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A Medieval Welsh Dominican Treatise on Mysticism
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2024
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The aim of this paper is to draw to the attention of readers not conversant with Welsh the significance and importance of a work little known at present outside Wales but deserving of a far wider readership. This is the anonymous medieval Welsh prose treatise on mysticism called Ymborth yr Enaid (Sustenance of the Soul), the third and sole surviving book of a larger work called Cysegrlan Fuchedd (Holy Living). Ymborth yr Enaid has several claims to distinction. First, it is the only example of a medieval Welsh treatise on mysticism, and for that reason, as well as its intrinsic merits, it is important in the context of medieval vernacular mystical writings. Second, it is the work of a man who was not only a considerable theologian and philosopher but also a very gifted artist. Third, the work represents a unique fusion of native Welsh bardic learning and mainstream scholastic theology, a fact which is not only remarkable in itself but also, in this case, far-reaching in its implications for the Welsh prose literature of the period generally, both religious and secular, not least with regard to such fundamental questions as the dating, provenance, and authorship of much of it. Ymborth yr Enaid is a work rich in variety and pregnant with significance.
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- Copyright © 1997 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
References
1 This is a greatly shortened version of Daniel, R. lestyn, A Medieval Welsh Mystical Treatise (Research Paper No. 9 of the University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh and Celtic Studies; Aberystwyth, 1997).Google Scholar
2 For an edition of the treatise, see idem, Ymborth yr Enaid (Caerdydd, 1995)Google Scholar.
3 His words are “a certain member of the order of Friars Preachers’.
4 See further A Medieval Welsh Mystical Treatise, p. 4.
5 Ibid., p. 6.
6 Davies, Oliver, Celtic Christianity in Early Medieval Wales: The Origins of the Welsh Spiritual Tradition (Cardiff, 1996), pp. 177‐8Google Scholar, n14. Davies further says: “Had he been a Master, he would undoubtedly not have returned to Wales but would have exercised a teaching role at a major Dominican centre such as Oxford or Paris.’
7 See Andrews, Rhian M. et al. (eds.), Gwaith Bleddyn Fardd ac Eraill (Caerdydd, 1996), pp. 347‐92Google Scholar.
8 See Daniel, R. lestyn, ‘Golwg Newydd ar Ryddiaith Grefyddol Cymraeg CanoL’, Lien Cymru, XV, rhifyn 3 a 4 (1987‐8), 213‐37Google Scholar; Ymborth yr Enaid, pp. xxii‐xxxiv.
9 Idem, “Awduriaeth y Gramadeg a Briodolir i Einion Offeiriad a Dafydd Ddu Hiraddug’ in Williams, J.E. Caerwyn (ed.), Ysgrifau Beimiadol XIII (Dinbych, 1985), pp. 178‐208Google Scholar.
10 Rachel Bromwich, Medieval Welsh Literature to c. 1400: A Personal Guide to the University of Wales Press Publications (Cardiff, 1996), p. 15. Referring to the different version of the Grammar, Dr. Bromwich maintains: “All derive from a common original of the thirteenth century believed to have been composed by a poet who may also have been a cleric’
11 Cnepyn is the diminutive form of cnap“knap, piece’ and used of a person signifies someone of small physical stature; Gwerthynion is the name of an ancient commote in what is now Radnorshire.
12 See Costigan, N.G. (Bosco) et al. (eds.), Gwaith Gruffudd ap Dafydd ap Tudur, Gwilym Ddu o Arfon, Trahaearn Brydydd Mawr ac lorwerth Beli (Aberystwyth, 1995), p. 61Google Scholar. 25‐6. The Welsh is Ladin gyfiawn which could also be interpreted ’ [like] measured Latin’.
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18 Roberts, Gwassanaeth Meir, p. xxxi.
19 Ymborthyr Enaid, p. lvii.
20 Idris Foster, “The Book of the Anchorite’, Proceedings of the British Academy, XXXVI (1950), 208‐9, Ymborth yr Enaid, pp. Iviii‐ix.
21 Davies, Celtic Christianity, p. 127.
22 Ymborth yr Enaid, p. lx.
23 Ibid., p. Ixi.
24 This view was confirmed for me by the distinguished Dominican historian Simon Tugwell O.P. in a letter dated 6 October 1990: ‘I am unaware of any Dominican vernacular works as early as the 2nd quarter of the thirteenth century. Recent scholarship has certainly identified some German vernacular works earlier than had been thought but, so far as 1 know, they are still only late 13th century.’
25 Ymborth yr Enaid, p. lix.
26 See Williams, Glanmor, The Welsh Church from Conquest to Reformation (Cardiff, 1962)Google Scholar, passim.
27 Ymborth yr Enaid, pp. lxii‐xiv.
28 The earliest extant constitutions of the Dominicans belong to the year 1228, the text of which was edited by Denifle, H., “Die Constitutionen des Predigerordens von Jahr 1228’, Archiffiir Lilleratur‐ und Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters, 1 (1885), 165‐227Google Scholar.
29 Ymborth yr Enaid, p. lxiv. The titles of the works are Expositio super Constitutiones Fratrum Praedicalorum corresponding to the prima distinctio, and De Officialibus Ordinis Praedicatorum corresponding to the secunda distinctio. Texts in Berthier, J.J. (ed), Humbert de Romans: Opera de Vita Regulari (2 vols., Romae, 1889), 11, pp. 1‐178Google Scholar and 179‐371 respectively.
30 Davies, Celtic Christianity, p. 121.
31 In his review of Ymborth yr Enaid in New Blackfriars, LXXVII (1996), 474‐5.
32 De Trinitate VIII, x Cquaedam vita duo aliqua copulans, vel copulare appetens’).
33 Davies, Celtic Christianity, p. 125.
34 E.g. Contra Adversarium Legis et Prophetairum I, 5.
35 Davies, W.T. Pennar, Rhwng Chwedl a Chredo (Caerdydd, 1966), p. 117Google Scholar.
36 Quoted in Foster, ‘The Book of the Anchorite’, 210.
37 Ibid., 209‐10; Ymborth yr Enaid, pp. xlvii‐viii. For the text, see Vogtlin, A. (ed), Vila Beatae Virginis Mariae et Salvatoris Rhythmica (Tubingen, 1888)Google Scholar, the section from pp. 108.3124‐116.3351.
38 On what follows, see also Ymborth yr Enaid, pp. Ivi‐vii.
39 Forshaw, HP. (ed.), Speculum Religiosorum and Speculum Ecclesia (London, 1973)Google Scholar.
40 Legge, M.D., Anglo‐Norman in the Cloisters (Edinburgh, 1950), p. 96Google Scholar.
41 For a brief but useful account of the Merure, see Pantin, W.A., The English Church in the Fourteenth Century (Cambridge, 1955), 222‐3Google Scholar.
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43 Idem, ’“On Divine Love” from The Food of the Soul: A Celtic Mystical Paradigm?’, Mystics Quarterly, XX, no. 3 (1994), 92‐3; idem, Celtic Christianity, p 91.
44 On this Christianization, see further Costigan, N.R. (Bosco), “Awen y Cynfeirdd Gogynfeirdd’ in Owen, M.E. & Roberts, B.F. (eds.), Beirdda Thywysogion (Caerdydd, 1996), pp. 14‐38Google Scholar.
45 Davies, Celtic Christianity, p. 116.
46 Ibid., p. 141.
47 I am grateful to Oliver Davies for drawing my attention to this point in conversations.
48 Williams, J.E. Caerwyn, The Irish Literary Tradition (translated by Ford, P.K.; Cardiff and Massachusetts, 1992), pp. 161‐3Google Scholar.
49 See, e.g., Daniel, R. Iestyn, Rhaglith i Awdl gan Sypyn Cyfeiliog: Dogfen Hanesyddol?, Dwned, I (1995), 63‐5Google Scholar.
50 In the case of Ireland, it is known that pupils were assigned their tasks at night‐time to be completed after a day's work by the following night, Williams, The Irish Literary Tradition, pp. 161‐2.
51 Gerard Sitwell O.S.B. from a letter dated 1967 to Mrs. CM. Daniel, Bangor.
52 Lewis, Saunders, “Pwyll y Pader o Ddull Hu Sant’, Bulletin of the Board of Celtic Studies, II, part 4 (1925), 288Google Scholar.
53 Davies, Celtic Christianity, p. 127.
54 Loc. cit.
55 Ibid., pp. 137‐9.
56 Ibid., p. 140.
57 Ibid., pp. 136,140.
58 See A Medieval Welsh Mystical Treatise, pp. 25‐7.
59 Ibid., pp. 27‐31.
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