Note 59 — Chapter IX · Place-name Stories

Careful observation may be expected to add to the number of these instructive instances. It is, however, not to be supposed that all double forms of the names in these stories are to be explained in exactly the same way. Thus, for instance, corresponding to Lug, genitive Loga, we have the two forms Ỻeu and Ỻew, of which the former alone matches the Irish. But it is to be observed that Ỻeu remains in some verses59 in the story of Math, whereas in the prose he appears to be called Ỻew. It is not improbable that the editing which introduced Ỻew dates comparatively late, and that it was done by a man who was not familiar with the Venedotian place-names of which Ỻeu formed part, namely, Dinỻeu and Nantỻeu, now Dinỻe and Nantỻe. Similarly the two brothers, Gofannon and Amaethon, as they are called in the Mabinogi of Math and in the Kulhwch story, are found also called Gofynyon and Amathaon. The former agrees with the Irish form Goibniu, genitive Goibnenn, whereas Gofannon does not. As to Amaethon or Amathaon the Irish counterpart has, unfortunately, not been identified. Gofannon and Amaethon have the appearance of being etymologically transparent in Welsh, and they have probably been remodelled by the hand of a literary redactor. There were also two forms of the name of Manawyđan in Welsh; for by the side of that there was another, namely, Manawydan, liable to be shortened to Manawyd: both occur in old Welsh poetry60. But manawyd or mynawyd is the Welsh word for an awl, which is significant here, as the Mabinogi called after Manawyđan makes him become a shoemaker on two occasions, whence the Triads style him one of the Three golden Shoemakers of the Isle of Prydain: see the Oxford Mabinogion, p. 308.