#brb going through the Triads closely to find all the bits Lloyd Alexander lifted

[verecunda]

When research meets fandom (so much fandom)

For my next WIP, I’ve been researching the archaeology and early history of southeast Scotland, particularly Lothian. Then I got distracted by reading bits of Aneirin and other early medieval literature relating to the area (slightly later than my period, but tangents will tangent >.>). Which is why I found myself reading the old Arthurian poem Pa Gur?, which mentions Arthur and co. in Eidyn (Edinburgh or thereabouts), fighting an enemy called the “dog-heads”, which have been interpreted as werewolf-like monsters.

My first thought: dog- or wolf-headed monster men in Eidyn? Did they ever roam as far afield as Cramond at all? Because this is putting me very strongly in mind of that bit in Rosemary Sutcliff’s The Shining Company, where the protagonists camp out in the ruins of the old Roman fort at Cramond:

[Castellum] had an unchancy reputation, for it was said that it had been garrisoned, not by Red Crests, but by men who called themselves Frontier Wolves and had some sort of kinship with the four-footed kind, and whose ghosts still came back in wolf shape to run through the ruins at full moon.

Even better, though, the leader of these dog-heads is named as Gwrgi Garwlwyd. Gwrgi...... OH MY GOD, IT’S GURGI. The weird hairy anthropomorphic thing from the Prydain books, it’s Gurgi!!! So that’s where he came from! :DD

I already knew that Lloyd Alexander drew a lot on the Mabinogion for the Prydain series, but now I’m finding there’s actually a lot of detail from more obscure corners of Arthurian mythology. Pa Gur actually has a reference to Cei fighting a giant cat on the island of Anglesey (Latin name: Mona). Llyan!!

Further reading also reveals that, according to the Welsh Triads, the giant cat was birthed by Henwen the otherworldly pig, who was kept by Coll son of Collfrewy, swineherd to Dallben... I AM LOSING MY MIND.

Now I'm feeling it’s high time to read those books again. :D