The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries by Evans-Wentz W. Y

Author:Evans-Wentz, W. Y [Evans-Wentz, W. Y]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Global Grey
Published: 2016-02-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 5. Brythonic Divinities And The Brythonic Fairy-Faith [283]

'On the one hand we have the man Arthur, whose position we have tried to define, and on the other a greater Arthur, a more colossal figure, of which we have, so to speak, but a torso rescued from the wreck of the Celtic pantheon.'--The Right Hon. Sir JOHN RHY^S.

The god Arthur and the hero Arthur--Sevenfold evidence to show Arthur as an incarnate fairy king--Lancelot the foster-son of a fairy woman--Galahad the offspring of Lancelot and the fairy woman Elayne--Arthur as a fairy king in Kulhwch and Olwen--Gwynn ab Nudd--Arthur like Dagda, and like Osiris--Brythonic fairy-romances: their evolution and antiquity--Arthur in Nennius, Geoffrey, Wace, and in Layamon--Cambrensis' Otherworld tale--Norman-French writers of twelfth and thirteenth centuries--Romans d'Aventure and Romans Bretons--Origins of the 'Matter of Britain'--Fairy-romance episodes in Welsh literature--Brythonic origins.

ARTHUR AND ARTHURIAN MYTHOLOGY

As we have just considered the Gaelic Divinities in their character as the Fairy-Folk of popular Gaelic tradition, so now we proceed to consider the Brythonic Divinities in the same way, beginning with the greatest of them all, Arthur. Even a superficial acquaintance with the Arthurian Legend shows how impossible it is to place upon it any one interpretation to the exclusion of other interpretations, for in one aspect Arthur is a Brythonic divinity and in another a sixth-century Brythonic chieftain. But the explanation of this double aspect seems easy enough when we regard the historical Arthur as a great hero, who, exactly as in so many parallel cases of national hero-worship, came--within a comparatively short time--to be enshrined in the imagination of the patriotic Brythons with all the attributes anciently belonging to a great Celtic god called Arthur.[284] The hero and the god were first confused, and then identified, [285] and hence arose that wonderful body of romance which we call Arthurian, and which has become the glory of English literature.

Arthur in the character of a culture hero,[286] with god-like powers to instruct mortals in wisdom, and, also, as a being in some way related to the sun--as a sun-god perhaps--can well be considered the human-divine institutor of the mystic brotherhood known as the Round Table. We ought, probably, to consider Arthur, like Cuchulainn, as a god incarnate in a human body for the purpose of educating the race of men; and thus, while living as a man, related definitely and, apparently, consciously to the invisible gods or fairy-folk. Among the Aztecs and Peruvians in the New World, there was a widespread belief that great heroes who had once been men have now their celestial abode in the sun, and from time to time reincarnate to become teachers of their less developed brethren of our own race; and a belief of the same character existed among the Egyptians and other peoples of the Old World, including the Celts. It will be further shown, in our study of the Celtic Doctrine of Re-birth, that anciently among the Gaels and Brythons such heroes as Cuchulainn and Arthur were also considered reincarnate sun-divinities.

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