The Mabinogion

‘On the bank of the river he saw a tall tree: from the roots to crown one half was aflame and the other green with leaves.’

Nothing illustrates the strange nature of these Welsh stories better than this vertically halved tree. The combination of fact and fantasy, of myth, history and folklore in The Mabinogion conjures up a magical enchanted world, which is none the less firmly rooted in the forests, hills and valleys of ancient Wales. The eleven stories were composed orally over a span of centuries, before being written down in the thirteenth century. They make up, in their virtuosity and panache, one of the great Welsh epics.