Episode 30 – You Can’t Fix Stupid – Myths Your Teacher Hated

Episode 30 Show Notes

Source: Welsh Folklore

This week on MYTH, we’re headed to Wales for a little Disney inspiration. You’ll learn that you can’t out magic a witch, that it’s hard to find good help, and that bards can be badasses. Then, in Gods and Monsters, you’ll learn that not all doggos are friendly. This is the Myths Your Teacher Hated podcast, where I tell the stories of cultures from around the world in all of their original, bloody, uncensored glory. Modern tellings of these stories have become dry and dusty, but I’ll be trying to breathe new life into them. This is Episode 30, “You Can’t Fix Stupid”. As always, this episode is not safe for work.
Taliesin (Tally-s-in) the Bard lived in the 6th century AD in what would one day become Wales. His story is known primarily through the Book of Taliesin from the 14th century, which includes some poems which possibly, though not definitely, could be copies of his original work. He also became part of mythic legend, serving as a bard in King Arthur’s court and traveling as a companion of both Bran the Blessed and King Arthur himself. This week’s story focuses on the humble origins of this legendary bard. This is a story that I hadn’t heard until I attended a panel on Mythology in Urban Fantasy at this year’s DragonCon, so I want to thank Nancy Holzner, author of the Deadtown urban fantasy series, for taking the time to give me the information on the Mabinogion (Mab-i-no-gee-an) I needed to dive into this particular tale. A word before we begin. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen Welsh words written out, but they are a tongue-twisting combination of constants that act like vowels. I’m going to do my best to get these names right, but I’m pretty much guaranteed to fuck a few of them up. Sorry in advance.
There once was a boy, whose parents weren’t in the picture for reasons that have been lost to time. This was in the wild period between the fall of the Roman Empire and the beginning of the Middle Ages, so any number of things could have killed them: disease, famine, rampaging beasts, marauding soldiers. Pick your favorite. However it happened, the young boy, named Gwion Bach ap Gwreang (Gwee-on Bach ap Gw-rang), ended up working as a servant in the home of the enchantress Cerridwen (Care-id-when) (although some versions say she was a goddess instead).
Cerridwen and her husband, a giant named Tegid Foel, lived on the shores (or perhaps on an island in the center) of Bala Lake. The couple had three children: a beautiful, clever daughter named Crearwy, an ill-tempered boy named Avagddu, and a truly hideous and stupid son named Morfran. I’m not just being insulting when I say that Morfran was stupid. The boy was dumber than a box of rocks, to the point that his mother feared what would happen to him when he had to go out into the world on his own. It was as true of society then as it is today: you can be ugly or dumb, but not both. Afraid that the nobility, who thought their shit didn’t stink, wouldn’t accept the boy into polite society, she tried spell after spell on the boy, trying to fix either his looks or his brain, but to no avail. He was so cosmically ugly and stupid that not even her impressive magic could do anything about it.
After years of attempts, Cerridwen found a tome of powerful magic known as the Fferyllt. In it, she discovered a potion known as the Potion of Inspiration and Science that could give anyone who drank it all of the wisdom of the world. Once prepared correctly, the first three drops would provide the drinker with magical knowledge, and the rest would become a deadly poison. Of course, nothing that powerful comes easy, and such a potion has to be stirred constantly over the fire for a year and a day. Now, the witch, she’s got shit to do. She can’t spend an entire year stirring a cauldron, especially since it’s just grunt work once the complicated recipe is followed and the magic infused, so she does what any enterprising entrepreneur would do in this situation: she outsourced that shit.
She hired young Gwion Bach to stir the cauldron and a blind man named Morda to tend to the fire beneath it. Each was given very specific instructions to keep the cauldron boiling nonstop for a full year and a day on pain of excruciating torment. Although it sounds like a terrible job, times were hard and a job was a job. At least this job didn’t involve people trying to stick you full of pointy bits of metal. The two men got to work, and Cerridwen went about her business. From time to time, according to the spell book and the positions of the stars and planets, the witch would gather new herbs and plants to add to the potion, or else chant tongue-twisting incantations over the boiling liquid.
Many months passed with the two men staying diligently with the boiling cauldron. They slept in fits and starts, alternating with each other. They ate only what was brought to them by the witch. They didn’t bathe (not because of the job, but because this was the old days and bathing was how you got possessed by the devil, thank you very much). Finally, the end was only days away, and Cerridwen went out to search for the last batch of herbs needed to bring the potion to full potency and ensure that her hideous son would be the cleverest, most intelligent man ever born.
I’m guessing you’ve probably boiled pasta before, and probably you’ve cooked with hot oil. Well, this here magical potion bubbled and spit like a combination of both as it neared completion. If you’ve ever cooked with oil, I can almost guarantee that you’ve been burned at least once by an errant splatter that jumped out of the pan. Sure enough, on a year and a day, before Cerridwen could return with the final ingredients, three boiling hot drops of the potion leapt out of the cauldron and spattered on Gwion Bach’s hand. Some versions of the story say that it was because he was tired and less than attentive after a year of watching the same fucking cauldron, and that’s probably true. Can you blame him? Honestly, it’s kind of amazing that he managed to stir a boiling cauldron for a year without this happening sooner, no matter how attentive he tried to be. He was caught completely by surprise by the shock of pain and he did what any normal person does when they burn their fingers – he stuck them in his mouth to cool.
As soon as the three drops were in his mouth, incredible knowledge and cunning flooded his mind. Although a little dazzled by this sudden burst of intellect, he almost immediately realized that he had just ruined a year of the witch’s work in trying to improve her son and that there was no way she was going to believe it was an accident, even though it totally was. She was a very suspicious woman, which comes with the territory when you wield powerful magic, and his fantastic new brain went into overdrive concocting hundreds of horrible things she could do to the boy to punish him. He definitely couldn’t wait around here for her to get back. She was going to assume he was guilty either way, so he might as well get a head start.
Behind him, he hears a great CRACK. He looks back, startled, to see that the cast iron cauldron has split into two pieces thanks to the caustic poison left behind after the three drops had been consumed. The horrible, steaming, spitting liquid drained across the floor and into a nearby stream, which flowed down, becoming larger, until it eventually became a fairly large stream near the castle of the local king, Gwyddno Garanhir. The horses had been hobbled near the water to drink their fill, and drank the awful poison unknowingly. Every last one of the king’s horses dropped stone dead, and the stream was thereafter known as the Poison of the Horses of Gwyddno.
If anything, that was even more reason for Gwion to get the fuck out of here, post haste. Not sure where else to go, he headed towards his homeland (and maybe to the family that was still there; the story doesn’t say). He knew that the witch would be coming after him soon (which begs the question of why he didn’t try to go somewhere a little less obvious, but maybe he figured her powerful magic would allow her to find him anywhere, so he might as well go somewhere he can get some help). Not long after, Cerridwen comes back to find the broken cauldron sitting next to the blind Morda, who hadn’t left since he hadn’t done anything wrong; he didn’t want her to think him guilty of conspiring with the thief because he fled.
Seeing that a whole year, and a whole lot of magic, had been wasted, she flew into a rage. She grabbed up a stick of wood from the pile that had been stacked there for feeding the fire, and she beat the poor, innocent blind man upside the head. She smashed his face into a bloody pulp, and cracked his eye socket, causing his blind eyeball to pop out of his skull and hang on his cheek, dangling by the nerve. Through screams of pain, he begged the witch to stop. “Don’t hit me, I didn’t do it! It wasn’t me! Why do you think I’m still here?” Some of her rage abated, she stopped beating the man to listen to what he had to say. Through sobs and a mouthful of broken teeth, he told her what had happened, as best he knew. “I should have known. It was Gwion Bach that robbed me. He will pay for this theft with his life.” Not bothering to offer any kind of assistance to the man she had beaten savagely for no good reason, she raced off after the missing servant boy.
Gwion Bach was now supernaturally clever, so he knew better than to hope that he had escaped the angry witch. He kept a lookout for her as he fled, and so he was able to see her approaching his hidden camp site. He asked his newfound knowledge how exactly he was supposed to escape her now when Cerridwen would see him if he tried to run, and to his surprise, the knowledge answered. His brain was flooded with the requirements for shapeshifting at will. Unlike the witch’s incredibly complex intelligence potion, this spell didn’t require anything but the proper state of mind.
He needed to flee a predator, and so naturally, he turned himself into a small gray bunny and raced swiftly through the underbrush. She saw the flash of fur as he raced off, and she grinned toothily. The grin turned into a snarl as she too changed her shape, choosing a greyhound to pursue the fleeing rabbit. In a trice, she flashed off through the forest after Bunny Gwion.
The man turned bunny poured on all of the speed his tiny legs could muster, but the greyhound behind him continued to gain. Up ahead, he could hear flowing water with his sensitive bunny ears, and he knew he would be hemmed in by the river. Shit, he wasn’t going to get away. “Then do something unexpected,” said his magical brain. He thought for a moment, and then he concentrated. His gray fur shimmered and melted as he leapt towards the river and a large salmon splashed neatly into the water and began to race downstream.
Behind Gwion, Cerridwen saw the bunny dive into the water and put on a fresh burst of speed. She too leapt into the water, form flowing and changing as she flew through the air. With barely any splash, a small, lithe otter broke the river’s surface and raced off downstream after the salmon.
As a muscular fish, Gwion was able to make great speed down the river, helping to stay ahead of the pursuing otter. He just might pull this off! His hopes were abruptly dashed, though, as the river gave way to the sea. He no longer had the current to help him, and ahead of him, he could see some very large, very hungry looking fish eyeing him. Fuck. If he kept going, he’d get eaten. If he turned back, the witch would do something worse. He looked around desperately, and had an idea. There was really only one option.
He dove down a few feet, and then surged directly for the water’s surface. The salmon leapt out of the water in a magnificent, glistening splash. At the crest of the jump, the fish shimmered again to be replaced with a sparrow. He winged off desperately away from the otter below. Not to be outdone, Cerridwen also leapt out of the water, fur melting into feathers, and a great hawk soared after the sparrow.
Gwion Bach flew with as much speed as he could muster, but he knew it was no use. When he looked back, he could see the form of the hawk behind and above him, gaining steadily. He knew it was just a matter of time before she got close enough to dive on him, and not much time at that. If she caught him, the initial dive would probably shatter his back, leaving him helpless for whatever horrible torture she had planned for him. Maybe it was time to change tactics. He had magical knowledge, true, but the witch had practical experience. Whatever animal he picked, she always seemed to know a better one.
Below him, Gwion could see the patchwork of cultivated fields. Ahead, he could see a barn filled with winnowed wheat. He dove desperately into the barn and, as soon as the roof blocked his view of the hawk, he changed form yet again. Gwion dropped into the piles of wheat as a single grain. If he’d had a nose, he’d have snorted with laughter. Let’s see that bitch find him now!
Shortly thereafter, the hawk soared into the barn and pulled up short. There was no other door out of here, so Cerridwen knew that the boy had to still be in here. He’d clearly changed forms again. She briefly considered whether he might have turned into a mouse, which meant she should turn into a cat, but looking at all of the grain, she thought that maybe he’d been sneakier than she’d expected. If a hawk’s beak could have smiled, it would have. She closed her eyes and concentrated with her magical senses. With all distractions blocked out, she could feel the residual magic of his transformation coming…from…over there!
The hawk hopped over the pile of grain, shifting one last time into a great chicken. She scratched at the grain on the dirt floor of the barn until she found the wheat grain she wanted. Before Gwion could marshall his thoughts to change forms again, she swallowed him down in one quick gulp. And that was the end of Gwion Bach.
Right about now, you’re probably thinking “Now wait a minute here, asshole. You said at the beginning that this was the story of Taliesin the Bard, and he hasn’t even shown up. What the fuck?” I’m getting there. As I said, that was the end of Gwion Bach, but not the end of this story. Cerridwen flies back home and transforms back into her normal shape. A month goes by and something strange happens. Cerridwen doesn’t have her period. She hadn’t had sex with her husband in a very, very long time (at first because she was busy with the potion and then because she was busy trying to find a new option for fixing her hideous, stupid son), so there was no logical reason for her to be pregnant. She knew she was though, and moreover, she knew that the child was some form of Gwion Bach. Either because of magic or because the people who came up with this story had some very interesting ideas about how the female reproductive system worked, she had somehow gotten pregnant through the mouth (and let that be a warning to you about the dangers of blowjobs from witches, I guess).
Understandably, Cerridwen was furious. She had eaten that little fucker to kill him, not to inseminate herself. I mean, yeah, grain is technically wheat jizz, but biology wasn’t supposed to work like this! No real explanation is given, but I have to assume that this was somehow the doing of Gwion Bach, using his magical knowledge for a supernatural hail mary. Since safe abortions weren’t an option in the sixth century, she resolved to murder the baby as soon as it was born and finally rid herself of that pesky thief once and for all.
She spent the next eight months getting bigger and angrier, and the hormones weren’t helping. By the time she went into labor, she well and truly hated Gwion Bach; she’d only thought she’d been murderous before! At long last, the blessed day came and Cerridwen’s body was racked with pain. She screamed her agony and rage to the heavens as she approached the ring of fire and then, at last, it was over. Time to murder a baby!
She looked down at the infant, still covered in various fluids and general post-birth nastiness, and was shocked to see that the baby boy looked nothing like the homely servant boy she had tried to kill. He…he was beautiful! Not in the way that all mothers think their children are beautiful, but like baby model beautiful. He was the most beautiful child she had ever seen, and she found she just couldn’t make herself bash his head in the way she’d intended. On the other hand, she still hated his ass, and she sure as shit wasn’t about to raise this motherfucker. It was a conundrum. Cerridwen wasn’t a witch for nothing, and so she thought long and hard until she came up with a solution that threaded the needle. In time honored mythological fashion, she would avoid having to take responsibility for killing the baby by letting nature do the dirty work!
Smiling, she got up and went through her house looking for something. She came back with a large leather bag, more than big enough for a baby to fit in. In some versions of the story, it’s a coracle, a small wicker boat popular in Wales. Either way, it’s bad news for the baby. She carried the infant boy down to the beach, put him into the bag, and cast him into the sea and to the mercy of God. The story is very specific that this happened on April 29th. Not sure why that matters, but whatever. It was April 29th as she watched the whatever it was carrying the baby away on the waves.
As you probably already guessed, the boy didn’t drown as he definitely should have. Instead, he floats along the sea until he comes to the weir of Gwyddno Garanhir, ruler of Cantre’r Gwaelod off the coast of Wales (since sunken beneath the sea). The weir, a small fish trap made of stakes, was located on a small strand near the castle, and every May Eve (i.e., April 30th, the last day in April), over a hundred pounds worth of fish (the currency, not the weight), was taken from the weir.
Gwyddno had only a single son named Elphin, and the boy was a mess. To quote Hank Hill “The boy ain’t right.” He was clingy, needy, and clumsy, none of which are useful traits to have in a 6th century prince. His father was constantly upset at the antics of his son, and became convinced that he had been born in an evil hour and would never amount to anything.
Rank hath its privileges (or if you’re a Mel Brooks fan, “it’s good to be the king”), and so Gwyddno went to consult the small council about his issues with his son. “Well, your kingliness, I thought we were called together to discuss all of the important matters of the kingdom, but sure, let’s play Dr. Phil! Your son suffers from a lack of confidence. Have you considered giving him some positive feedback?” “I’ve tried, but how do you praise a constant fuckup? I can’t tell him ‘good job’ if he shits the bed every time!” “Then give him something easy to start with! Build his self esteem up a little, and he’ll move on to bigger things!” “Like what?” “Well, it’s almost May Eve. How about you send him out to collect the fish from the weir? It’s an easy but important job, and accomplishing it will make you both feel good!”
The king thought about it, and decided he liked the idea. So it came to pass that on April 30th, Elphin went down to the weir to collect the fish. One small problem though – there were no fish in the weir. None. Nada. Zip. Zilch. This had never happened before, and Elphin cursed his rotten luck. It wasn’t his fault, but everyone would blame him just the same. As he turned to leave, something caught his eye. Caught on a pole of the weir was a small leather bag. One of the weir wardens shook his head at Elphin. “Ye gods and little fishes, but you’re a curse. I can’t remember a year when this weir didn’t produce a hundred pounds worth of fish, but this year, the first year that it’s your job to collect them, there ain’t shit but this stupid leather bag.”
“Well, go grab the bag, then. Who knows, maybe I’ll suddenly get incredibly lucky, and there will be something in it worth a hundred pounds.” The warden fished the bag out of the water and opened it to see the forehead of a baby. Now, I would expect any normal person opening a bag fished out of the sea to find a baby in it would say something like “Holy fuck, a baby!” Maybe that’s just me, though, because the warden said “What a radiant brow!” Seriously, this was apparently one good-looking baby.
“A radiant brow, huh? Then his name shall be Taliesin!” He didn’t bother to wonder if the kid already had a name, but to be fair, if someone went to the trouble of putting the infant in a bag and throwing it into the ocean alive, they clearly weren’t coming for it. “On the downside, a baby boy is going to cost us money, not bring it in, so I’m still super unlucky. Fuck me.” He climbed up on his horse, still carrying the baby, and walked the horse slowly and gently, rocking the little boy to sleep.
Or so Elphin thought. Instead, imagine his surprise when he heard a tiny voice speaking his name. In a relatively long, complex extemporaneous poem, the infant boy praised Elphin and spoke of glory and honor to come for the young man. I’ll just paraphrase the poem rather than trying to transcribe it.
“Fair Elphin, quit your bitching! Despair does you no good, and besides, God has cool things in mind for you. No one has ever been as lucky at Gwyddno’s weir than you this night. I may be little, but I am mighty and quite talented (as you can plainly tell by the fact that I, a newborn, am spitting rhymes right now. Seriously, stop crying. It’s bumming everyone out. I’m small now, but on the day that you need me, I will be worth more to you than three hundred salmon ever could be. I’ll protect you, big guy.”
Elphin’s luck changed from the moment he met little Taliesin. He adopted the boy and raised him as his own and Taliesin, through his poems and prophecy, became the most famous bard in old Britain. When the Saxons invaded, he was there to provide strength and courage to the Celtic warriors to fight off the deadly horde. He went on to have a lot of adventures, which are stories for another time, but one of his last prophecies is honestly kind of spooky. Roughly translated, he said that Britain would keep their own language but lose their lands, except for Wales. Given the rise and fall of the British Empire, I’d say the plucky little guy was on to something.
If this story feels vaguely familiar, it’s probably because, like me, you’ve seen Disney’s The Sword in the Stone. Specifically, I’m referring to the scene between Madame Mim and Merlin, where they get into a shapeshifting duel. Mim is inspired by Cerridwen, and their duel from her fight with Taliesen (although it certainly doesn’t end with her getting knocked up). I think I mostly like the original version better, although the whole business with Arthur and the lady squirrel is one of my favorite scenes in all of Disney. And with that little squirrel still unlucky in love, it’s time for Gods and Monsters. This is a segment where I get into a little more detail about the personalities and history of one of the gods or monsters from this week’s pantheon that was not discussed in the main story. This week’s monster is the Gwyllgi, the twilight dog.
This monstrous beast, often known as the Dog of Darkness or the Black Hound of Destiny (which both sound like rejected Harry Potter titles for the Prisoner of Azkaban), or sometimes just as the Black Dog, is a Welsh monster that stalks the moonlit roads. The name is likely a combination of the Welsh words for ‘twilight’ and ‘dog’, hence Twilight Dog. It is described as a massive hound or direwolf, solid black in color, with fiery red eyes that glow in the darkness. Most commonly, this particular version of the Black Dog can be found in northeastern Wales, especially around the Nant y Garth pass in Llandegla.
The Twilight Dog is probably related to the British black dog folklore, which is often considered to be a hellhound, although it may also be related to the Cwn Annwn (and for the record, there’s only a single vowel between the two words of that goddamned name). The Cwn Annwn, or the hounds of Annwn, were the spectral hounds that haunted the Otherworld of Welsh mythology and were considered to be part of the Wild Hunt (discussed briefly in the Gods and Monsters segment of Episode 24), and so it shouldn’t surprise you that the Twilight Dog was considered to be a death omen.
According to Welsh folklore, the howling and barking of the dogs could he heard clearest and loudest when they were far away. The closer they got, the quieter they got. Once they went completely silent, and stood before you, your doom was at hand. If you met the gaze of its fiery eyes, you would become instantly paralyzed, making you easy prey. Even if you were informed enough to avoid its devastating gaze, the creature was more than happy to stalk you along the empty, lonely country roads through the darkness until, finally bored of the game, he would pounce on you and rip out your throat.
That’s it for this episode of Myths Your Teacher Hated. Keep up with new episodes on our Facebook page, on iTunes, on Stitcher, on TuneIn, and on Spotify, or you can follow us on Twitter as @HardcoreMyth and on Instagram as Myths Your Teacher Hated Pod. You can also find news and episodes on our website at myths your teacher hated dot com. If you like what you’ve heard, I’d appreciate a review on iTunes. These reviews really help increase the show’s standing and let more people know it exists. If you have any questions, any gods or monsters you’d want to learn about, or any ideas for future stories that you’d like to hear, feel free to drop me a line. I’m trying to pull as much material from as many different cultures as possible, but there are all sorts of stories I’ve never heard, so suggestions are appreciated. The theme music is by Tiny Cheese Puff, whom you can find on fiverr.com.
Next time, there’s something a little spooky in the air, which means it’s time for our annual Halloween episode! We’ll be hearing the supposedly true legend of the Bell Witch from American folklore. You’ll learn that ghosts can be helpful, that Andrew Jackson is super stubborn, and that you should never let the poltergeist find your booze. Then, in Gods and Monsters, you’ll find out why you really don’t want to meet a moth on a lonely stretch of highway in West Virginia. That’s all for now. Thanks for listening.