along roads which should logically have been familiar to him. In other cases the act of sitting upon a mound or hill opens the way to traffic from one world to the other.

Two poems in the thirteenth-century Book of Taliesin portray Annwn, although not under that name, as an island. One of these, the so-called Spoils of Annwfn, refers to an attack on the otherworld by Arthur from which only seven of his retinue return and uses a variety of names for the otherworld, probably indicating different aspects—for example, Caer ("fortress"), Sidi (perhaps from the Irish sídh, "mound"), Caer Feddwid (perhaps "drunkenness"), and Caer Wydr ("glass"). This last name recalls an account in the ninth-century Historia Brittonum said to have been written by one Nennius, which tells of an attack by sea upon a glass tower. Since both texts refer to silent sentinels, it may be assumed that the otherworld is the land of the dead. It is never viewed as a land of torment, however. The other poem in the Book of Taliesin describes it as being free of sickness and old age and flowing with wine.

In the Second Branch of the Mabinogi, the timeless world of forgetful bliss underlies the feasts and sojourn of Brân's followers at Harlech and the island of Gwales, and this motif is common in modern folktales. The birds of Rhiannon, whose song heard over the water lulls the living to sleep, are doubtless from this otherworld. Annwn has its own kingdoms, and its rulers may call upon mortals to aid them, as Arawn, king of Annwn, summons Pwyll in the First Branch. Most commonly Gwynn ap Nudd, not Arawn, is known as king of the otherworld. He has this role in the eleventh-century story Culhwch and Olwen and in the sixteenth-century Life of Saint Collen. In modern folklore he is king of the fairies, but he has a more sinister role as leader of the Wild Hunt, the hounds of which are known as Cwn Annwn ("dogs of Annwn").

Bibliography

A good popular discussion is provided in Proinsias Mac Cana's Celtic Mythology (London, 1983), especially useful in this context because it cites Irish examples of these otherworld concepts. Patrick Sims-Williams extends the discussion in "Some Celtic Otherworld Terms," in A. T. E. Matonis and Daniel Melia, eds., Celtic Language, Celtic Culture (Van Nuys, Calif., 1990), pp. 57–81. John Rhys's Celtic Folklore: Welsh and Manx, 2 vols. in 1(1901; reprint, London, 1980) gives folklore examples, as does T. Gwynn Jones, Welsh Folklore and Folk Custom (reprint, Cambridge, 1979). Marged Haycock edits and discusses the "Spoils of Annwn" poem in " 'Preideu Annwn' and the Figure of Taliesin," Studia Celtica 18/19 (1983–84): 52–78.