Afallach is a man's name found in several medieval Welsh genealogies, where he is made the son of Beli Mawr. According to a medieval Welsh triad, Afallach was the father of the goddess Modron. The Welsh redactions of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, Brut y Brenhinedd, associate him with Ynys Afallach, which is substituted as the Welsh name for Geoffrey's Insula Avalonsis, but this is fanciful medieval etymology and it is more likely his name derives from the Welsh word afall "apple tree" ; from which, granted, the name of Avalon is also often thought to derive, so that the meaning of "Afallach" is associated but not necessarily directly. In the tale of Urien and Modron he is referred to by his daughter as the King of Annwn, therefore he may originally been cognate with Arawn or Gwyn or perhaps all three were once regional variants of the same Deity.
Dinas Emrys is a rocky and wooded hillock near Beddgelert in Gwynedd, north-west Wales. Rising some 76 m (250 ft) above the floor of the Glaslyn river valley, it overlooks the southern end of Llyn Dinas in Snowdonia.
The Trinovantēs or Trinobantes were one of the Celtic tribes of Pre-Roman Britain. Their territory was on the north side of the Thames estuary in current Essex, Hertfordshire and Suffolk, and included lands now located in Greater London. They were bordered to the north by the Iceni, and to the west by the Catuvellauni. Their name possibly derives from the Celtic intensive prefix "tri-" and a second element which was either "nowio" – new, so meaning "very new" in the sense of "newcomers", but possibly with an applied sense of vigor or liveliness ultimately meaning "the very vigorous people". Their capital was Camulodunum, one proposed site of the legendary Camelot.
Lud, according to Geoffrey of Monmouth's pseudohistorical History of the Kings of Britain and related medieval texts, was a king of Britain in pre-Roman times who founded London and was buried at Ludgate. He was the eldest son of Geoffrey's King Heli, and succeeded his father to the throne. He was succeeded, in turn, by his brother Cassibelanus. Lud may be connected with the Welsh mythological figure Lludd Llaw Eraint, earlier Nudd Llaw Eraint, cognate with the Irish Nuada Airgetlám, a king of the Tuatha Dé Danann, and the Brittonic god Nodens. However, he was a separate figure in Welsh tradition and is usually treated as such.
The Catuvellauni were a Celtic tribe or state of southeastern Britain before the Roman conquest, attested by inscriptions into the 4th century.
Cunedda ap Edern, also called Cunedda Wledig, was an important early Welsh leader, and the progenitor of the Royal dynasty of Gwynedd, one of the very oldest of Western Europe.
Cunobeline or Cunobelin, also known by his name's Latin form Cunobelinus, was a king in pre-Roman Britain from about AD 9 to about AD 40. He is mentioned in passing by the classical historians Suetonius and Dio Cassius, and many coins bearing his inscription have been found. He controlled a substantial portion of south-eastern Britain, including the territories of the Catuvellauni and the Trinovantes, and is called "King of the Britons" by Suetonius. Cunobeline may have been a client king of Rome, based on the images and legends appearing on his coins. Cunobeline appears in British legend as Cynfelyn (Welsh), Kymbelinus or Cymbeline, as in the play by William Shakespeare.
Tasciovanus was a historical king of the Catuvellauni tribe before the Roman conquest of Britain.
Cassivellaunus was a historical British military leader who led the defence against Julius Caesar's second expedition to Britain in 54 BC. He led an alliance of tribes against Roman forces, but eventually surrendered after his location was revealed to Julius Caesar by defeated Britons.
Historia regum Britanniae, originally called De gestis Britonum, is a pseudohistorical account of British history, written around 1136 by Geoffrey of Monmouth. It chronicles the lives of the kings of the Britons over the course of two thousand years, beginning with the Trojans founding the British nation and continuing until the Anglo-Saxons assumed control of much of Britain around the 7th century. It is one of the central pieces of the Matter of Britain.
Eudaf Hen is a figure of Welsh tradition. He is remembered as a King of the Britons and the father of Elen Luyddog and Conan Meriadoc in sources such as the Welsh prose tale The Dream of Macsen Wledig and Geoffrey of Monmouth's Latin chronicle Historia Regum Britanniae. He also figures into Welsh genealogies. Geoffrey of Monmouth calls him Octavius, a corruption and faux-Latinization of Old Welsh/Breton Outham. According to the medieval Welsh genealogy from Mostyn MS. 117, Eudaf was a direct ancestor of King Arthur.
Welsh mythology consists of both folk traditions developed in Wales, and traditions developed by the Celtic Britons elsewhere before the end of the first millennium. As in most of the predominantly oral societies Celtic mythology and history were recorded orally by specialists such as druids. This oral record has been lost or altered as a result of outside contact and invasion over the years. Much of this altered mythology and history is preserved in medieval Welsh manuscripts, which include the Red Book of Hergest, the White Book of Rhydderch, the Book of Aneirin and the Book of Taliesin. Other works connected to Welsh mythology include the ninth-century Latin historical compilation Historia Brittonum and Geoffrey of Monmouth's twelfth-century Latin chronicle Historia Regum Britanniae, as well as later folklore, such as the materials collected in The Welsh Fairy Book by William Jenkyn Thomas (1908).
Conan Meriadoc is a legendary British Celtic leader credited with founding Brittany. Versions of his story circulated in both Brittany and Great Britain from at least the early 12th century, and supplanted earlier legends of Brittany's foundation. His story is known in two major versions, which appear in the Welsh text known as The Dream of Macsen Wledig, and in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae. Both texts associate him with Magnus Maximus, a Roman usurper against the Valentinianic dynasty who was widely regarded as having deprived Britain of its defences when he took its legions to claim the imperial throne. Conan's cousin or sister, Saint Elen, is said to have been Macsen Wledic's wife.
The Turoni or Turones were a Gallic tribe of dwelling in the later Touraine region during the Iron Age and the Roman period.
Catigern is a figure of Welsh tradition, said to be a son of Vortigern, the tyrannical King of the Britons, and the brother of Vortimer. A figure of this name also appears in the Welsh genealogies, though he is given different parentage. Catigern is nearly exclusively known for a tradition in which he fell in battle with the Saxons.
Mandubracius or Mandubratius was a king of the Trinovantes of south-eastern Britain in the 1st century BC.
Llefelys is a character in Welsh mythology appearing in the medieval Welsh tale Cyfranc Lludd a Llefelys. In the tale, Llefelys is king of Gaul while his brother Lludd is king of Britain. The tale appears in the Red Book of Hergest and the White Book of Rhydderch, the source texts for the Mabinogion, and embedded into various versions of the Brut y Brenhinedd, the Welsh adaptation of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae.
Brut y Brenhinedd is a collection of variant Middle Welsh versions of Geoffrey of Monmouth's Latin Historia Regum Britanniae. About 60 versions survive, with the earliest dating to the mid-13th century. Adaptations of Geoffrey's Historia were extremely popular throughout Western Europe during the Middle Ages, but the Brut proved especially influential in medieval Wales, where it was largely regarded as an accurate account of the early history of the Celtic Britons.
Lludd and Llefelys is a Middle Welsh prose tale written down in the 12th or 13th century; it was included in the Mabinogion by Lady Charlotte Guest in the 19th century. It tells of the Welsh hero Lludd Llaw Eraint, best known as King Lud son of Heli in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia Regum Britanniae, and his brother Llefelys.
A number of medieval chronicles of the history of Wales survive, notably the 9th century Historia Brittonum and the 10th century Annales Cambriae. These early chronicles are written in Latin, while from the 12th century, some are composed in Middle Welsh. The oldest surviving manuscripts of chronicles kept in the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth date to the 13th century.
