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The Welsh Pantheon

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Floor mosaic from 3rd-4th century AD in Aquae Sulis (Bath).

I worship the deities of the Welsh Pantheon, and so I am gradually building devotional space and information about them here. I have the closest relationship with Rhiannon -- who I've been devoted to since 2013 -- so I am starting with Her and will add pages for other deities over time.

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It is my honor to share my prayers and prose for Them as well as what I've learned about Them. I hope that perhaps this sharing can help lead other people to share in the joy of relationship with the Gods as well, if they are so-moved, and if it is the right time and path for them.

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Note:

If you can just hear now the scholars shouting "But there is NO EVIDENCE that the figures in Welsh medieval literature were gods! There IS NO Welsh pantheon!" (or if you are such a person), I have the following to counter this over-confident assertion: 
 

  1. Yes, there is evidence. Linguistic evidence is evidence (much to the irritation of archaeologists, who for some reason, mostly seem to discount or downplay it, especially in the Celtic context, aside from Barry Cunliffe). There are several quite clear direct cognates among the names of figures in medieval Welsh literature and poetry with names of known pre-Christian Gaulish and/or Brythonic deities (and the latter are known because of ancient archaeological and philological evidence, and in some cases, also historical). What's more, many of the medieval Welsh literary figures' names are also cognate with figures in Irish mythology who are also said to be gods. How inconvenient this is for those who like to cry "no evidence!" (probably because they happen to not like the very-likely-pagan origins of some of the material).

    For example:
    attested pre-Christian Gaulish/Brythonic deity name > Welsh medieval name that is its direct evolution/cognate (Irish cognate, if applicable)

    1. Maponos > Mabon​

    2. Matrona > Modron

    3. Brigantia > Braint (Irish cognate: Brigid)

    4. Gobannos > Gofannon (Irish cognate: Goibniu)

    5. Loucetios > Lleu (Irish cognate: Lugh)

    6. Nodens > Nudd/Lludd Llaw Eraint [llaw eraint = silver hand] (Irish cognate: Nuada Airget Lam, also meaning "silver hand")

    7. Matunus > Math

    8. Taranis > Taran

    9. Ogmios > Heufydd/Hefaidd Hen (Irish cognate: Oghma)
       

  2. As David Rankin summarises in his chapter in Miranda Green's book The Celtic World: "Brennus [a king of the Gauls] is said to have mocked the anthropomorphic statues of the gods he saw in Delphi" (p. 25), and he also later clarifies "Greek sources knew that it was against Celtic sentiments to make naturalistic likenesses of the gods" (p. 26, emphasis added). Therefore, to insist on the presence of remains such as statues and inscriptions in the archaeological record to prove the existence of any pre-Roman Celtic deity is to ignore the culture of the relevant time period, which shunned the practice of writing about religious matters, found deific statuary distasteful, and whose druids gathered not in shrine buildings but in groves. It is highly likely that this is precisely why there is so little evidence of Brythonic Celtic archaeological remains specifying any deities at all (not just a lack of the deific figures in the Mabinogi & etc, but a lack of much of anything obviously referring to a deity at all, especially anything pre-Roman invasion).
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  3. Even if the above points were not valid (and they are), there is certainly a Welsh pantheon now, seeing as how we are venerating these figures as divine now. Most scholars are coming at this from the point of view of either monotheism or atheism (and usually an atheism informed by monotheist culture and/or upbringing), and they equate religion with monotheism. Both monotheists and atheists do not consider the elevation of spirits or figures to the status of godhood, or the process of apotheosis, as legitimate (except sometimes perhaps for other cultures who aren't western, or for other time periods when people were "ignorant" or "barbarians" -- to do so now is seen as "silly"). But we are polytheists, and we live in the now, and many of us do see this as legitimate; their prejudices be damned. It boils down to a fundamental difference in worldview and in foundational ideas about what divinity is. For a further dive into this, see the "Fairy Bride, Fairy Queen or Goddess?" section on my page for Rhiannon (a similar section is on the page for Gwyn ap Nudd).

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Recommended Sources & Further Learning

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