Canu Cadwallon

Canu Cadwallon ('the Singing of Cadwallon', Welsh pronunciation: [ˈkanɨ̞ kadˈwaɬɔn]) is the name given by R. Geraint Gruffydd and subsequent scholars to four Middle Welsh poems associated with Cadwallon ap Cadfan, king of Gwynedd (d. 634 AD). Their titles come from the now-lost book entitled Y Kynveirdh Kymreig 'The Earliest Welsh Poets' (Hengwrt MS 120), compiled by the seventeenth-century antiquarian Robert Vaughan of Hengwrt. Later catalogues derived from this manuscript preserve the titles of these poems. Three of the four poems concerning Cadwallon were copied in other texts. One surviving poem is called 'Moliant Cadwallon' by modern scholars or 'Cerdd y Cor a'r Gorres' in the catalogues of Vaughan's manuscript. Fifty-six lines of the poem survive. It appears to refer to events just before the Battle of Hatfield Chase (Old Welsh: Gueith Meicen) in 633, as Cadwallon's final victory over Edwin of Northumbria is not mentioned in the poem. After narrating Cadwallon's expulsion of the English from Gwynedd, the poet exhorts the king to take the fight to Edwin, "set York ablaze" and "kindle fire in the land of Elfed".

There are two other poems concerning the king, with one known as 'Marwnad Cadwallon ap Cadfan' or 'Englynion Cadwallon', and the other as 'Gofara Braint'. The former poem lists Cadwallon's battles and ends with a reference to his death in the Battle of Heavenfield (Old Welsh: Cant Scaul) in 634, but is thought to be ninth- or tenth-century at the earliest, based on its similarities to other early Welsh 'saga' literature like Canu Heledd and Canu Llywarch Hen. 'Gofara Braint' survives only in five lines, and refers to Edwin's head being brought to the court of Aberffraw after the battle of Hatfield Chase. The last poem, titled 'I Gadwallon ap Cadfan, brenin Prydain' by Vaughan, is completely lost. Were this poem earlier than 'Englynion Cadwallon', it may have informed some of the content of that poem, perhaps together with the lost sections of 'Gofara Braint'.

There is no author given to any poem in the manuscripts, though the Welsh Triads give the name of Cadwallon's chief poet as Afan Ferddig. Excepting one copy of 'Englynion Cadwallon' which survives in the fourteenth-century Red Book of Hergest, the three surviving poems exist only in seventeenth-century manuscripts. Nevertheless, scholars of medieval Welsh literature generally regard 'Moliant Cadwallon' as a genuine seventh-century composition, which would make it one of the oldest works in Welsh literature alongside those attributed to Aneirin and Taliesin. While not edited as part of Canu Cadwallon, there is also a fragmentary verse in Peniarth MS 21 supposedly composed by Cadwallon ap Cadfan which narrates an episode of his exile in Ireland.