Thursday 31 August 2023

Peredur: Flower of Warriors, Candle of Knights

Peredur: A Grail Romance? Part V

“Historia Peredur vab Efrawg …. is a microcosm of almost all the problems which can be found in early Welsh prose literature. It is virtually impossible to unravel the manuscript tradition, and because of this it is difficult to settle upon an ‘authoritative’ text; the narrative structure has been analysed in different ways, and widely differing suggestions have been advanced as to the underlying structure which unifies the romance; and the relationship of the story to other versions, notably Chrétien’s Conte du graal and its continuations, appears less than straightforward.”1

The majority of studies of the Middle Welsh tale Peredur, son of Efrog tend to focus on its relationship with Chrétien de Troyes Perceval, or The Story of the Grail. Chrétien’s eloquent writing style and enthralling storytelling has led to a persistence in priority of the French text with the former dismissed as a pale imitation of the latter, Peredur seen as a poorly structured adaption from the French. However, this conclusion fails to give merit to the original tale as can be deciphered from careful analysis of the manuscript tradition instead of rushing into comparisons with the French.

The 'standard' (full or long) version of Peredur son of Efrog, familiar to most of us as found in the collection of tales in The Mabinogion, is found in two manuscripts: the “White Book of Rhydderch” (Aberystwyth, National Library of Wales, Peniarth 4–5, dated c. 1350); and the “Red Book of Hergest” (Oxford, Bodleian Library, Jesus College 111), which is dated slightly later to between 1382 and c.1400. The versions of Peredur found in these two manuscripts are very similar. 

It is certainly true that the popular version of ‘Peredur’ as found in the Mabinogion collection taken from the Red Book of Hergest contains episodes that mirror sections of Chrétien’s tale. However, there are earlier versions of Peredur in which the claimed French influence is noticeably absent from certain sections. 

Valley of the Mills (Alan Lee)

Narrative Structure
In Peredur the hero’s initial journey transforms him from a country bumpkin into a skilful knight; following on from the procession of a bleeding spear and a severed head at his uncle’s castle he embarks on a further series of adventures in which he gains the love of Angharad (Golden-Hand), before winning the admiration of the empress of Constantinople, with whom he rules for fourteen years; finally he embarks on a series of further adventures that leads him to the Fortress of Wonders, where the procession is explained and he gains vengeance on the witches of Caerloyw. 

It was noted in Part III - Peredur: From Caerllion to Constantinople that the so-called standard version of the tale, as found in the Red Book and White Book, contains logical breaks in the story using a standard formula with each section beginning and ending at King Arthur’s court at Caerllion:

1. The first section begins in the Welsh Woods where Peredur leaves his mother to become a knight, goes to Arthur’s court and ends after Peredur befriends Gwalchmai and they return to Caerllion.

2. The next section commences with "The first night Peredur came to Caerllion to Arthur's court" when he met Angharad Law Eurog (Golden Hand). After a series of adventures, he returns to Arthur's court as the ‘Mute Knight’ and wins the love of Angharad.

3. The next section again begins "Arthur was in Caerllion ar Wysg" and ends with Peredur, now known as the ‘Knight of the Mill,’ …. ‘and there did he stayed with the empress fourteen years’. There is a reason why the formula of returning to Arthur’s court is not used here as we will see below.

4. The final section again begins with the same formula "Arthur was in Caerllion ar Wysg" when a black, curly-haired maiden arrives at Arthur’s court on a yellow mule, and after a series of further adventures culminating in the death of the witches of Caerloyw, ends with “And that is what is told of the Fortress of Wonders” breaking the previous links returning to Arthur’s court at Caerllion suggesting closure of the episode of the black, curly-haired maiden, but perhaps leaving the tale open for further addition opening with “Arthur was in Caerllion”.

One can imagine oral delivery of the tale to a court audience with the people knowing a new adventure commenced when the storyteller opened with the words, "Arthur was in Caerllion”.

As we can see the tale has four logical sections divided by events, starting or returning, at Arthur’s court at Caerllion. The exception to this being the very opening episode in the Welsh woods, and the very end of the standard (Mabinogion) version at the Fortress of Wonders and the killing of the witches of Caerloyw.

One exception to the ‘Caerllion rule’ is the third section which ends at Constantinople where Peredur stayed with the Empress for 14 years; the text ends with “And thus ends the Progress of Peredur ab Efrawg”. This ending is very similar to the closure of the Branches of the Mabinogi which use a similar phrase to close the respective branch, clearly implying that this was the end of the original tale of Peredur, apparent by not ending back at Arthur’s court at Caerllion with the final section with the black, curly-haired maiden being a bolt-on episode to align the procession of the bleeding lance and the severed head with the Grail procession in Chrétien de Troyes Perceval as stated in Part IV – Peredur: The Procession

However, learned scholars, more qualified than myself, have divided the tale into three parts. For example, Mary Williams2 saw the tale with a tripartite structure:

i) from the beginning to the end of the drops of blood in the snow episode,

ii) the story of Angharad Golden-Hand, Peredur’s adventures in the Round Valley, the Black Opressor, the Sons of the King of Suffering, and the Addanc, the Serpent with the Ring, The Miller and the Empress of Constantinople,

iii) from the arrival of the black, curly-haired maiden to the death of the witches of Caerloyw.  

Williams was surely correct in arguing that the variations in the first part and the last part indicates they were the work of different authors. Williams saw the events described in the last section being added at a later date as they were necessary for the explanation of the first part, and copied directly from the French.

Brynley Roberts also sees three sections to the tale of Peredur which are essentially the same as Williams:

Part A - departure from his mother, to King Arthur's court, the lame nobleman, the procession

Part B - Anghard Golden-Hand, the empress of Constantinople

Part C - opens with the black, curly-haired maiden, ending with death of the witches of Caerloyw.3

The manuscript tradition confirms the separation between these three sections; Roberts claims that in two of the four manuscripts which preserve the tale of Peredur, the section breaks are clearly marked by introducing each with a large capital. These capitals are only used to mark the beginning of these three sections and do not appear anywhere else in the narrative, indicating the importance of these break points.4

We can shed some clarification on the situation when we consider that copies of the tale of Peredur can be found in two further medieval manuscripts; while parts A and B are present in all four manuscripts, Part C is not. 

In addition to the ‘standard’ version found in the White Book of Rhydderch and the Red Book of Hergest there is also two versions that are designated as ‘fragments’ incomplete or deficient of some of the text. One is found in MS Peniarth 14, which breaks off mid-sentence during Peredur's visit to his second uncle, and an earlier version found in MS Peniarth 7, which is deficient of the opening section and ends with Peredur ruling with the empress of Constantinople. 


Notes and References:
1. Ian Lovecy, Historia Peredur Ab Efrawg, in Arthur of the Welsh, Wales University Press, 1991, pp.171.
2. Mary Williams, Essai sur la composition du roman gallois de Peredur, 1909.
3. Brynley F. Roberts, ‘”Peredur Son of Efrawc”: A Text in Translation’, 2000, Arthuriana 10.
4. Ibid.


Sunday 20 August 2023

Peredur: The Procession

Peredur: A Grail Romance? Part IV

It is said that Chretien de Troyes’ French ‘Perceval, or the Story of the Grail’ is the source for the Welsh text ‘Peredur son of Efrog’; or, conversely, that Peredur is the source of Perceval; or perhaps they both derive from a common source? But it is not as simple as an adaption of one text or the other, as the long versions of Peredur found in the Red Book of Hergest and White Book of Rhydderch roughly mirror its French counterpart at the beginning and the end, but the Welsh text exhibits distinct variations to its continental equivalent such as the central part, featuring Angharad Golden-Hand and the empress of Constantinople, which is unique to the Welsh tale. But one episode that eternally binds the two texts is the mysterious procession at the lame king’s castle.

The Procession
Without doubt the mysterious procession at the castle of the lame nobleman bears the greatest similarity between the Welsh text of ‘Peredur Son of Efrog’ and the French ‘Perceval, or The Story of the Grail’; this brief passage has attracted the attention, but little agreement, of scholars for decades. Although the episode of the procession in the two tales is remarkably similar, in both texts, for example, it is a simple serving dish preceded by a bleeding lance or spear. And yet there are significant differences between them. 

Perceval witnesses the Grail procession at the table of the Fisher King.
From a 1330 manuscript of Perceval ou Le Conte du Graal by Chrétien de Troyes,
(BnF Français 12577, fol. 74v, c.1330)

In Chretien’s version this dish is golden and adorned with rich gemstones, emits a brilliant radiance that makes candles seem dim by comparison, is termed the ‘Grail’ and has captured the Western imagination for nearly a thousand years. Chretien calls this vessel ‘un graal’ from the Old French for a simple shallow dish or large serving tray, derived from the Medieval Latin ‘gradalis, gradale’: “a flat dish or shallow vessel.” We should note that in Chretien’s initial mention of the Grail procession at the castle of the Fisher King, there is no mention of the contents of the Grail and emphasis is clearly focused on the vessel itself.

When Chretien later returns to the Grail it is within the adventures of Gauvain (English = Gawain, Welsh = Gwalchmai) which takes up the final part of his tale and is no more than a brief mention by a hermit who Perceval meets on Good Friday after five years in which he spent in search of strange and daunting adventures, sending sixty knights as prisoners to King Arthur’s court. In that five years he never set foot in a church and had forgotten what day it was. This section is loaded with Christian overtones spending much of the short episode on the meaning of the Eucharist. Perceval takes penance by eating only the same food as the hermit for the next two days. On Easter Day Perceval received communion. The hermit turns out to be his uncle who explains that the vessel he saw at the castle of the lame Fisher King, the Grail, contains a single host (a mass wafer) that miraculously sustains the Fisher King’s wounded father. 

Chretien adds that the story says no more about Perceval for now as he has much to tell of Gauvain before he returns to him. This turns out to be Chretien’s final mention of the Grail, the final part of his poem concentrating on the adventures of Gauvain, and Perceval has by now disappeared from the story. Chretien’s text later breaks off unfinished during Gauvain’s adventures without any explanation of the mystery of the Grail. 

The short episode in the Perceval when the Hermit explains the mystery of the Grail has the feel of a later addition to the text, although in the majority of manuscripts there is no indication of a change in author, the text continues without any break, as it does in one Continuation to another. It is generally argued that Chretien intended to return to the adventures of Perceval to conclude his tale but this is far from certain. There is no evidence to support such a notion and we could just as easily argue that Chretien purposefully left his story unfinished to maintain the enigma of the Grail. If so, it certainly worked.

If the final section of Chretien’s tale, with the focus on Gauvain, has the feel of a later addition to the main story, we could certainly say the same for the final section of Peredur that it centered on the Fortress of Wonders.

The Ugly Maiden
In both the Welsh text ‘Peredur son of Efrog’ and Chretien de Troyes’ French ‘Perceval, or the Story of the Grail’, a hideous old hag on a mule (in Peredur the ‘black, curly-haired maiden’, or the ‘Ugly Damsel’ in Chretien’s Perceval) from the Castle of Pride reprimands the hero because he failed to ask the meaning of the procession that he witnessed at the lame nobleman’s castle (the ‘Fisher King’ in Chretien). As we have seen above Part III Peredur: From Caerllion to Constantinople, in the Welsh text the maiden tells Peredur that he is not worthy of her greeting because:

“When you came to the court of the lame king and when you saw there the young man carrying the sharpened spear, and from the tip of the spear a drop of blood streaming down to the young man’s fist, and you saw other wonders there, too––you did not question their meaning or their cause.”1

In Chretien’s version he provides a quite vivid description of this repulsive looking old hag mounted on a tawny mule, “if my source is to be believed, there was no such utterly hideous creature even in hell” he writes.  Again, in Perceval as in Peredur, she greets the king and his knights but takes Perceval to task for not asking about the bleeding lance or the grail calling him the “wretched one”. 

She leaves for the Castle of Pride where there are 560 knights of worth, each with a noble lady, adding that if anyone aspired to be the finest in the world he could win that title by going to the peak of Montesclaire where a damsel is besieged. Anyone who could free the girl would win the greatest honour and praise. With that she fell silent and rode off. Gauvain leapt up and said he would go to Montesclaire to rescue the girl, while Perceval declared that he would seek the mystery of the grail and the lance that bleeds. The French tale then follows Gauvain’s various adventures, including a tournament at Tintagel and a battle with Guigambresil that is postponed for a year so that Gauvain can go in search of ‘the lance with the ever-bleeding head’ as it is written that the time will come when the whole kingdom of Logres will be destroyed by that lance. The story ends without Gauvain obtaining the bleeding lance.

The Welsh version of this section is remarkably similar, particularly the Castle of Pride and the sixty-six and five hundred knights there and the besieged maiden, however it does not mention the tournament at Tintagel. Instead of following the adventures of Gauvain (Gwalchmai) as in the French text, Peredur then embarks on a series of adventures in which he meets a priest who scorns him for wearing armour on Good Friday, reflecting the short episode in Chretien’s Perceval in which he meets the hermit on Good Friday as noted above. When he eventually arrives at the Fortress of Wonders a yellow-haired lad reveals it was he in the guise black-haired maiden, and it was he who brought the head on the salver and the spear with the blood streaming from its tip to its hilt. The lad explains that the head belonged to Peredur’s cousin, killed by the witches of Caerloyw, and they also made his uncle lame. The lad discloses he is Peredur’s cousin.2

In Chretien’s text the ‘graal’ is revealed, in Peredur the head on the salver is explained, but in neither text is the lance that bleeds explained, indeed no more is said of it until the many Continuations and later Romance adaptions of the ‘Story of the Grail conclude Chretien’s unfinished work, when it is explained as the spear of the Roman centurion Longinus that pierced Christ’s side when he hung on the cross

In the final section (Fortress of Wonders) of the Welsh text the head on the salver swimming in blood is revealed as Peredur’s cousin for which the witches of Caerloyw were responsible, it is also revealed that they made the greyhaired man lame. Peredur said he would not sleep in peace until he knew the story and significance of the spear about which the Black-maiden spoke – but the mystery of the bleeding spear is never revealed in either text.

In addition to the differences with the French text, there are internal inconsistencies in the Welsh text; On arrival at Arthur’s court the Black-maiden said, “….. you came to the court of the lame king and when you saw there the young man carrying the sharpened spear, and from the tip of the spear a drop of blood streaming down to the young man’s fist”.

Peredur’s first uncle was lame, but the procession occurred at the court of his second uncle. 

The details of the bleeding spear/lance differ also, whereas in the earlier scene at his second uncle’s castle a huge spear is carried by two lads which had three streams of blood running from its socket to the floor.

In the same account found earlier in the Welsh text two maidens carried the large salver between them with a man’s severed head, but at the Fortress of Wonders the yellow-haired lad reveals it was he who carried the head on the salver and he who carried the spear. Whereas we can accept the Celtic art of shapeshifting for the change in gender, it is difficult to explain how two lads carrying the bleeding spear become one, similarly two maidens carrying the head on a slaver is later explained as one lad.

Peredur is not chastised for failing to ask about the procession until the Black-maiden arrives at Arthur’s court in the final section (the Fortress of Wonders); in the earlier section immediately after he left his second uncle’s castle he meets a girl cradling a dead knight, she is his foster-sister and reveals the dwarfs are the dwarfs of his father and mother and that his mother has died, but she does not tell Peredur he should have asked questions about the procession.

In Chretien’s Perceval, the maiden he meets immediately after he left the castle of the Fisher King, reprimands him for failing to ask about the procession of the spear and the grail.

And in Chretien’s account it is one lad carrying the bleeding lance, which from the head came a drop of blood which ran down to the boy's hand. And a single maiden carried the grail.

During the procession, in between the bleeding lance and the grail, in Perceval two lads come in with two candlesticks each with at least ten burning candles, then finally a girl carries a silver trencher.

In Peredur we have no candlesticks in the procession at all but weeping and wailing following the bleeding spear, and no silver trencher, but the procession ends with loud shrieking and wailing by all following the severed head.

Evidently, these internal inconsistencies between the earlier Welsh text and the final section of ‘Peredur’ at the Fortress of Wonders suggest a final episode was bolted on to the original storyline  at a later date to align the Welsh text with Chretien’s French tale.

To determine the likelihood of this we now need to consider the content of the earlier versions of Peredur Son of Efrog and subsequent manuscript dating.



Notes & References
1. Sioned Davies, editor and translator, The Mabinogion, Oxford University Press, 2007, Peredur Son of Efrog, p.94.
2. Ibid. p.104


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Monday 14 August 2023

Peredur: From Caerllion to Constantinople

 Peredur: A Grail Romance? Part III

Mabinogionfrage
Traditionally, the Middle Welsh tales of ‘Peredur son of Efrog’, ‘Geraint son of Erbin’, and 'Owain, or The Lady of the Well’ have been known as ‘the three romances’ in part because they correspond to the late-12th century French romances of Chrétien de Troyes. 

The general consensus is that all three of the Welsh Romances are adaptions derived from Chrétien de Troyes's original works: Owain (Chwedl Iarlles Y Fynawn) is clearly related to Chrétien's Ywain, Le Chevalier du Lion; Geraint (Chwedl Geraint ab Erbin) closely follows Erec et Enid, and Peredur (Historia Peredur ab Efrawg) is typically seen as a Welsh version of Perceval, or Le Conte du Graal. However, scholars have long debated the exact nature of this relationship.

Since the 19th century scholars have grouped the Three Welsh romances together as a collective group in editions of The Mabinogion and these three texts certainly hold an affinity to their French counterparts. Yet as we have seen in Part I: Peredur: A Grail Romance? there is no manuscript authority for such a grouping of the three Welsh romances which hold no connection in date or authorship between them. Yet the Mabinogion grouping has certainly influenced the general perception of the three Welsh romances as counterparts of the French texts.

However, the relationship with Chrétien’s works differs from one Welsh romance (Welsh: ‘rhamantau’) to another, the tales in their extant form exhibit varying degrees of influence from the French sources; or is it the other way around? The ongoing controversy surrounding the influences of the three rhamantau and their French analogues is termed the ‘Mabinogionfrage’. 

Unlike the other Welsh rhamantau that have clear relationships to their French counterparts, the story of Peredur exhibits distinct variations to its continental equivalent, Chrétien de Troyes’s Perceval. It is said that Perceval is the source for Peredur, or that Peredur is the source of Perceval, or they both derive from a common source. There seems a reluctance to give priority to the Welsh text, consequently the ‘common source’ is seen as a satisfactory compromise.

However, we are not looking at a simple adaption of one text or the other, as the long versions of Peredur found in the Red Book and White Book roughly mirror its French counterpart at the beginning and the end, but the central part of the Welsh tale is unique.

The Roman Remains at Caerleon probably influenced
Geoffrey of Monmouth in locating King Arthur's Court there.

Arthur’s Court
The three Welsh Romances have as their focus the court at Caerllion (Caerleon) on Usk, home to King Arthur and Gwenhwyfar, his queen. But here Arthur's role is similar to that of the Continental romances where he is generally on the periphery of the story with the main adventure focused on his knights.

In each adventure the hero embarks on a journey in order to prove himself; once he has moved beyond Arthur’s court he comes to mysterious castles with grey-haired noblemen and beautiful maidens; challenging knights who must be defeated and vulnerable widows who must be defended. However, in each of the Welsh Romances the emphasis is different, so that although the three tales share common themes, which indeed set them apart from the other Mabinogion tales, they should not be regarded as a structured group or the work of a single author. 

Indeed, it may be significant that in both the White Book and Red Book collections ‘The Dream of the Emperor Maxen’ is preceded by ‘Peredur son of Efrog’. The author of 'Maxen' certainly had an interest in Caernarfon, and the author of the earliest version of 'Peredur' has been identified as coming from North Wales1; it seems probable that both texts are a product of the court of Gwynedd.2

Indeed, as we have seen, they have not been copied as a group in the extant manuscripts; neither do they share a common manuscript tradition. Moreover, although they exhibit some of the broad characteristics of romance, such as acts of chivalry and knightly virtues, they do not sit comfortably within that genre, so that the misleading term ‘the three romances’ becomes inappropriate. If we accept that they may be very loose retellings of Chrétien’s tales, they have certainly been adapted for the native audience with structure and style sitting comfortably within the Welsh narrative tradition.3

The Three Welsh Romances are far removed from another Mabinogion tale seen in the world of ‘How Culhwch Won Olwen’ where Arthur holds court in Celli Wig in Cornwall. It would appear the relocation of Arthur's court to Caerllion is influenced by Geoffrey of Monmouth's 12th century chronicle Historia Regum Britanniae (History of the Kings of Britain). In his preface to Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur William Caxton describes ruins sounding very like the Roman fortress of Isca (Caerllion),“in Camelot, the great stones and the marvelous works of iron lying underground, and the royal vaults which many now living have seen.

In Peredur the hero’s initial journey transforms him from a country bumpkin (as Sioned Davies describes him4) into a skillful knight; after a series of adventures he gains the love of Angharad (Golden-Hand), before winning the admiration of the empress of Constantinople, with whom he rules for fourteen years; finally he embarks on a series of further adventures that leads him to the Castle of Wonders, where the procession is explained and he gains vengeance on the witches of Caerloyw.

Yet, the Welsh text has been criticised for being poorly written and showing a lack of development of the character, displaying no interest in feelings or motives, with the emphasis firmly on the adventures.5

Peredur is structurally different to the other Welsh Romances; whereas the 'full' (or long) version is found in the White Book and Red Book, there is also two incomplete versions, one found in manuscript Peniarth 14, which breaks off mid-sentence during Peredur's visit to his second uncle, and an earlier version is found in MS Peniarth 7 which is deficient of the opening section and ends with Peredur ruling with the empress of Constantinople.

For the purpose of this essay I am referring to the full version of the tale as contained in the White Book and Red Book.6 The tale contains logical breaks in the story using a stand formula; each section beginning and ending at Arthur’s court.

The first section begins in the Welsh Woods with Peredur and his mother where she has taken the last of her sons away from society so as not to loose him to battle or tournaments as with her husband Efrog of the North and other sons, and ends after Peredur befriends Gwalchmai and they returned to Caerllion.

The next section commences with "The first night Peredur came to Caerllion to Arthur's court" when he met Angharad Law Eurog (Golden Hand). After a series of adventures, he returns to Arthur's court as the ‘Mute Knight’ and wins the love of Angharad.

The next section begins "Arthur was in Caerllion ar Wysg" and ends with Peredur, now known as the ‘Knight of the Mill,’ ruling with the empress of Constantinople for fourteen years ... "according to the story."

The final section again begins with the same formula "Arthur was in Caerllion ar Wysg". A black, curly-haired maiden arrives on a yellow mule and greeted Arthur but told Peredur he was not worthy of her greeting because when he went to the court of the lame king and saw the young man carrying the spear with a drop of blood streaming down to the young man’s fist, and other wonders, he did not question their meaning. To redeem himself Peredur sets off on another series of adventures ending at the Castle of Wonders.

The first section shows close proximity to Chrétien’s text, corresponding to the first part of the French tale in that it tells of the hero's days in the Welsh woods, first sighting of knights and desire to become such, meeting the maiden in the pavilion; arrival at Arthur's court; animosity from Cai (Kay); the Red Knight who insulted the queen with the goblet of wine; and the visits to the castles of the two uncles, where at the second he witnesses the strange procession. However, it must be stressed the Welsh text should not be considered a mirror of the French as there are certainly some scenes in Peredur that are absent from Chrétien’s tale and others placed in different order.

The second and third sections, featuring Angharad Law Eurog and ending with the empress of Constantinople are entirely absent from the French text.

The fourth and final section of the Welsh text has the feel of a bolt-on episode, perhaps written by a different author, with the appearance of the black, curly-haired maiden being equivalent to Chrétien’s Ugly Damsel who takes the hero to task for not asking questions about the procession. In Chrétien’s version Perceval is first taken to task directly after the episode at the Grail Castle in the first section. After leaving the Grail Castle he immediately meets a young maiden who cradles a dead knight. She calls him ‘Perceval the Wretched’ because he failed to question the meaning of the procession. She reveals herself as Perceval’s cousin and tells him that his mother has died.

If the Welsh version were a copy of Chrétien’s text then the copyist has inserted the second and third sections with Angharad and the empress before the hero is chastised by the black, curly-haired maiden for not asking the meaning of what he witnessed at the castle of the lame grey-haired man, Chrétien’s Fisher King. Significantly, there is no mention of the word “Grail” in the Welsh text.


Notes & References
1. Canhwyll Marchogyon: Cyd-destunoli Peredur, editors Sioned Davies, Peter Wynn Thomas, University of Wales Press, 2000.
2. Sioned Davies, editor and translator, The Mabinogion, Oxford University Press, 2007, Introduction, p.xx.
3. Ibid. p.xi.
4. Ibid.p.xxiv.
5. Ian Lovecy, Historia Peredur Ab Efrawg, in Arthur of the Welsh, edited by Rachel Bromwich, A.O.H. Jarman, Brynley F. Roberts, University of Wales Press, Second edition, 2008, pp.171-182.
6. I have used the version of Peredur son of Efrog contained in Sioned Davies edition of The Mabinogion, Oxford University Press, 2007, pp.65-102.


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