Mabinogi and Other Medieval Welsh Tales

University of California Press, 1977-01-15. Hardcover. Good/Acceptable. University of California Press, 1977. Hard cover, 205 pp. No other printings listed. In good condition with dust jacket in acceptable condition. Orange cloth covered boards with gold lettering on spine. Light bumping to edges and corners of covers. Binding tight. Damp staining to rear paste-down and the bottom corners of about the last 20 pages (does not effect text). Otherwise pages are clean and unmarked. Dust jacket has a 1" tear to the paper over the bottom edge of the back cover and a few other smaller nicks and tears and creasing to edges. Heavy dampstaining to paper over back of cover and rear jacket flap. Light overall scuffing and soiling to jacket as well with a bit of the color scuffed off along edges. Now in an archival quality Brodart cover. NOT Ex-Library. No remainder marks. [From jacket flap] The title Mabinogi refers to the first four stories in this collection of tales from Welsh tradition. They are best known as the "Four Branches of the Mabinogi," and comprise the tales of Pwyll, Branwen, Manawydan, and Math. The remaining stories also spring from the same tree, and together they form a collection that comprises the core of the ancient Welsh mythological cycle. They are also among the best that medieval Celtic literature has to offer. In the first thoroughly revised edition and translation of this world classic since Lady Charlotte Guest's famous Mabinogio went out of print, Mr. Ford has endeavored to present a scholarly document in readable, modem English. Basing his criteria on the latest scholarship in myth, he includes only those stories that have remained unadulterated by the influence of the French Arthurian romances. These are, in addition to the "Four Branches, the tale of "Kulhwch and Olwen," which is rooted in the mythological origins of Arthur, seen here in his role of divine hunter in pursuit of the swine-god; "Lludd and Lleuelis," which reaches beyond itsimmediate Celtic sources into ancient Indo-European ideologies; and the long unavailable "Tale of Taliesin," which offers insights into Celtic concepts of the archetypal poet-seer and the acquisition of Divine Wisdom.