The 12 Days of Celtic Mythology, Season 2, Day 7 PLAYLIST for this series: kzfaq.info/sun/PLvCdDm0wPhA3ZPWFBswdctH6sNCrGTuqC&si=MQsqkVPxLX0C_vrR You can read an annotated translation of the original Welsh text at www.culhwch.info or listen to an excellent storyteller telling the whole thing here: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/naebnL2c2bLdep8.html If you’d like to join the live online discussions, you need to become a patron (mininimum cost $2 per month. Cancel any time). www.patreon.com/KrisHughes Information about all my CLASSES is available at: tinyurl.com/GDclasses Today’s sources Lugh and Balor, Culhwch and Ysbaddaden www.patreon.com/posts/lugh-balor-78166157 Jeremiah Curtin. Hero-Tales of Ireland. (1894) p 281, 293 archive.org/details/herotalesofirela00curtuoft/page/283/mode/1up Elizabeth A. Gray Cath Maige Tuired. Irish Texts Society (1982) Sections 56-68, 77-81, 96-120, 133-134 sacred-texts.com/neu/cmt/cmteng.htm Patrick Sims-Williams. Irish Influence on Medieval Welsh Literature. Oxford University Press (2011) p 137-138 Jenny Rowland. Early Welsh Saga Poetry. (1990) p 580 Lugh/Lleu kzfaq.info/get/bejne/bL6joJaXp7jRYGg.html

Great story telling and discussion.

There seems to be several messages that act as ethical guides... No father will hand off his daughter so easily to just any young hero who pries his way into the court. A moment of self-reflection is realized through the denial of entry to the court after each skill is named, as one may reflect on their own skills and the value it adds to oneself. The "Jack" of all trades is key to gaining presence and recognition in the world of any young eligible maiden.

Today’s question is difficult for me having next to no knowledge of plays or satires, but one thought came to mind to add to today’s discussion. Perhaps this story was told in a comic way to engage children, I know it’s been considered that the Mabinogi might have originally been a collection of teaching tales for young noble men.

So many thoughts swirling around my mind for this one. I mentioned in the zoom call it may have been to make the villain seem bafoonish and unworthy. I'd like to add to that. His cowardice at throwing spears at his enemies backs and the bellyaching that followed his immediate kharma seems to me to highlight Ysbaddaden's need to be overthrown. Sidenote: Since we are noticing a potential connection between Lugh and Culhwch, I thought I would point out that Olwen leaving flowers where she walked calls Blodeuwedd to mind.

I think the comedy elements are there as a way to engage more with the audience. We already have romance and adventure, and perhaps comedy is added to balance these. I am also reminded of Ysbadden's list, which Sioned Davies suggests in an endnote is a place in the story where the audience may join in, and maybe even call out the repeating elements as a sort of chorus; if so, this could be another light-hearted way to engage the audience in the story along with the comedic elements the narrator/author would call out. I'll add that I don't feel like I have the ability to recognize medieval Welsh humor. For example, I couldn't help remembering the part of the story from a few days ago when Arthur was asking his court if he could have permission for a nap. On the one hand I can see this as being a familiar trope in medieval and older tales, where the king is poked fun at to reveal his humanity. This part strikes me as a humor, but maybe here there is some non-comedic, even tragic, mood to the scene where the great king is afflicted with basic human concerns, and possibly even showing the tragedy of the aging legend. However, maybe this is exactly where comedy can come in and help soften these harsh realities.

Humour has so many possible uses and so many interpretations. One use of humour could be to engage the audience, another to help an audience remember particular aspects of the tale. It maybe that humour was used to lighten any possible offense members of an audience might feel over particular characters or behaviours in the story. Humour can also be culture specific, for example things someone in the north of England find funny can be very different from someone who grew up in the south. I personally feel that the strongest use of any emotional aspect of a story is to draw the audience in and give that bit of magic and wonder we find in good stories that help them stay in our memories and let us feel more deeply connected.

The story of Odysseus and the Cyclops in the cave who was eating his crew and Odysseus got him drunk and blinded his eye in order to escape, has similarities to Balor One Eyes story.

I wonder if the humour is an addition to the story, a device used by the recorders to influence an audience. The are various ways a change of tone can affect a message. Adding humour might make the protagonist look a bit foolish, using humour might also devalue the impact of the tale by making people laugh at the values etc embedded in it, thus it can be more easily dismissed. If the Welsh scribe is borrowing from an earlier Irish tale they may be devaluing the import by using humour. However I prefer the notion that the tale is humerus because we remember things that make us laugh. Culwych and Olwyn without the humour might be too tedious to tolerate, the humour might help with audience engagement and participation, and by this mechanism, ultimately with remembering.

It feels like quite a dark humour to me, and makes me wonder about the context it was written and told in - perhaps deliberately satirising the hero tales at a time of war, for example, or likening an enemy to Ysbaddaden.

For me I see the humour as a way of engaging the audience, part of the storytelling. It does make me wonder if this was a tale told to a different audience (or different setting) than the 4 branches of the Mabinogion since these, with the possible exception of the threatened hanging of the pregnant mouse, seem far more serious with less humour.

I always wondered how in these tales the giant has a human sized beautiful daughter. And Olwen's father is black but she is blond and fair. And when I was a child reading the Norse stories it was the same. Just thought it was odd.

Isn't there an old tradition of the court jester being the only one who can really poke fun at royalty (or maybe this is simply a "rumor")? Maybe the humor in these stories is in the same vein, that the bards could tell these stories and point out the hypocrisies and wildly ridiculous parts of society but always have the out of "well it's just a joke right? Can't you take a joke?" I will 100% admit this isn't my sort of humor, the few times I chuckled it was more about the absurdity of it all rather than the humor, but I am also so far removed from the cultures and societies that produced these stories that I'm not really surprised the humor would be lost on me. I remember when I was reading the Mabinogi and was so appalled at some of the "punishments" characters were given, but after talking to some people who knew more about the stories and the culture they said it was all "more or less standard" and it just felt so far removed from my own ethics. Maybe this humor is the same for me.

I think they were fishing for likes 👍 looking for LOLS and also trolling, just as we seen happens online to this very day. Medieval keyboard warriors are no different and if you didn't laugh at their jokes you'd probably be drawing a sword from a rock in a place that was unbeknownst to anyone with a pen. Peace ✌️