Monstrum Demonstrare
March 8, 2010
“I set myself to sing of the madness of the bard of prophecy, an entertaining tale of Merlin. Guide my pen, Robert, glory of the bishops; for we know that Philosophy has filled you with its holy nectar and made you universally learned, so that you might prove yourself the foremost teacher in the world.
Approve, then, my project, and be ready to be more indulgent to this poet than was that other whom you have just succeeded, attaining an honour well-deserved.
Everything conspired to win that honour for you-your principles, your upright way of life, your birth, your fitness for the place: clergy and people alike supported you. That is why lucky Lincoln is now in the seventh heaven.
Indeed, it might well have been yourself whom I would wish to embrace in a noble poem. But I am not the man for it: no, not even if Orpheus and Camerinus and Macer and Marius and Rabirius of the great voice were all to sing through my mouth and the Muses were my accompanists. But, Sisters, you are used to singing with me; so let us to the song before us. Sound the lyre!
Now, many years and many kings had come and gone. Merlin the Briton was famous throughout the world as king and prophet. He was law-giver to the proud South Welsh, and he foretold the future to their leaders.”
http://www.maryjones.us/ctexts/merlini.html
My favorite subject the wild man. This is a universal myth. In Europe the oldest example we have of the tale is from the Scottish borders, which date from the 6th century. The name merlin is a famous one connected of course with Arthur. This construction is realy based on Geofrey of Monmouth who creates the framework for later legends of Arthur and Merlin in his history of Britian, written sometime around 1136 a.d. Geofrey also wrote a seprate book of prophecies and also a later life of Merlin (featured above) which departs from the Arthur Merlin story and returns the wild man much closer to his early British origins.
Gerald of Wales had not been very happy with Geofrey’s book, claiming it was a tissue of lies written under the influence of demons. Gerald also wrote on the subject of the wild man and clearly had knowledge of the Scottish legend contained in the life of Saint Kentigern the Bishop of Glasgow.
This was not a simple literary despute. One of Geralds works that does not survive or was never written was his decleration to have discovered lost prohecies relating to the wild man. Prophecy of course was a very powerfull political weapon. Robert the Bruce had used the prophicies of Lailoken (the scottish name for Merlin) in his wars with the English to strike fear into the hearts of the English armies bowmen (Largly comprised of Welsh bowmen) and as a means of boosting moral in Scotland, preachers carried the tale to the populace. The dispute between Gerald and Geofrey is in part a battle for control of prophecy. Geofrey’s return to more a more traditional version of the legend a means of maintianing credibility in sections of the population where the older story was well known.
It is an extremly popular legend. After Geofries restructuring of the story, the tradition sprang up that their were two Merlins as a means of explaning the discrepency between the two accounts.
