The Book of Taliesin is one of the most famous of Middle Welsh manuscript

Manuscript

A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...

s, dating from the first half of the 14th century though many of the fifty-six poems it preserves are taken to originate in the 10th century. The manuscript, known as Peniarth MS 2 and kept at the National Library of Wales

National Library of Wales

The National Library of Wales , Aberystwyth, is the national legal deposit library of Wales; one of the Welsh Government sponsored bodies.Welsh is its main medium of communication...

, is incomplete, having lost a number of its original leaves including the first. It was named Llyfr Taliessin in the 17th century by Edward Lhuyd

Edward Lhuyd

Edward Lhuyd was a Welsh naturalist, botanist, linguist, geographer and antiquary. He is also known by the Latinized form of his name, Eduardus Luidius....

 and hence is known in English as "The Book of Taliesin".

The volume contains a collection of some of the oldest poems in Welsh, though many of them, particularly those attributed to the Dark Age poet Taliesin

Taliesin

Taliesin was an early British poet of the post-Roman period whose work has possibly survived in a Middle Welsh manuscript, the Book of Taliesin...

 who was active towards the end of the 6th century, would have been composed in the Cumbric dialect of the north

Hen Ogledd

Yr Hen Ogledd is a Welsh term used by scholars to refer to those parts of what is now northern England and southern Scotland in the years between 500 and the Viking invasions of c. 800, with particular interest in the Brythonic-speaking peoples who lived there.The term is derived from heroic...

.

A core of praise poems of Urien Rheged is generally attributed to the historical Taliesin. The manuscript also preserves a few hymns, a small collection of elegies to famous men such as Cunedda

Cunedda

Cunedda ap Edern , was an important early Welsh leader, and the progenitor of the royal dynasty of Gwynedd.-Background and life:The name Cunedda derives from the Brythonic word , meaning good hound. His genealogy is traced back to Padarn Beisrudd, which literally translates as Paternus of the...

 and Dylan Eil Ton

Dylan Eil Ton

Dylan ail Don is a character in the Welsh mythic Mabinogion tales, particularly in the fourth tale, "Math fab Mathonwy"...

 and also famous enigmatic poems such as The Battle of Trees

Cad Goddeu

Cad Goddeu is a medieval Welsh poem preserved in the 14th-century manuscript known as the Book of Taliesin. The poem refers to a traditional story in which the legendary enchanter Gwydion animates the trees of the forest to fight as his army...

and The Spoils of Annwfn

Preiddeu Annwfn

Preiddeu Annwfn or Preiddeu Annwn is a cryptic early medieval Welsh poem of sixty lines found in the Book of Taliesin. The text recounts an expedition with King Arthur to Annwfn or Annwn, a Welsh otherworld...

(in which the poet claims to have sailed to another world with Arthur and his warriors). Several of these contain internal claims to be the work of Taliesin, but cannot be.

Many poems in the collection allude to Christian and Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 texts as well as native British tradition, and the book contains the earliest mention in any western vernacular literature of the feats of Hercules

Hercules

Hercules is the Roman name for Greek demigod Heracles, son of Zeus , and the mortal Alcmene...

 and Alexander the Great.

Contents by topic

Titles adapted from Skene. The Urien Rheged praise-poems are usually considered the oldest and credibly attributed to Taliesin. Other categories are for guidance only.

Praise poems to Urien Rheged

• XXXI "Gwaeith Gwen ystrad" ("The Battle of Gwen ystrad")
• XXXII Urien Yrechwydd (A Song for Urien Rheged)
• XXXIII Eg gorffowys (A Song for Urien Rheged)
• XXXIV Bei Lleas Vryan (A Song for Urien Rheged)
• XXXV "Gweith Argoet Llwyfein"("The Battle of Argoed Llwyfain")
• XXXVI Arddwyre Reged (A Song for Urien Rheged)
• XXXVII "Yspeil Taliesin" ("The Spoils of Taliesin")
• XXXIX "Dadolwch Vryen" ("The Satisfaction of Urien")

Other praise-songs

• XII "Glaswawt Taliesin" ("The Praise of Taliesin")
• XIV "Kerd Veib am Llyr" ("Song Before the Sons of Llyr")
• XV "Kadeir Teyrnon" ("The Chair of the Sovereign")
• XVIII Kychwedyl am dodyw ("A rumour has come to me")
• XIX "Kanu y Med" ("Song of Mead")
• XX "Kanu y Cwrwf" ("Song of Ale")
• XXI "Mic Dinbych" ("Praise of Tenby")
• XXIII "Trawsganu Kynon" ("Satire on Cynan Garwyn")
• XXV Torrit anuyndawl (Song of the Horses)
• XXXVIII Rhagoriaeth Gwallawc(Song on Gwallawg ab Lleenawg)

Elegies

• XL "Marwnat Erof" (Elegy of Erof [Ercwlf])
• XLI "Marwnat Madawg" (Elegy of Madawg)
• XLII "Marwnat Corroi ap Dayry" (Elegy of Cu-Roi son of Daire)
• XLIII "Marwnat Dylan eil Ton" (Elegy of Dylan son of the Wave)
• XLIV "Marwnat Owain ap Vryen" (Elegy of Owain son of Urien)
• XLV "Marwnat Aeddon" (Elegy of Aeddon)
• XLVI "Marwnat Cunedda" (Elegy of Cunedda)
• XLVIII "Marwnat Vthyr Pen" (Elegy of Uthyr Pen(dragon))

Hymns and Christian verse

• II Marwnat y Vil Veib ("Elegy of a Thousand Sons", a memoir of the saints)
• V Deus Duw ("O God, God of Formation", Of the Day of Judgment)
• XXII "Plaeu yr Reifft" ("The Plagues of Egypt", Mosaic history)
• XXIV Lath Moessen ("The Rod of Moses", Of Jesus)
• XXVI Y gofiessvys byt ("The Contrived World", Of Alexander)
• XXVII Ar clawr eluyd ("On the Face of the Earth", Of Jesus)
• XXVIII Ryfedaf na chiawr (Of Alexander the Great)
• XXIX Ad duw meidat ("God the Possessor", Hymn to the god of Moses, Israel, Alexander)
• LI Trindawt tragywyd ("The Eternal Trinity")

Prophetic

• VI "Armes Prydein Vawr" ("The Great Prophesy of Britain")
• X "Daronwy" ("Daronwy")
• XLVII "Armes Prydein Bychan" ("The Lesser Prophesy of Britain")
• XLIX Kein gyfedwch ("A bright festivity")
• LII "Gwawt Lud y Mawr" ("The Greater Praise of Lludd")
• LIII Yn wir dymbi romani kar ("Truly there will be to me a Roman friend")
• LIV "Ymarwar Llud Bychan" ("The Lesser Reconciliation of Lludd")
• LVII Darogan Katwal[adr?] ("Prophecy of Cadwallader" (title only))

Philosophic and gnomic

• I "Priv Cyfarch" ("Taliesin's First Address")
• III "Buarch Beird" ("The Fold of the Bards")
• IV "Aduvyneu Taliesin" ("The Pleasant Things of Taliesin")
• VII "Angar Kyfyndawt" ("The Loveless Confederacy")
• VIII "Kat Godeu
  Cad Goddeu
  Cad Goddeu is a medieval Welsh poem preserved in the 14th-century manuscript known as the Book of Taliesin. The poem refers to a traditional story in which the legendary enchanter Gwydion animates the trees of the forest to fight as his army...
  
  " ("The Battle of the Trees")
• XI "Cadau Gwallawc" ("Song on Lleenawg")
• IX "Mab Gyrfeu Taliesin" ("The Childhood Achievements of Taliesin")
• XIII "Kadeir Taliesin" ("The Chair of Taliesin")
• XVI "Kadeir Kerrituen" ("The Chair of Cerridwen")
• XVII "Kanu Ygwynt" ("The Song of the Wind")
• XXX "Preiddu Annwfn" ("The Spoils of Annwn")
• LV "Kanu y Byt Mawr" ("Great Song of the World")
• LVI "Kanu y Byt Bychan" ("Little Song of the World")

External links

• The book of Taliesin at the National Library of Wales. Gives access to colour images of Peniarth MS 2.
• The book of Taliesin, from the 19th century translation by W.F. Skene