Note 16 — Chapter VI · The Folklore of the Wells

There is, however, another Welsh legend concerning a great overflow in which a well does figure: I allude to that of Cantre’r Gwaelod, or the Bottom Hundred, a fine spacious country supposed to be submerged in Cardigan Bay. Modern euhemerism treats it as defended by embankments and sluices, which, we are told, were in the charge of the prince of the country, named Seithennin, who, being one day in his cups, forgot to shut the sluices, and thus brought about the inundation, which was the end of his fertile realm. This, however, is not the old legend: that speaks of a well, and lays the blame on a woman—a pretty sure sign of antiquity, as the reader may judge from other old stories which will readily occur to him. The Welsh legend to which I allude is embodied in a short poem in the Black Book of Carmarthen16: it consists of eight triplets, to which is added a triplet from the Englynion of the Graves. The following is the original with a tentative translation:—