Produced by Jeroen Hellingman and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net/ for Project Gutenberg. (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
HON. LL.D. OF THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH PROFESSOR OF CELTIC PRINCIPAL OF JESUS COLLEGE, OXFORD
Une des légendes les plus répandues en Bretagne est celle d'une prétendue ville d'Is, qui, à une époque inconnue, aurait été engloutie par la mer. On montre, à divers endroits de la côte, l'emplacement de cette cité fabuleuse, et les pécheurs vous en font d'étranges récits. Les jours de tempête, assurent-ils, on voit, dans les creux des vagues, le sommet des flèches de ses églises; les jours de calme, on entend monter de l'abîme le son de ses cloches, modulant l'hymne du jour.--Renan.
More than once in the last chapter was the subject of submersions and cataclysms brought before the reader, and it may be convenient to enumerate here the most remarkable cases, and to add one or two to their number, as well as to dwell at somewhat greater length on some instances which may be said to have found their way into Welsh literature. He has already been told of the outburst of the Glasfryn Lake (p. 367) and Ffynnon Gywer (p. 376), of Llyn Llech Owen (p. 379) and the Crymlyn (p. 191), also of the drowning of Cantre'r Gwaelod (p. 383); not to mention that one of my informants had something to say (p. 219) of the submergence of Caer Arianrhod, a rock now visible only at low water between Celynnog Fawr and Dinas Dinlle, on the coast of Arfon. But, to put it briefly, it is an ancient belief in the Principality that its lakes generally have swallowed up habitations of men, as in the case of Llyn Syfadon (p. 73) and the Pool of Corwrion (p. 57). To these I now proceed to add other instances, to wit those of Bala Lake, Kenfig Pool, Llynclys, and Helig ab Glannog's territory including Traeth Lafan.
Perhaps it is best to begin with historical events, namely those implied in the encroachment of the sea and the sand on the coast of Glamorganshire, from the Mumbles, in Gower, to the mouth of the Ogmore, below Bridgend. It is believed that formerly the shores of Swansea Bay were from three to five miles further out than the present strand, and the oyster dredgers point to that part of the bay which they call the Green Grounds, while trawlers, hovering over these sunken meadows of the Grove Island, declare that they can sometimes see the foundations of the ancient homesteads overwhelmed by a terrific storm which raged some three centuries ago. The old people sometimes talk of an extensive forest called Coed Arian, 'Silver Wood,' stretching from the foreshore of the Mumbles to Kenfig Burrows, and there is a tradition of a long-lost bridle path used by many generations of Mansels, Mowbrays, and Talbots, from Penrice Castle to Margam Abbey. All this is said to be corroborated by the fishing up every now and then in Swansea Bay of stags' antlers, elks' horns, those of the wild ox, and wild boars' tusks, together with the remains of other ancient tenants of the submerged forest. Various references in the registers of Swansea and Aberavon mark successive stages in the advance of the desolation from the latter part of the fifteenth century down. Among others a great sandstorm is mentioned, which overwhelmed the borough of Cynffig or Kenfig, and encroached on the coast generally: the series of catastrophes seems to have culminated in an inundation caused by a terrible tidal wave in the early part of the year 1607 [1].