Pryderi's Role In The Mabinogi

The Mabinogion, a complex collection of works of great significance to the Welsh culture: a compilation of texts that cannot be taken literally where each line has some metaphorical and/or cultural significance. This paper will mainly be focusing on the four branches (The Mabinogi), trying to explore the connections between these four relatively independent works that are grouped together to form the Mabinogi. At first glance, there seems to be no connection between the texts except for one thing, which is the character of Pryderi who appears in all four texts. There are two ways to understand Pryderi’s role in the Mabinogi, the first is that he is just a minor character who was put in so that a connection can be made between the four texts,
The reason why is that he was actually an old Celtic hero. The Celts have a standard model they have on the idea of what makes a hero and Pryderi fits many of them. These characteristics are exemplified in the first branch, Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed, which was briefly mentioned before. The story starts out with the story of Pwyll which eventually leads up the birth of Pryderi. When Pryderi was born, he was taken away by most likely some supernatural force as suggested when it is described how all Rhiannon, his mother, and her handmaidens all mysteriously falls asleep. Later on, he mysteriously appears at Teyrnon’s, the lord of Gwent Is Coed, house on May eve. That night, Teyrnon was guarding his horse since each May eve, when his mare gave birth to a foal, the foal would mysteriously disappears and he finally decided to find out what is going on. That night, after his mare gave birth, he saw a huge hand reaching for the foal and so he cut the hand off. Afterwards, when he hears a noise outside, he went out to see what’s outside and by the time he returns, he saw Pryderi laying at his door. Being childless, he and his wife decided to raise up the baby themselves. During this time, the pair can see that Pryderi grow at an abnormal pace. By the time he looked like a teen, Teyrnon realizes that his adopted son is actually Pwyll’s son and so went to reunite the two and became Pryderi’s foster father instead. From the above summary, there are already many of the characteristics of an old Celtic hero. The following is a list of some of the common characteristics of a hero that Pryderi