Mallt-y-Nos

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Mallt-y-Nos ( "Matilda of the Night" , [ maɬt ə noːs ]) is an ugly and vicious old woman from the Celtic mythology of Wales .

Behavior and demeanor

The Mallt-y-Nos rides in the " Wild Hunt " together with Arawn and the Cŵn Annwn , the dogs from the Otherworld . With her cries and screams, she drives the dogs on, which then hunt the lost souls to Annwn . It is also said that she was once a beautiful but godless Norman noblewoman who loved the hunt above all else. Her exclamation: "If there is no hunt in heaven, then I never want to come there!" Was fulfilled, which is why she now screams so mournfully as she rides through the night.

etymology

The Welsh term mallt goes back to the Welsh noun malltod , which means 'curse, disfigurement, rot, decomposition or gust of wind'. Nos is the noun for 'night'. Mallt-y-Nos can thus be translated as 'curse of the night'.

Mallt-y-Nos aka Matilda

Marie Trevelyan tells of two stories. The first is about the earthly Matilda, a Norman noblewoman who came from Gloucester with Fitzhamon to subdue South Wales. Matilda loved the hunt. She became so obsessed with hunting that she once exclaimed, "If there is no hunt in heaven, I never want to go there." When she died, the Welsh god of the Otherworld, Arawn, appeared and took care of her soul. She had been an extremely beautiful woman in her lifetime, but after her death she was turned into a terrible and ugly witch. Matilda was condemned by Arawn to hunt for all eternity.

The second story goes that a young Welsh woman loved hunting but her fiancé thought none of it were ladies. At their wedding, he promised never to hunt again, and she also agreed. However, she missed hunting very much. She longed for it for over a year, but her husband forbade her. When he was absent for a while, she took the opportunity. She rode with a hunting party for a whole day, forcing everyone to be silent about it. Unfortunately, on the way back, she was thrown from her horse and broke her leg. When her husband returned, he knew immediately what had happened and that she had broken her promise not to hunt. He stormed out of the house and interviewed a dyn hysbys ('wise man, wizard'). The two men returned to the castle and uttered curses, which made the young woman rise from the ground into the air and toss her into the wind. When a whirlwind sucked her up, Arawn rescued her, who put her in a wagon to lead Annwn's hunt.

Related figures

The shape of the Mallt-y-Nos is similar to:

See also

literature

  • Sir J Rhys: Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion as Illustrated by Celtic Heathendom . Williams and Northgate, 1892, p. 609.
  • M. Trevelyan: Folk-lore and Folk-stories of Wales ., Pp. 49-50. (Kessinger Publishing, 1973)
  • T. Williams: The Doom of Colyn Dolphyn . Longman, Rees, Orme and Co, 1837, p. 72.
  • W. Sikes: British Goblins: Welsh Folk Lore, Fairy Mythology, Legends and Traditions . Kessinger Publishing, 1880, p. 216.
  • Notes and queries Nº19 . Oxford University Press, 1850, p. 294.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ M. Trevelyan: Folk-lore and Folk-stories of Wales . Kessinger Publishing, 1973, pp. 49-50.