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Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed

R.B. 1

This is the beginning of the Mabinogi.[1]

W.B. 1Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed, was lord[2] of the seven cantrefi[3] of Dyfed; and once upon a time he was at Arberth, his chief court,[4] and it came into his heart and mind to go to hunt. The direction of his dominion in which he desired to hunt was Glyn Cuch, and that night he set forth from Arberth, and came as far as the top of Llwyn Diarwya. And that night he remained there, and, on the morrow in the youth of the day,[5] he arose and came to Glyn Cuch in order to let loose the dogs in the wood. And he sounded the horn and started assembling the hunt. And he went on foot after the dogs, and lost touch with his companions; and while he was listening for the baying of the pack, he
  1. ↑ Not in W.B.
  2. ↑ ‘arglwydd’. The ‘arglwydd’ or lord in ancient Wales was nominally subject to the ‘brenhin’ or king. In actual practice he was independent. He was the administrator of the territories under him, rather than the absolute owner. The ‘cantref’ was regarded as the unit of a ‘lordship’, and to be lord over seven ‘cantrefi’ implied a very powerful position.
  3. ↑ ‘cantref’, pl. ‘cantrefi’. A territorial division in Wales, somewhat similar to the English ‘hundred’. Theoretically, a ‘cantref’ contained a hundred ‘trefi’, settlements, or homesteads.
  4. ↑ ‘Ilys’, court. The word is frequently translated ‘palace’; but the term means the residence of a lord or other person having territorial jurisdiction over a tract of country, the place where he dwelt, where renders were made, and where the appellate court of the tract sat.
  5. ↑ ‘the youth of the day’. Professor Loth identifies the time with ‘prime’, i.e. the first three hours after sunrise.
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