PERYF ap CEDIFOR WYDDEL (fl. 1170), poet

He was one of eight brothers at least, seven of whom were foster-brothers of Hywel ab Owain Gwynedd. When Hywel was slain at Pentraeth, Anglesey (1170), in battle against his half-brothers, Dafydd and Rhodri, the sons of Christina, the seven stood by him. Some of them were also slain, and three only of them escaped injury. Ithel, the other brother, had already been killed at Rhuddlan, at an earlier date, while fighting for Owain Gwynedd, and a series of englynion lamenting his death had been composed by Cynddelw (The Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales , 174a).

On p. 346 of The Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales we find a series of elegiac englynion by Peryf to Hywel, and in the Hendreg. MS. 126a, and in The Myvyrian Archaiology of Wales , 281b, there is an anonymous series, which are clearly the work of one of the seven foster-brothers. There is every reason for accepting the opinion expressed by Thomas Price (Hanes Cymru, 584-7) and by Thomas Stephens (Literature of the Kymry, 39-41) that these very fine englynion were also composed by Peryf.

Author

• David Myrddin Lloyd, (1909 - 1981)

Published date: 1959

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