THE TRIUMPHS OF OWEN.* A FRAGMENT. FROM THE WELSH. [From Evans. Spec. of the Welsh Poetry, 1764, quarto, p. 25, where is a Prose version of this Poem, and p. 127. Owen succeeded his father Griffith app Cynan in the principality of N. Wales, A.D. 1137. This battle was fought in the year 1157. Jones. Relics, vol. ii. p. 36.] OWEN's praise demands my song, Liberal hand, and open heart. 5 Compare with this poem, "Hermode's Journey to Hell," in Dr. Percy's Translation of Mallet's Northern Antiquities, vol. ii. p. 149. See Beronii Diss. de Eddis Island. p. 153. Mundi credita кπúρwσ in qua solem nigrescere, tellurem in mari submersam iri, stellas de cœlo lapsuras, ignem in vetustam orbis molem et fabricam disævituram, v. Sibyll. Velusp. Stroph. liii. * The original Welsh of the above poem was the composition of Gwalchmai the son of Melir, immediately after Prince Owen Gwynedd had defeated the combined fleets of Iceland, Denmark, and Norway, which had invaded his territory on the coast of Anglesea. There is likewise another poem which describes this famous battle, written by Prince Howel, the son of Owen Gwynedd; a literal translation of which may be seen in Jones. Relics, vol. ii. p. 36. In Mason's edition, and in all the subsequent editions, it is said that Owen succeeded his Big with hosts of mighty name, Dauntless on his native sands father, A.D. 1120. The date I have altered, agreeably to the text of Mr. Jones, to A.D. 1137. V. 4. Gwyneth] North Wales. V. 8. "With open heart and bounteous hand." Swift. Cad. and Van. V. 10. "A battle round of squadrons three they shew." Fairfax. Tasso, xviii. 96. V. 13. "And on her shadow rides in floating gold." V. 14. Lochlin] Denmark. V. 20. The red dragon is the device of all his descendants bore on their banners. Cadwallader, which V. 23. "It seems (says Dr. Evans, p. 26,) that the fleet landed in some part of the frith of Menai, and that it was a kind of mixt engagement, some fighting from the shore, others from the ships; and probably the great slaughter was owing Talymalfra's rocky shore Echoing to the battle's roar. Check'd by the torrent-tide of blood, While, heap'd his master's feet around, Thousand banners round him burn: * 25 30 35 40 to its being low water, and that they could not sail. This will doubtless remind many of the spirited account delivered by the noblest historian of ancient Greece, of a similar conflict on the shore of Pylus, between the Athenians and the Spartans under the gallant Brasidas. Thucyd. Bel. Pelop. lib. iv. cap. 12." V. 25. "Tal Moelvre." Jones. V. 27. This and the three following lines are not in the former editions, but are now added from the author's MS. Mason. V. 31. From this line to the conclusion, the translation is indebted to the genius of Gray, very little of it being in the original, which closes with a sentiment omitted by the translator: "And the glory of our Prince's wide-wasting sword shall be celebrated in a hundred languages, to give him his merited praise." THE DEATH OF HOEL. AN ODE. SELECTED FROM THE GODODIN.* [See S. Turner's Vindication of Ancient British Poems, p. 50. Warton's Engl. Poetry, vol. i. p. lxiii.] HAD I but the torrent's might, With headlong rage and wild affright To rush, and sweep them from the world! * Of Aneurin, styled the Monarch of the Bards. He flourished about the time of Taliessin, A. D. 570.1 This Ode is extracted from the Gododin. See Evans. Specimens, p. 71 and 73. This poem is extremely difficult to be understood, being written, if not in the Pictish, at least in a dialect of the Britons, very different from the modern Welsh. See Evans, p. 68-75. "Aneurin with the flowing Muse, King of Bards, brother to Gildas Albanius the historian, lived under Mynyddawg of Edinburgh, a prince of the North, whose Eurdorchogion, or warriors wearing the golden torques, three hundred and sixtythree in number, were all slain, except Aneurin and two others, in a battle with the Saxons at Cattraeth, on the eastern coast of Yorkshire. His Gododin, an heroic poem written on that event, is perhaps the oldest and noblest production of that age." Jones. Relics, vol. i. p. 17.- Taliessin composed a poem called 'Cunobiline's Incantation,' in emulation of excelling the Gododin of Aneurin his rival. He accomplished his aim, in the opinion of subsequent bards, by condensing the prolixity, without losing the ideas, of his opponent. V. 3. The kingdom of Deïra included the counties of Yorkshire, Durham, Lancashire, Westmoreland, and Cumberland. See Jones. Relics, vol. i. p. 17. 1 Mr. Jones, in his Relics, vol. i. p. 17, says, that Aneurin flourished about A. D. 510. Too, too secure in youthful pride, To Cattraeth's vale in glitt'ring row Wreath'd in many a golden link: Or the grape's extatic juice. Flush'd with mirth and hope they burn: 5 10 16 20 V. 7. Cian] In Jones. Relics, it is spelt Kian.' V. 11. In the rival poem of Taliessin mentioned before, this circumstance is thus expressed: "Three, and threescore, and three hundred heroes flocked to the variegated banners of Cattraeth; but of those who hastened from the flowing mead-goblet, save three, returned not. Cynon and Cattraeth with hymns they commemorate, and me for my blood they mutually lament." See Jones. Relics, vol. ii. p. 14. -"The great topic perpetually recurring in the Gododin is, that the Britons lost the battle of Cattraeth, and suffered so severely, because they had drunk their mead too profusely. The pas sages in the Gododin are numerous on this point." See Sharon Turner's Vindication of the Anc. British Poems, p. 51. V. 14. See Sayer's War Song, from the Gaelic, in his Poems, p. 174. V. 17. See Fr. Goldsmith. Transl. of Grotius. Joseph Sophompancas. p. 9. "Nectar of the Bees," and Euripid. Bacchæ. v. 143. ῥεῖ δὲ μελισσᾶν νέκταρι. |