thinking about the atrocious 1970s vampire musical movie produced by beatles drummer ringo starr in which ringo plays merlin the wizard and it's sort of not explained why merlin is even in a vampire movie in the first place
Some background for each!
Gwalchmai: The OG Gawain, slayer of giants in Welsh myth, besties with Owain and Peredur. He's known for his gold/silver tongue and is literally like The Best Boi. I am enamoured with him. Tells Cai to do one when Peredur gives him a broken arm. Also this passage single-handedly convinced me that Peredur and Gwalchmai are a couple: 'And Peredur and Gwalchmai went to Gwalchmai's pavilion to take off their armour. And Peredur put on the same kind of garment that Gwalchmai wore. And they went hand in hand to where Arthur was, and greeted him.' Thank u, Sioned Davies.
Branwen: Is the only woman in the Mabinogi to have a branch named after her. Literally the sweetest woman ever. Her dad is the sea God, Llŷr, and her brothers are Bendigeidfran and Manawydan. Trained a starling to send messages to Bendigeidfran to say she was being abused by the Irish court in an absolutely amazing move. Sadly she passes away once she's made it back to Wales alongside Manawydan, Pryderi, and five other men (and Bendigeidfran's severed head!) '"Oh son of God," she said, "woe that I was even born. Two good islands have been laid waste because of me!" She gives a mighty sigh and her heart breaks. And they make a four-sided grave for her and bury her there on the banks of the Alaw.'
Cai: OG Kay. Depending on what u read he is either the most renowned warrior ever - 'Prince of plunder/The unrelenting warrior to his enemy' as Pa Gur yv y Porthaur says - the possession of the most fuckin batshit magical powers as Culhwch ac Olwen relates: 'Cai had magical qualities. For nine days and nine nights, he could hold his breath under water. For nine nights and nine days, he could go without sleep. A wound from Cai's sword no physician could heal.' And so it goes on. Or he is literally the most grumpo to have ever grumped and I respect him hugely.
Blodeuwedd: OWL WOMAN. FLOWER-FACE. 'Then they took the flowers of the oak, and the flowers of the broom, and the flowers of the meadowsweet, and from those they conjured up the fairest and most beautiful maiden that anyone had ever seen.' She is literally stupidly beautiful AND SHE PLOTS TO KILL HER HUSBAND, LLEU, WHO QUITE FRANKLY DESERVED IT. A fuckin queen. She fucked over Gwydion's bb boi in one fell swoop, I simply MUST Stan.
Finally, RHIANNON: HORSE WOMAN. QUEEN OF DYFED. LITERAL TYLWYTH TEG LADY. She literally says to Pwyll - who she later marries - 'Be silent for as long as you like: never has a man been more stupid than you have been.' And if a woman said that to me I WOULD PERISH. also had an amazingly fast horse and like dhdjdddj when Pwyll dies - in a, I presume, stupidity-related incident - Rhiannon marries Branwen's brother Manawydan and actually gets treated with respect instead of whatever fuckery Pwyll was pulling.
Anyways VOTE, VOTE, VOTE. Best two go through to the quarter finals. U only have 1 DAY TO VOTE SO ZOOMIES!!!!
Still fighting with the html to adjust lettering sizes but the Medieval Literature list is now two pages long :^)
I've added an updated Parzival, Iwein, Erec, Iban, Wigalois, Wigamur, Jaufre, Tristano Riccardiano, an additional translation of The Mabinogion by Sinoed Davies, & more!
TUMBLRINAS I NEED YOUR HELP!! I’m writing an essay about expectations surrounding romance through the lens of aspec identities for my creative nonfiction class. I have several short interview type questions and I’m trying to collect as many responses as possible.
If you identify as asexual, aromantic, or anywhere on the spectrum pls consider taking a look at this google form:
At this point, my categorized Arthurian theme song list has spiraled entirely beyond reasonable proportions. If it’s taught me anything, it’s that at least two thirds of Imagine Dragons’ songs seem like they could be about Mordred.
So the only English translation I've been able to find online of the Irish Arthurian romance Eachtra Mhelóra agus Orlando ("The Adventures of Melora and Orlando") is on this old website, which I'll link here:
http://web.archive.org/web/20121222212746/http://www.literatefreedom.org/prae-9.4.htm#Adventure
However, I've copy-pasted the text and footnotes onto this PDF for anyone who wants to finally read it:
Hope both links work for everyone. Let me know if they don't.
Also let me know if you want me to adjust the format of the PDF if there are any readibility issues.
This is slander. "Ymddiddan Gwyddno Garanhir a Gwyn ap Nudd" is interesting (and a little confusing, as a lot of the best poems are). Here is the best breakdown of it which I've found online.
Reading Jenny Rowland's Early Welsh Saga Poetry (largely due to my interest in the stories around Urien Rheged) and had a moment of "oh! @wildbasil come pick up your boy"
...followed very quickly by the author, uh, roasting Gwyn for his pedestrian poetry???
Give the man a break lmao
(a compliment for my Superhuman Knights post)
Giantess/Superhuman Strength (and Size) - British Folk Myths/Welsh Lore
[....]
[....]
Sorcery/Prophecy - De Ortuu Waluuanii/Enfances Gauvain
Preternatural Hair - Knight of the Cart
Ageless Beauty - Vulgate Cycle
...so, writers, where is my Muscle Witch Rapunzel-type Queen?
Amusingly, these funfacts give a solid reason why Morgan needs something like the Green Knight to assassinate Guinevere, particularly the giantess thing from Welsh Myth: Morgan doesn't stand a chance against Guinevere face-to-face.
Wisdom and Graciousness
Conte du Graal/Perceval - Gawain's description
Vulgate Cycle - Merlin's description
Vulgate Cycle - Guinevere being compared to the God-blessed Grail Maiden
The Queen's Knights
(Give Gwen back her warriors!)
One I didn’t like at first but which really grew on me as I read more of his poems is Edwin Arlington Robinson’s characterization of Gawain. He appears in Tristram, Merlin, and Lancelot, always as a side character who’s only there for a fairly short time, so you have to fit his arc together from the fragments. At the start, everyone sees him as cheerful and careless—he’s called “gay Gawaine” in the old sense of the word more than once—but he’s more insightful than most of the others give him credit for, and, after his brothers are dead and he becomes unhinged in his quest for revenge, you realize that he was already unhinged and his cheerful flippancy was a coping mechanism/mask. He also has a delightful way with words. In Tristram, he tells Isolt of Brittany that he isn’t sure whether he’s hitting on her or not but it doesn’t matter because “Tristram, off his proper suavity, has fervor to slice whales, and I, from childhood, have always liked this life.” During his last conversation with Lancelot, Gawaine tells him, “A gloomy curiosity was our Modred, from his first intimation of existence. God made him as He made the crocodile, to prove He was omnipotent.”
Pick and choose from whatever adaptations or retellings you know of, they don’t all have to appear in the same story. No wrong answers. :^)
@usedtobeaduchess Triad 20 is where Arthur as Terror of the Sod comes from.
From The Welsh Triads
From Layamon's Brut
From Don Quixote. (Too bad its Post-Camlann...)
Extra Points:
In which I ramble about poetry, Arthuriana, aroace stuff, etc. In theory. In practice, it's almost all Arthuriana.
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