Llyfr Aneirin (The Book of Aneirin)

Synonyms: Cardiff 1/Cardiff MS 2.81
Cym: The Book of Aneirin

The Llyfr Aneirin or the 'Book of Aneirin' is one of the most discussed collections of poetry in the Welsh language. It is one of the oldest of the extant Welsh manuscripts and the current version was penned around 1255–1265 (with the latter date being the most agreed today). This makes it the second oldest of the early Welsh manuscripts of prose and poetry (only the Black Book of Carmarthen is fractionally older).

The volume contains a long, elegaic poem which is described as E Gododdin ai Dri Gwarchan (The Gododdin and its Three [Other] Songs) by Neirin (whom Nennius, in his Historia Brittonum named as Aneirin one of the earliest of the great bards [it should be noted that many words in Welsh beginning with 'n' develop a prosthetic 'a').

The manuscript itself measures 17 x 7.5 cm with a total of 42 folio leaves, 38 of which bear the manuscript itself. The manuscript is written by two hands and at least 3 folio leaves are missing. It seems that the manuscript was re-bound in black calf leather later in the middle ages. The writers of the text are known as 'A' and 'B'. Scribe A wrote the majority of the Gododdin (and the Gwarchanau), but scribe B seems to have come across an older version of the poem and made his copy where scribe A left off (pages 31 to 38 [and the missing folios]). Scribe A is writing in Classical Medieval Orthography of the 13th century. However, scribe B is using a much earlier orghography and indicates that he was copying a manuscript that dates before 1100 (the language used dates to the centuries between 800 and 1100). Images of the manuscript can be found at Llyfr Aneirin at Gathering the Jewels.

The manuscript currently resides in the Cardiff Central Library under the catalogue number of Cardiff MS 2.81. Its early history is somewhat mysterious. Fairly obviously it was copied in Wales from two earlier manuscripts that derived, in one way or another, from the Old North. Marginal notes tell us that the mauscript was in the possession of the bards Dafydd Nanmor (c 1450–1480) or Gwynedd and Gwilym Tew (c 1460–1480) from Morgannwg as both state they owned it. Somehow, the MSS found its way to the Hengwrt library and Edward Lhuyd refers to it in the 17th century. Thence it makes its way to South Wales. First to Aberdare and then into the posession of Theophilus Jones (1759–1812) then to the collection of the Reverend Thomas Price, Carnhunawc before finally coming into the collection of Sir Thomas Philips. From whose collection, in 1896 the volume came to the Cardiff Free Library where it was catalogued as Cardiff 1.

Of course, the most famous poem in the volume is that of Y Gododdin (The Gododdin), found in two forms. The poem itself commemorates the exploits of a war band from the realms of the Gododdin tribe (from the region of Edinburgh) who were chosen to fight at the strategic site of Catraeth (Catterick in Yorkshire) and who fell disastrously during this engagement. Current scholarship puts the battle at some point between 595 and 603 CE. There is little doubt that this represents the historical period of Nennius' 'Neirin'.

One of the debates as to whether the British language, Brythonic had evolved into something like an early form of Welsh by this period. Some of the language in the poem (especially the version of scribe 'B') is undoubtedly archaic and some of the rhymes do date back before the 850s, before the poems were first written down. Modern consensus is that the poems do date back to the seventh century and were probably the produce of a poet called 'Neirin'. For centuries the poems were transmitted orally and only subsequently were they written down. This gave two variant but related versions of the poem that were then copied into the volume we now know as the Llyfr Aneirin

Three poems are interleaved in the Gododdin that do not belong to the original text and these three occur in the hands of both scribe A and scribe B thus they must have been in the earlier manuscript. The language is older than the main part of the Gododdin and it's suggested they date to about 850 and were added to an earlier version of the poem by an unknown scribe. It should also be noted that the prologue to the Gododdin probably was not written by Aneirin, but it is now accepted as part of the poem.


Cymraeg Canol	Cymraeg Cyfoes	English
Hand 'A'
E Gododin	Y Gododdin	The Gododdin
Gwarchan Tudfwlch	Gwarchan Tudfwlch	Tudfwlch's Poem
Gwarchan Adebon	Gwarchan Adebon	Adebon's Poem
Gwarchan Cynfelyn	Gwarchan Cynfelyn	Cynfelyn's Poem
Gwarchan Malderew	Gwarchan Maldderew	Maldderew's Poem
Hand 'B'
E Gododin	Y Gododdin	The Gododdin
Poems Interpolated in the Text
Dyfnwal Frych	Dyfnwal Frych	Dyfnwal Frych
Peis Dinogad	Pais Dinogad	Dinogad's Shift
Englyn Kyni	Englyn Cyny	Cyny's Englyn

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