The opening lines of Culhwch and Olwen, from the Red Book of Hergest Kilydd mab Kelydon Wledig a fynnei wraig kyn mwyt ac ef. Sef gwraig a vynna oedd Goleudyd merch Anlawd Wledig.
Culhwch's father,King Cilydd son of Celyddon, loses his wifeGoleuddydd after a difficult childbirth.[1] When he remarries, the young Culhwch rejects his stepmother's attempt to pair him with his new stepsister. Offended, the new queen puts a curse on him so that he can marry no one besides the beautifulOlwen, daughter of thegiantYsbaddaden Pencawr. Though he has never seen her, Culhwch becomes infatuated with her, but his father warns him that he will never find her without the aid of his famous cousinArthur. The young man immediately sets off to seek his kinsman. He finds him at his court inCelliwig in Cornwall.[2][3][4]
Culhwch at Ysbaddaden's court. An illustration byE. Wallcousins inCeltic Myth & Legend, Charles Squire, 1920 "Horses shall I have, and chivalry; and my Lord and kinsmanArthur will obtain for me all these things. And I shall gain thy daughter, and thou shalt lose thy life." "Go forward...and when thou hast compassed all these marvels, thou shalt have my daughter for thy wife."
Arthur agrees to lend help in whatever capacity Culhwch asks, save the lending of his swordCaledfwlch and other named armaments, or his wife.[a][5] He sends not only six of his finest warriors (Cai,Bedwyr,Gwalchmei,Gwrhyr Gwalstawd Ieithoedd,Menw son of Tairgwaedd, Cynddylig Gyfarwydd), but a long list of personages of various skills (includingGwynn ap Nudd) recruited to join Culhwch in his search for Olwen.[6] The group meets some relatives of Culhwch's that know Olwen and agree to arrange a meeting. Olwen is receptive to Culhwch's attraction, but she cannot marry him unless her father Ysbaddaden agrees, and he, unable to survive past his daughter's wedding, will not consent until Culhwch completes a series of about forty impossible-sounding tasks, including the obtaining of the basket/hamper ofGwyddneu Garanhir,[b] the rescue ofMabon from his prison, and the hunt ofTwrch Trwyth andYsgithyrwyn.[8] The completion of only a few of these tasks is recorded. In the end, the giant is killed, leaving Olwen free to marry her lover.
The prevailing view among scholars was that the present version of the text was composed by the 11th century, making it perhaps the earliest Arthurian tale and one ofWales' earliest extant prose texts,[9] but a 2005 reassessment by linguist Simon Rodway dates it to the latter half of the 12th century.[10] The title is a later invention and does not occur in early manuscripts.[11]
The story is on one level afolktale, belonging to the bridal quest "the giant's daughter" tale type[12] (more formally categorized asSix Go through the Whole World type,AT 513A).[13][14][15] The accompanying motifs (the strange birth, the jealous stepmother, the hero falling in love with a stranger after hearing only her name, helpful animals, impossible tasks) reinforce this typing.[16][12]
However, the bridal quest serves merely as aframe story for the rest of the events that form the in-story,[17] where the title characters go largely unmentioned. The in-story is taken up by two long lists and the adventures of King Arthur and his men. One list is a roster of names, some two hundred of the greatest men, women, dogs, horses and swords in Arthur's kingdom recruited to aid Arthur's kinsman Culhwch in his bridal quest.[c] The other is a list of "difficult tasks" or "marvels" (pl.Welsh:anoethau, anoetheu),[20][14] set upon Culhwch as requirements for his marriage to be approved by the bride's father Ysbaddaden. Included in this list are names taken from Irish legend, hagiography, and sometimes actual history.
The fight against the terrible boarTwrch Trwyth certainly has antecedents in Celtic tradition, namely Arthur's boar-hunt with his houndCafall, whose footprint is discussed in theMirabilia appended to theHistoria Brittonum.[21] The description of Culhwch riding on his horse is frequently mentioned for its vividness, and features of the Welsh landscape are narrated in ways that are reminiscent of Irish onomastic narratives.[22] As for the passage where Culhwch is received by his uncle, King Arthur, at Celliwig, this is one of the earliest instances in literature or oral tradition of Arthur's court being assigned a specific location and a valuable source of comparison with the court ofCamelot orCaerleon as depicted in later Welsh, English, and continental Arthurian legends.[citation needed]
Culhwch's horse-ride passage is reused in the 16th-century prose "parody"Araith Wgon, as well as in 17th-century poetic adaptations of that work.[citation needed] The Tolkien scholarTom Shippey has pointed out the similarities betweenThe Tale of Beren and Lúthien, one of the main cycles ofJ. R. R. Tolkien'slegendarium, andCulhwch and Olwen.[23]
Questioning the Ouzel of Cilgwri inCulhwch and Olwen byShirley Jones (2016)
British painter/poetDavid Jones (1895–1974) wrote a poem called "The Hunt" based on the tale ofCulwhch ac Olwen. A fragment of a larger work, "The Hunt" takes place during the pursuit of the boar Twrch Trwyth by Arthur and the various war-bands of Celtic Britain and France.
In 1988,Gwyn Thomas released a retelling of the story,Culhwch ac Olwen, which was illustrated byMargaret Jones.Culhwch ac Olwen won the annualTir na n-Og Award for Welsh language nonfiction in 1989.[24]
Soviet animated filmQuest for Olwen, adapted from the legend, was released in 1990, directed by Valery Ugarov.[25]
Ashadow play adaptation ofCulhwch and Olwen toured schools inCeredigion during 2003. The show was created by Jim Williams and was supported byTheatr Felinfach.
The tale ofCulhwch and Olwen was adapted by Derek Webb in Welsh and English as a dramatic recreation for the reopening ofNarberth Castle in Pembrokeshire in 2005.[citation needed]
The Ballad of Sir Dinadan (2003), the fifth book ofGerald Morris'sThe Squire's Tales series, features an adaptation of Culhwch's quest.
The Quest (2016) is anartist's book byShirley Jones focusing on the quest, which is to find the whereabouts of the prisoner, Mabon, son of Modron, inCulhwch and Olwen.[26]
^abFord (2019) :"At the level of folktale, it belongs to a widely known type, “the giant's daughter.” A number of motifs known to students of the international folktale are clustered here: the jealous stepmother, love for an unknown and unseen maiden, the oldest animals, the helper animals, and the impossible tasks are perhaps the most obvious".
^Chadwick, Nora (1959). "Scéla Muicce Meicc Da Thó". InDillon, Myles (ed.).Irish Sagas. Radio Éireann Thomas Davis Lectures. Irish Stationery Office. p. 89.: "details of Ailbe's route.. recalls the course taken by the boar Twrch Trwyth in..Kuhlwch (sic.) and Olwen
^Tom Shippey,The Road to Middle Earth, pp. 193–194: "The hunting of the great wolf recalls the chase of the boarTwrch Trwyth in the WelshMabinogion, while the motif of 'the hand in the wolf's mouth' is one of the most famous parts of theProse Edda, told ofFenris Wolf and the godTyr; Huan recalls several faithful hounds of legend,Garm, Gelert, Cafall."
Koch, John T. (2014). "The Celtic Lands". InLacy, Norris J. (ed.).Medieval Arthurian Literature: A Guide to Recent Research (revised ed.).Routledge. pp. 256–262.ISBN978-1-317-65695-1.
Parker, Will."Culhwch ac Olwen: A translation of the oldest Arthurian tale".Culhwch ac Olwen. Archived fromthe original on 19 January 2024. Retrieved6 April 2025. Contains extensive footnotes referring to the Welsh text. The original site no longer exists; this is the last Wayback Machine snapshot.
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