May (poem)

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Cardiff Central Library MS 4.330 [= H26], a 16th-century manuscript of the poem Dafydd Mai.gif
Cardiff Central Library MS 4.330 [= H26], a 16th-century manuscript of the poem

"May", "May Month" or "The Month of May", known in Welsh as "Mis Mai", is a 14th-century Welsh poem in the form of a cywydd [1] by Dafydd ap Gwilym, widely seen as the greatest of the Welsh poets. [2] The poem celebrates May, and specifically May Day, as the beginning of summer, the season in which the poet can make assignations to woo young ladies in the woods, [3] [4] though since the woods of May are only one part of Creation his praise of them also involves praise of God. [5] It was included by Thomas Parry in his Oxford Book of Welsh Verse . [6]

Contents

Date

Dafydd's mention in "May" of "florins of the tree-tops" in connection with " fleur-de-lys riches" has been the basis of an attempt to date the poem. Florins, featuring fleurs-de-lys in their design, were only minted in medieval England between January and August 1344, after which the mintage was discontinued. It was argued by D. Stephen Jones that this showed Dafydd's poem to have been written in or after 1344. Rachel Bromwich pointed out, however, that florins on which fleurs-de-lys figured had been minted in Florence since 1252, and were so widely current across Europe that they have been called "the standard gold coin of the Middle Ages". References to florins in the works of Chaucer and other poets of his time are normally to the Italian coin. She therefore rejected the argument. [7] Dafydd Johnston has since advanced evidence in favour of Jones's theory, citing the line after Dafydd's mention of the florin, "He guarded me secure from treachery", as a possible oblique reference to Luke 4:30: "But he passing through the midst of them, went his way", a verse which was often used as a charm to ward off evil and which was inscribed in Latin on the obverse of the English florin. [4] [8]

Recensions

Three different recensions of the poem exist, represented by Cardiff Central Library MS 4.330 (Hafod 26), a collection of most of Dafydd ap Gwilym's poems (along with some by other poets) made in the Conwy Valley about 1574 by the lexicographer Thomas Wiliems; Bodleian MS Welsh e 1, a collection copied some time between 1612 and 1623 by Ifan Siôn, Huw Machno and one unidentified other, probably for Owen Wynn of Gwydir; and National Library of Wales MS 5274D, an early 17th-century collection. There are not many differences between these three, but one is important: NLW MS 5274D includes two couplets not found in the others. [4] [9] [10]

Poetic technique

"May" displays an impressive command of verse technique. The second line of each rhyming couplet ends with the word Mai, thus maintaining a monorhyme through the entire 52-line poem. [11] This feat is paralleled in only one other poem by Dafydd, "Summer", [12] though the Welsh court poets of a slightly earlier date used monorhyme in their awdlau . [13] The metrical rules of the cywydd form demand that the final -ai syllable of the rhyme-word be unstressed, the consequence of which is that in almost every case this word is a verb in the imperfect tense, giving the poem, according to one critic, "a sense of reflection and longing". [3] Dafydd further restricts his choices by starting each of the first eight lines with the letter D, yet the difficulties he sets himself result in no strain in the expression of his thoughts. [11]

Dafydd makes much use of ambiguity in this poem, both in his vocabulary and in his syntax. One clear example of this is his repeated use of the word mwyn, meaning "gentle", tender", "noble", but also "riches", "wealth", "ore", which he uses to reinforce the money imagery of the poem. [14] [4] Hazel leaves, for example, he describes as "florins of the tree-tops" – one of many usages in his poems of foreign words intended to jolt the reader by their unexpectedness. [15] Dafydd uses this money imagery to present the month of May as a wealthy and generous young lord, [11] whom he describes in terms borrowed from older Welsh praise-poetry addressed to the poets' noble patrons. [3]

Sources and analogues

"May" is a work which exhibits connections with other medieval Celtic poetry. As with Dafydd's poem, Summer is personified as a patron of Nature in an Irish poem, "Cétamon", or "May Day", found in The Boyhood Deeds of Fionn . [16] A Welsh triad believed to have circulated orally tells us of "Three things that gladden a lover: a loyal love-messenger, a faithful sweetheart, and a long day, the woodland dark". Cf. lines 27–28 from "May": "Green is the hillside, joyous the love-messenger, long is the day in the leafy woods of May." [17] In more general ways Dafydd's poem recalls the Maytime carols which, it is known, circulated after Dafydd's time, and which may well have been in existence in his day as well; [18] also the praises of nature in early Welsh gnomic and proverbial englynion . [19]

Connections with other poems by Dafydd

The poem strongly connects the idea of love with all the natural phenomena of summer, as do his cywyddau "Summer", "In Praise of Summer", and "May and January". [20] In the last two of those poems May and Summer are personified – as a strong horseman in "May and January", and as a fair forester in "In Praise of Summer" – just as Dafydd portrays May as a free and generous nobleman in this poem. [21] He delights in describing birds, particularly in evoking their abundance in summer, as in this poem, "May and January", and "The Magpie's Advice". [22] Dafydd uses coins as metaphors not just here but in his "The Owl", "The Star", "A Moonlit Night", and "The Elegy for Madog Benfras". [23] [24]

Editions

Translations and paraphrases

Citations

  1. ↑ Bromwich 1986, p. 76.
  2. ↑ Koch, John T. (2006). Celtic Culture: A Historical Encyclopedia. Volume 5. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO. p. 1770. ISBN   1851094407 . Retrieved 11 June 2024.
  3. 1 2 3 Ford 1999, p. 265.
  4. 1 2 3 4 Johnston 2007.
  5. ↑ Flood, Victoria (2022). "The Supernatural Company in Cultural Translation: Dafydd ap Gwilym and the Roman de la Rose Tradition". In Flood, Victoria; Leitch, Megan G. (eds.). Cultural Translations in Medieval Romance. Studies in Medieval Romance, 24. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer. p. 78. ISBN   9781800104419 . Retrieved 1 February 2025.
  6. ↑ Parry 1962, pp. 58–60.
  7. ↑ Bromwich 1982, pp. 4, 19.
  8. ↑ Bromwich 1982, p. 4.
  9. ↑ Johnston, Dafydd (2007). "The Manuscript Tradition" (PDF). Dafydd ap Gwilym.net. Welsh Department, Swansea University. pp. 22–23. Retrieved 1 February 2025.
  10. ↑ "Rhestr o'r Llawysgrifau". Dafydd ap Gwilym.net (in Welsh). Welsh Department, Swansea University. 2007. Retrieved 1 February 2025.
  11. 1 2 3 Thomas 2013, p. 53.
  12. ↑ Bromwich 1982, p. 18.
  13. ↑ Parry 1962, p. 543.
  14. ↑ Bromwich 1982, pp. 18–19.
  15. ↑ Bromwich 1982, pp. xix, 4.
  16. ↑ Nagy, Joseph Falaky (2016). "Finn's Student Days". In Boyd, Matthieu (ed.). Ollam: Studies in Gaelic and Related Traditions in Honor of Tomás Ó Cathasaigh. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. pp. 237–238. ISBN   9781611478341 . Retrieved 1 February 2025.
  17. ↑ Edwards 1996, p. 155.
  18. ↑ Edwards 1996, pp. 81–82.
  19. ↑ Bromwich 1982, p. 20.
  20. ↑ Fulton, Helen (1989). Dafydd ap Gwilym and the European Context. Cardiff: University of Wales Press. p. 168. ISBN   9780708310304 . Retrieved 1 February 2025.
  21. ↑ Bromwich 1986, pp. 34–35.
  22. ↑ Thomas, Gwyn (2003). Dafydd ap Gwilym: Y Gŵr wrth Gerdd (in Welsh). Aberystwyth: Canolfan Uwchefrydiau Cymreig a Cheltaidd, Prifysgol Cymru. pp. 9–10. ISBN   9780947531171 . Retrieved 2 February 2025.
  23. ↑ Bromwich, Rachel (Spring 1973). "Influences upon Dafydd ap Gwilym's Poetry". Poetry Wales. 8 (4): 46. Retrieved 2 February 2025.
  24. ↑ Bromwich 1986, p. 83.

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References

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