A Philological Look at the Dark Morgian

Last night it was mentioned that Morgian started out good and became progressively more evil. It doesn't seem that parsimonious, though.

 

Part of the issue seems to turn on whether the Mabinogion texts are dated earlier than Chretien and Geoffrey, or whether they are dated later. Based on the Mabinogion and the Bruts, Waller argues that Gwalcmei's (Gawain's) mother Gwyar (a) is his mother not his father, and (b) is best associated with Morgian. In so arguing, Waller cites Sir John Rhys, who

 

suggests that the etymology of the name Gwyar, which seems to mean blood that has been shed, "places the bearer of it on the level of the Irish Morrigu as a war-fury."(5) Miss L. A. Paton in citing this passage says of the name Gwyar, "But, if it belongs to Gwalchmei's mother at all when put beside Geoffrey's words it places its bearer on a nearer level with the war-goddess Ana.(6)"

 

(5) J. Rhys, Studies in the Arthurian Legend (Oxford, 1891), p. 169.

(6) L. A. Paton, Studies in the Fairy Mythology of Arthurian Romance, Radcliffe College Monograph No. 13 (Boston, 1903), p. 140. Miss Paton gives in a note a reference to the pas- sage in which San-Marte refers to Gwyar as Gwalchmei's father.

 

In other words, one can't be sure that Gwyar is Gwalcmei's mother rather than his father, but if Gwyar is his father there is no other tradition that concurs; multiple texts name Gwalcmei's father as Lot/Loth/Llew. On the other hand, if Gwyar is Gwalchmei's mother she is not only his mother but probably most closely associated with Morgian. Ergo the earlier one dates the Mabinogion, the less neatly the progression of "Good Morgian" to "Evil Morgian" appears across the legendarium.[1]

 

Moreover, Loomis notes that a gloss in a fourteenth-century manuscript notes that the goddess Machae is "a scald-crow; or she is the third Morrigan [Morgian]."[2] Based on this, Morgian/Machae is a much older tradition than the textual evidence suggests, especially if redaction is taken into account. The earliest redaction of the Cattle Raid of Cooley dates back to at least the eighth century, according to Loomis. Among the stories associated with this "scald-crow" are vengeance tales in which Morrigan's vengeance is usually caused by unrequited love.[3]

 

Based on the evidence of text and redaction, it is, at the very least, questionable that Morgian was really considered a 'good' character earlier in the legendarium, toward the end of which she was supplanted and vilified by a waxing authorial affinity toward Gwenhwyvar.[4] At most, Morgian is a mixed bag of complex literary and oral traditional manifestations, turning moral shades from the brightest white to the deepest midnight across the legendarium. One idea remains: if we are looking for a pattern in the portrayal of Morgian, we may need to look beyond the reductionist construct of "good earlier, evil later."

 

 

[1]. Waller, Evangelia H. "A Welsh Branch of the Arthur Family-Tree," in Speculum, Vol. 1. No. 3 (July, 1926), 344-346.

[2]. Loomis, Roger. "Morgain La Fee and the Celtic Goddesses," in Speculum,
Vol. 20, No. 2 (Apr., 1945), 192-193.

[3]. Bloody vengeance for unrequited love strikes me as slightly dark; the crow image doesn't help either.

[4]. As long as we're discussing Welsh/Irish/Celtic manifestations of Morgian, I'll just use the Celtic spelling for 'Gwenivere' to keep things in the same linguistic family.