Annwn or Annwfn (Middle Welsh Annwvn, Annwyn, Annwyfn or Annwfyn) was the Otherworld in Welsh mythology. Ruled by Arawn, or much later by Gwyn ap Nudd, it was essentially a world of delights and eternal youth where disease is absent and food is ever-abundant. It later became Christianised and identified with the land of souls that had departed this world. In modern Breton, "Anaon" is synonymous with paradise rather than hell and the phrase "mont da Anaon", literally "to go to Anaon", is a euphemism for "to die".^[1].

Name and etymology[link]

Middle Welsh sources suggest that the term was recognised as meaning "very deep" in medieval times.^[2] The appearance of a form antumnos on an ancient Gaulish curse tablet, however, suggests that the original term may have been *ande-dubnos (*andubnos in British), a common Gallo-Brittonic word that literally meant "underworld".^[3] The pronunciation of Modern Welsh Annwn is [ˈanːʊn].

Mythical locations[link]

In both Welsh and Irish mythologies, the Otherworld was believed to be located either on an island or underneath the earth. In the First Branch of the Mabinogi, it is implied that Annwn is a land within Dyfed, while the context of the Arthurian poem Preiddeu Annwfn suggests an island location. Two other otherworldly feasts that occur in the Second Branch of the Mabinogi are located in Harlech in northwest Wales and on the island of Grassholm in southwestern Pembrokeshire.

Appearances in Welsh literature[link]

Annwn plays a reasonably prominent role in the Four Branches of the Mabinogi, four interlinked mythological tales dating from the early medieval period. In the First Branch of the Mabinogi, entitled Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed, the eponymous prince offends Arawn, ruler of Annwn, by baiting his hunting hounds on a stag that Arawn's dogs had brought down. In recompense he exchanges places with Arawn for a year and defeats Arawn's enemy Hafgan, while Arawn rules in his stead in Dyfed. During this year, Pwyll abstains from sleeping with Arawn's wife earning himself gratitude and eternal friendship from Arawn. On his return, Pwyll becomes known by the title Penn Annwn, "Head (or Ruler) of Annwn." In the Fourth Branch, Arawn is mentioned but does not appear; it is revealed that he sent a gift of otherworldly pigs as a gift to Pwyll's son and successor, Pryderi, which ultimately leads to war between Dyfed and Gwynedd.

The similarly mythological epic poem Cad Goddeu describes a battle between Gwynedd and the forces of Annwn, lead again by Arawn. It is revealed that Amaethon, nephew to Math, king of Gwynedd, stole a bitch, a lapwing and a roebuck from the Otherworld, leading to a war between the two peoples. The denizens of Annwn are depicted as bizarre and hellish creatures; these include a "wide-mawed" beast with a hundred heads and bearing a host beneath the root of its tongue and another under its neck, a hundred-clawed black-groined toad, and a "mottled ridged serpent, with a thousand souls, by their sins, tortured in the holds of its flesh"^[4]. Gwydion, the Venedotian hero and magician successfully defeats Arawn's army; first by enchanting the trees to rise up and fight, and secondly by guessing the name of the enemy hero Bran, thus winning the battle.

Preiddeu Annwfn, an early medieval poem found in the Book of Taliesin describes a voyage led by King Arthur to the numerous otherworldy kingdoms within Annwn, either to rescue the prisoner Gweir, or to retrieve the cauldron of the Head of Annwn. The narrator of the poem is possibly intended to be Taliesin himself. One line can be interpreted as implying that he received his gift of poetry or speech from a magic cauldron, as Taliesin does in other texts, and Taliesin's name is connected to a similar story in another work.^[5] The speaker relates how he journeyed with Arthur and three boatloads of men into Annwfn, but only seven returned. Annwfn is apparently referred to by several names, including "Mound Fortress," "Four-Peaked Fortress," and "Glass Fortress", though it is possible the poet intended these to be distinct places. Within the Mound Fort's walls Gweir, one of the "Three Exalted Prisoners of Britain" known from the Welsh Triads,^[6] is imprisoned in chains. The narrator then describes the cauldron of the Chief of Annwn; it is finished with pearl and will not boil a coward's food. Whatever tragedy ultimately killed all but seven of them is not clearly explained. The poem continues with an excoriation of "little men" and monks, who lack in various forms of knowledge possessed by the poet.

Over time, the role of king of Annwn was transferred to Gwyn ap Nudd, a hunter and psychopomp, who may have been the Welsh personification of winter.^[7] The Christian Vita Collen tells of Saint Collen vanquishing Gwyn and his otherworldly court from Glastonbury Tor with the use of holy water. In Culhwch and Olwen, an early Welsh Arthurian tale, it is said God gave Gwyn ap Nudd control over the demons lest "this world be destroyed." Tradition revolves around Gwyn leading his spectral rouds, the Cwn Annwn ("Hounds of Annwn") on his hunt for mortal souls.

Annwn in cinema[link]

In 2005 John Fawcett directed the film The Dark. Based on the novel book Sheep written by Simon Maginn, the movie tales the story of Adèlle, a divorced woman who travels to Wales together with her daughter Sarah to meet her ex husband, James. When Sarah disappears in a reef a little girl called Ebrill, missed 50 years ago, is found in the waters little time after. Looking for her daughter, a man called Dafydd tells Adèlle the story of Rowan Hywell alias "The Shepherd", Ebrill's father who created a sect in the town of Stumblehead after Ebrill's death to commit mass suicide in order to recover Ebrill from Annwyn, the Welsh Otherworld. The Shepherd finally recovered Ebrill, but believing that the girl suffered demonic possession by the dark, he tried exorcize her by means of the trepanation, dying again and being took to the waters to return her Annwyn by a young Dafydd. Understanding that Ebrill abducted Sarah into Annwyn to live again, Adèlle takes Ebrill to enter both in Annwyn looking for meet Sarah and save her.

See also[link]

• Avalon
• Other World
• Cŵn Annwn

References[link]

• Lambert, Pierre-Yves. (2003). La langue gauloise: description linguistique, commentaire d’inscriptions choisies. Paris: Errance. 2nd ed.
• Sims-Williams, Patrick. (1990). "Some Celtic otherworld terms". Celtic Language, Celtic Culture: a Festschrift for Eric P. Hamp, ed. Ann T. E. Matonis and Daniel F. Mela, pp. 57–84. Van Nuys, Ca.: Ford & Bailie.
• Davies, Sioned. (2007). The Mabinogion – a new translation. (Oxford World's Classics.)
• Mac Cana, Proinsias. (1983). Celtic Mythology (Library of the World's Myths and Legends). Littlehampton Book Services Ltd.
• Lindahl, C. A. (2000–2002). Medieval Folklore. Oxford: Oxford University Press, Inc.
• Matthews. John. (1996). Sources of the Grail. Edinburgh: Floris Books ISBN 0-86315-233-3.
• Dixon-Kennedy, Mike. (1996). Celtic Myth & Legend. London: Blandford and Cassel Imprint ISBN 0-7137-2571-0.

External links[link]

• "The Dark" in the IMDb